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“Good night, Ms. Moretti.”
Liza fell asleep quickly, and with a smile on her face.
Chapter Nine
Matt glanced over at the sound of Liza’s happy sigh and cursed himself for being a fool. She’d had his dick twisted in a knot since the night of the gala, which was a huge problem since that was the body part he was thinking with these days.
He’d had his head turned by Liza from the first moment he’d seen her, and if he’d been able to keep it in his pants, remembering she was the forbidden fruit, he would have been fine. But he’d taken that taste after the gala, then another on New Year’s, and he’d foolishly convinced himself he could go back for more without any serious repercussions.
Now, as he looked at her profile, her lips slightly upturned as she soaked up the sun, there was no pretending this wasn’t going to end badly. For both of them.
Liza was someone he could easily fall in love with if he allowed it to happen.
In the past, he always drew a line in the sand when it came to lovers, and he’d never stepped a toe over it. Sex was sex and emotion played no part in it.
Last night, he’d attempted to draw that line with Liza, offering her sex without strings. And then…he’d immediately crossed it by inviting her to share his hotel suite with him.
Even now, he couldn’t figure what the hell had provoked him to do such an utterly stupid thing. He’d been laying on top of her, his cock still tucked inside her body, and all he could think was that he needed to grab as much of her as he could, as quickly as he could, because this was going to implode too soon.
“I swear it’s going to take an entire week of this gorgeous sunshine to thaw me out from everything Philadelphia has thrown at us the last few months,” she said, her eyes closed beneath her sunglasses. She was laying on the lounger next to him, the ocean waves rolling along the white sand beach about twenty feet away. A light breeze blew in from the sea, so even though the sun was bright, it wasn’t hot or humid. It was perfect weather.
“It has been a brutal winter.” He reached for the drink the cabana boy had delivered earlier. They’d both ordered mai tais. He typically didn’t go for fruity drinks, but when in Rome…
It had been nearly four a.m. Hawaii time before they’d checked into their suite, and while they’d caught several hours of sleep on the plane, they agreed it would be smart to get a few hours more in order to avoid jet lag.
They woke up around eight, neither of them in a hurry to get out of bed.
Now that they’d opened the floodgates on sex without strings, Matt hadn’t been able to resist caging her beneath him and fucking her like his life depended on it. It had been shortly before ten when they’d managed to drag themselves away from each other. Showering separately—because they agreed a joint shower would ensure they missed lunch as well as breakfast—they’d gone in search of brunch after working up one hell of a hunger.
While eating, they discussed the day’s plan like they were travel companions. That was when Matt should have said “catch you later in bed” and spent the day fortifying his walls. Instead, his dick made the call, so here he was, lying next to her on a lounge chair so they could—as Liza suggested—recuperate from their day of travel by taking it easy.
In addition to attending the wedding, which was taking place in three days, Liza shared the list of touristy things she planned to do over the course of the week, since she’d never been to Hawaii. Matt had traveled to the islands a few times, and he’d even done several of the things on her list. Regardless of that, he’d agreed to accompany her to all of it. He was a sucker, drunk on sex. It was the only explanation he could come up with.
For the first hour on the beach, they both read as they sunbathed, but then Liza had put her book down and started a conversation. For the past three hours, the two of them had talked about every subject under the sun, including politics, movies, music tastes, and favorite Philly haunts. Liza was interesting and a witty storyteller, who spoke not just in words but with her expressions and Italian hand gestures. His father had broken Matt’s habit of speaking with his hands long ago, calling the gestures common, but as he watched Liza animatedly waving her hands around, she was nothing short of adorable.
Matt preferred to play his cards close to his chest, but Liza had a way of asking him simple questions, then drawing out more and more, until he found himself telling her things he’d never told anyone. Not that he’d revealed any big secrets.
Instead, he’d talked about his childhood with Gage and Conor, the games they’d played, how he’d had a stellar tenth birthday party complete with pony rides, and how he’d apparently been quite the little liar in kindergarten, telling his teacher that his grandfather had been run over by a fire truck—he hadn’t—and how his dad had broken both legs after falling off a ladder—also untrue. Matt’s mother used to bring the story up quite often to him, laughing about her confusion when his teacher had called to offer her sympathy over their family’s tragedies.
Liza had roared with laughter, teasing him that she wasn’t surprised in the slightest he’d been a “little shit” when he was young.
That was when it occurred to Matt that he’d done such a good job repressing past memories, that he’d lost the happy ones along with the bad.
Then Liza regaled him for the better part of an hour about her girlfriends’ “bad habit” of falling for her cousins and brothers. Matt always tried to give her family a wide berth, thanks to bad blood and past sins, so most of what she shared was news to him. Gage probably knew all these stories, but by tacit agreement, his brother didn’t share a lot of details about his newfound Moretti friends, and Matt didn’t ask.
While Liza joked about her friends’ new romances, it was clear she was enthralled by the love matches and thrilled that her best friends were either now family or on their way there.
Her brother Elio had married Gianna Duncan, the two becoming parents last September. That was the relationship that felt normal to him.
Because her brother Aldo and cousin Tony were both currently in committed threesomes, something Matt struggled to wrap his head around. Of course, that was probably because he’d spent the better part of his life resisting the idea of shacking up with one person. Spending the rest of his life with two partners? No thanks.
Liza pulled off her sunglasses and rolled to her stomach.
“Did you put sunscreen on your back?”
She lifted her head, shaking it slightly and squinting at him. “Can’t reach.”
Matt pushed up from his chair, grabbing the bottle of sunscreen from her bag. Perching on the edge of her lounge chair, he poured some onto his palm and began rubbing it onto her upper back.
