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“All your transactions are done via email and phone calls…mostly email based on your reaction,” she observed. “You don’t get to converse with the interested buyer and why they want the painting. You won’t discover the motive and the drive, and they won’t know how much each piece meant to you and how much you agonized just to get a piece right. Every painting is personal, especially yours, but you sell them just like that and call it a day.”
“My face,” he blurted out. “They will see. My family…”
“Who said their influence extends to another continent? I know the Hastings are practically unknown there.”
The way he looked at her made it seem like he just figured this out himself and was rather stupefied, so she left him to ponder. Triumph flared at his answer.
“You have a point. I guess it is a good idea to travel to Italy now that my business deals are done, and I have some free time.”
“Good. Great.”
“Come with me.”
“That’s—what?”
A second later, he was in front of her and holding her hands, an earnest expression staring her in the face. She gulped at his nearness, then registered what he was saying again.
“You want me to come to Italy?”
“Yes. I’m selling your painting, too. You should have a say on the buyer.”
“It’s not my piece,” she argued. She tried to tug when his thumbs ran circles over her knuckles, but he was relentless. “It’s yours to take and do as you want.”
“You are the artist, too. You matter.”
“My work,” she said weakly. “My son.”
“We will schedule it around your work. Is there no one to watch over your son for a few days?”
There were a lot willing and able, but a hundred excuses flew in her head, anyway, telling her it wasn’t a good idea and how she shouldn’t even have time for this. But the calling had started its way in her system the moment she had picked up the paintbrush again, and him being so close made it difficult to say no. She stood rigid and with determination.
“I shouldn’t—”
“Please, Alexa. I need you there. I need you with me.”
When he said it with that soft pleading and blue eyes boring into hers as if she was the only one that he saw, how was determination supposed to win? Alexa inwardly cursed, still hanging on to her excuses…then, letting them go.
“Fine. I will come with you.”
Chapter 8
Everything from the packing to the plane ride left Edmund with a pit in his stomach that just wouldn’t go away, telling him it wasn’t a good idea to leave things behind: the business, his family, the fights he had been having with them lately. But it was like Alexa’s words had possessed his very being, refusing to let go and change his mind, solidified when she appeared at the airport poised and relaxed in a summer dress that hugged her curves. She smiled when she spotted him, then latched on to his arm and steered him to where they needed to go. Perhaps she sensed his nerves, too, as she leaned her head once they were seated and whispered in his ear.
“I’m nervous.”
He didn’t expect that, and it had him whirling to examine her. True to her words, there was a sense of uncertainty about her that wasn’t present in the airport, signaling she was just good at hiding it. Instinctively, he took her hand and tried to ignore the electric charge that latched onto his skin, not wanting to make a fool of himself and his one-sided reaction.
“Don’t be. I’m here.”
“You don’t want to be,” she pointed out.
“Initially,” he corrected. “But now that I’m here, I’ve decided there’s nothing to be hung up on. The same goes for you. You are with a handsome man on a flight to one of the best places in the world. The next few days might be related to your craft, but you can also treat it as a vacation. I know I will.”
Just like that, calming her down became his method of calming himself down, too, until the ride became inconsequential, and he wasn’t counting down the hours in between sleep and wakefulness. They arrived in the afternoon as planned and took a taxi to their hotel, where he stayed in his room until the sky was orange and was soon barging into her room. She looked down at the view from her window, then glanced at him.
“Let’s go.”
She kept staring. “How sensitive are you to burning?”
