‘No.’ I turned my phone off, slipping it back into my bag just as Matteo came bustling down the garden path, a black tray held aloft on one shoulder. It contained a single blue and white plate which he placed in the middle of the table, a spoon balanced on either side.
‘Buon appetito!’ He smiled, clasping both hands together in delight before scurrying back towards the restaurant. Magda’s head appeared around the door, craning at what looked like a very uncomfortable angle, before Matteo shooed her back inside, saying something that required a lot of hand gestures. I stifled a giggle as Luca poured us both some more wine.
‘What’s this?’ I asked, frowning at the generous square of tiramisu sat in the centre of the hand-painted plate, cream oozing out from all sides.
‘Dessert,’ Luca said with deliberate slowness, as if I were an alien from another planet.
I laughed. ‘No. I mean, I thought we were having pizza?’
‘Dessert first. Pizza after.’
‘You can’t have dessert first!’ I scoffed, throwing my head back.
His eyes danced as they watched me. He dipped a finger into the cocoa-dusted whipped cream and raised it to his lips.
‘Says who?’ His tongue swirled around the tip of his finger as he licked the cream off. It was slow. Intentional. But his tongue might as well have been in between my thighs the effect it was having on me.
‘Says the world,’ I maintained, my voice hoarse.
‘No, seriously, what idiot came up with that rule? Some miserable sod who thought it was a good idea to make people wait for the very thing they’re looking forward to the most? Life’s too short for waiting, Thompson; sometimes you’ve got to write your own rules.’ His eyes didn’t leave mine as the spoon disappeared inside his mouth, the low moan of satisfaction rumbling at the back of his throat making me wonder what else might draw that noise out of him.
‘Screw it.’
I grabbed the other spoon, filling it with a mound of coffee-soaked sponge and cream. My eyes closed with pleasure as I savoured the sweet, creamy flavours, a sigh of desire escaping audibly from somewhere deep inside me. But when I opened my eyes and saw Luca watching me across the table, my pulse beat hot and fast beneath my skin, and I realised I was far from satisfied.
‘You’ve got a little something—’ Luca leaned towards me asif in slow motion. I had to fight the urge to grab his face in my hands and taste the bitter tang of coffee on his lips as the tip of his thumb glided briefly across my own. When it retreated, a smear of white cream was just visible. Luca inspected it for a moment, twisting it this way and that before slowly raising it to his mouth, lips parted, and sucking it clean. Fuck. Who knew tiramisu could be such a turn-on?
I reached for my wine glass, the deep, velvety Barolo doing very little to cool the raging fire burning in the pit of my stomach. A slow smile grew on Luca’s mouth, as if he knew the effect he was having on me. Never one to give up without a fight, I crossed my legs, letting my right shoe fall to the floor, the bare skin of my foot gliding brazenly up Luca’s trouser leg beneath the table, higher, higher—
His spoon clattered noisily against the side of the plate, one hand clenching a fistful of tablecloth whilst the other shot into the air, palm splayed as he tried to get Matteo’s attention.
‘Can we get the bill?’
My back hit Luca’s front door, which used to be my front door, at the very same moment our lips touched. You could hardly call it a kiss. His lips brushed mine so gently it was barely more than a whisper even though every inch of my body was practically screaming with desire, my heart beating so loudly I swear the whole building must have heard it. His hands found my hips, certain in what they wanted as he pulled me tightly against him, his mouth trailing a path of impossibly soft kisses down the length of my neck.
‘Did I tell you how beautiful you look tonight?’ he murmured against my skin, catching my earlobe between his teeth.
‘Not that I can recall,’ I gasped breathlessly, tipping my head back with a moan as his mouth moved down my neck, grazing my shoulder, along my collarbone. My hips bucked impatientlybeneath him and I felt Luca smile against my skin, but he took his time making his way further down, pulling the neckline of my dress down to expose my breast, teasing my nipple with his tongue, sucking, biting.
‘Well, you do. And this dress,’ he mused throatily, his fingers finding the bow that secured it at my hipbone.
‘Yes?’ I panted, wanting him, willing him to undo me. He took half a step back, his eyes pure fire as he kept hold of the tie, the bow slowly unravelling until the two halves of my dress hung open like a robe. I dropped my shoulders, the smallest of movements enough to send the silky material pooling around my feet.
‘Somehow it looks even better on the floor,’ Luca breathed, eyes roaming over my nearly naked body as though committing it to memory. I reached for him then, my hands frantic as they scrabbled at the bottom of his shirt, yanking it out of his jeans and over his head in my haste, myneed,to feel his skin against mine. And then my mouth was on his again, but this kiss was different. It was urgent, decisive, our teeth clashing against each other as we backed into the flat, my dress and his shirt forgotten about on the front door mat. We didn’t make it to the bedroom. Luca’s hips pinned me against the living room wall and my entire body responded, melting into him as his arms snaked tightly around me, pulling me ever closer until my left leg was somehow hitched around his waist. His pinky finger teased the elastic of my underwear, pinging it once against the flesh of my hip as a low whimper escaped from my mouth.
‘So, I take it you’re now a fan of having your dessert first?’ came Luca’s voice in the dark, his hands everywhere all at once. I felt like my body was going to burst into flames at any moment.
‘Consider me converted.’ I smiled, pulling him towards me once more.
17
I was supposed to be getting coffee. One black drip coffee for me. One flat white for Luca. Luca, who I’d left in a delicious tangle of warm bed sheets with the promise that I’d be right back, the prospect of coffee and freshly baked pastries the only reason he had eventually let me wiggle out from beneath him, reluctantly unhooking my leg from around his hip bone, allowing his wandering fingers to slip from the curve of my waist. But my phone told me that was almost three hours ago. And that I had five missed calls and two voicemails from Luca.
I’d walked the two streets over to Drew’s Brews as intended, my hands swallowed up by the sleeves of Luca’s sweatshirt, which brushed gently against my bare legs, the skirt of last night’s dress dancing in the breeze. I’d closed my eyes, angling my face up towards the late morning sun as I stood patiently in the late Sunday morning queue, flashbacks of last night playing on repeat.
Last night.
It had been – well, no single word existed that came close to describing how I’d felt in that moment. How Luca had made me feel. And I’d felt everything, everywhere, all at once. My toes curled in recollection as I remembered waking up when it was still dark out to the feeling of Luca’s hand tracing the length of my thigh, past the tiny birthmark by my belly button, the tip of his finger brushing the underside of my breast which appearedto have been moulded to fit perfectly in the palm of his hand. The way he’d breathed my name against my lips, his tongue doing magical things as I felt the weight of him hovering over me.
