The morning light is a pale, accusing thing. It filters through the bamboo slats of the pool cabana and lays itself across my bare legs, over the rumpled towel I’m using as a pathetic shield. Sebastian is a solid, warm line against my back, his breath stirring my hair. His hand rests on my hip, possessive even in sleep. I stare at the turquoise square of the plunge pool, its surface perfectly still, and I feel like I’ve been cracked open and left on a rock to dry.

“I can hear you thinking,” his voice rumbles, sleep-rough and closer than I expected. His fingers flex, digging into the soft flesh of my waist. “It’s deafening.”

“I’m not thinking. I’m… metabolizing.”

“A euphemism if I ever heard one.” He shifts, his body a landscape of heat and muscle against mine. I feel the hard line of him press against the small of my back, and my stomach does a slow, treacherous roll. “What time is it?”

“Early. The world hasn’t started yet.” I watch a gecko scuttle along the edge of the pool. “We should probably… un-stick ourselves. Before someone comes looking for coffee.”

He doesn’t move. His lips brush the knob of my spine, a whisper of contact. “Let them look.”

It’s that simple, terrifying statement that does it. The surrender in it. The parameters he wanted have dissolved into morning breath and tangled limbs and a hand that won’t let go. I roll over to face him. His blue eyes are heavy-lidded, his dark hair smashed on one side. He looks unraveled. He looks like mine.

“This is a terrible idea,” I whisper, echoing our words on the beach. My hand finds his cheek, the scratch of stubble a gritty, real anchor.

“Yes.” He captures my wrist, turns his head to press a kiss to my palm. His tongue traces the lifeline. “But it’s the only one we have.”

The world starts, as it always does, with Amelia.

Her voice, sharp with purpose, cuts through the jasmine-scented air from the main villa’s terrace. “Imogen? Sebastian? The car leaves for town in twenty. We’re not waiting.”

It’s a bucket of ice water. Sebastian’s body goes rigid against mine. In one fluid motion, he’s sitting up, the towel falling away, his broad back a tense landscape of muscle. My hand feels cold where his warmth just was.

“Right,” he says, the word clipped and British and utterly detached. It’s the voice he uses for faculty meetings. The switch is so complete it steals my breath.

We dress in a frantic, silent ballet, turning away from each other, pulling on yesterday’s rumpled clothes. My emerald silk feels like a lie against my skin. He buttons his shirt with precise, efficient movements, his face a mask of polite neutrality. When he turns to me, he’s Professor Fairfax again. The man who kissed my palm is gone.

“We left separately,” he states, not asks. His blue eyes scan me, not as a lover, but as a co-conspirator assessing the scene of the crime. “You went for an early swim. I came out for coffee. Our paths didn’t cross.”

“A tragic tale of near-misses,” I say, aiming for flippant. It comes out thin.

He reaches out, not to touch me, but to pluck a leaf from my wild hair. He holds it up, evidence. “See that you’re convincing.”

Then he’s gone, slipping out of the cabana and melting into the resort’s landscaped pathways with the silent grace of a man used to not being seen.

I wait a full five minutes, my heart hammering a guilty rhythm against my ribs. I splash pool water on my face, try to arrange my hair into something resembling ‘carefree morning swim’ and not ‘ravished in a cabana.’ The performance has begun.

The town is a postcard of cobblestone streets and whitewashed buildings draped in bougainvillea. Amelia has organized the expedition with military precision: Elizabeth and Arthur’s father, Charles, are to be escorted to the local silver market. Arthur is tasked with finding a specific type of cigar for the wedding. It is, in essence, a series of errands disguised as culture.

We move in a loose pack. Amelia and Arthur walk ahead with his parents, a portrait of the soon-to-be-merged families. Sebastian hangs back, a respectful few paces, his hands clasped behind his back like a tour guide. I drift even further, pretending intense fascination with every shop window selling identical woven blankets and ceramic suns.

“Your sister said you were an actress,” Elizabeth says, glancing back at me with a kind smile. “This must all seem terribly mundane.”

“Oh, no. It’s… rich text,” I say, gesturing vaguely at a display of sombreros. “The human condition, carved from straw.”

Sebastian, ahead of me, lets out a quiet, choked sound that might be a cough. Or a laugh strangled at birth.

We maintain the distance. It’s a careful, invisible string between us, pulled taut. He doesn’t look at me. I don’t look at him. We are masterpieces of indifference.

It breaks in the spice market.

The air is thick with the scent of cumin, cinnamon, and dried chilies. The aisle is narrow, crowded with sacks of vibrant powders. Amelia and the parents are ahead, consulting with a vendor. Arthur is mesmerized by a display of vanilla beans. I’m pretending to smell saffron when a hand closes around my wrist.

Not gently. Firmly. Warmly.

Sebastian pulls me backward, around a corner into a slightly quieter alley stacked with clay pots. He doesn’t say a word. He just tugs me along, our footsteps echoing on the stones, until the crowd thins and the spice smell fades into the scent of baking bread.

“This is a terrible idea,” I hiss, my heart doing a frantic salsa. He’s still holding my wrist.

“The worst,” he agrees, his voice low. He finally stops, releasing me. He runs a hand through his dark hair, looking down the alleyway then back at me. The polite mask is gone, replaced by a faint, desperate amusement. “But I can’t spend three hours pretending to be fascinated by hand-tooled leather. I’ll go mad.”

“So your solution is to kidnap me?”

“Yes. Come on.” He nods his head toward the bustling main street we’ve emerged onto. “Ice cream. My treat. Consider it ransom.”

I don't let him turn toward the street. My own hand shoots out, fingers curling into the crisp cotton of his shirt. I pull him back into the shadow of the alley, against the cool clay of a giant pot. The world narrows to the strip of sun cutting across his surprised face, the scent of baking bread, and the frantic drum of my own pulse.

“Kidnapping requires a negotiation,” I say, and my voice is all breath.

His blue eyes darken, understanding flooding them. He doesn’t speak. He just bends his head, and his mouth finds mine.

This isn’t like the beach. That was salt and surrender. This is stolen. Urgent. The kiss is all push and pull, a silent argument. My back presses into the rough clay. His hands come up to frame my face, his thumbs stroking my jaw, but his mouth is demanding. It tastes like spice market and restraint finally snapping. I open for him, and his tongue is a hot, claiming stroke that makes my knees weak. I fist my hands in his shirt, holding on, pulling him closer until I can feel every hard, muscled line of him against me.

He breaks for air, his forehead resting against mine. Our breaths mingle, ragged and loud in the quiet alley. “Negotiation concluded,” he rasps.

“I didn’t hear my terms.”

“Your terms are irrelevant. You lost the moment you pulled me back in.” He steals another kiss, softer this time, a slow, sucking pull on my bottom lip that sends a direct current of heat to my core. “Ice cream. Now. Before I do something profoundly stupid in a public thoroughfare.”

He takes my hand. Not my wrist. My hand. His fingers lace through mine, warm and sure. We emerge onto the main street like any other couple, blinking in the bright sun. The contact is a live wire. My whole awareness funnels down to the point where our palms meet, the slight dampness, the way his thumb moves in a subtle, absent caress against my knuckle.

We find a small, tiled shop with wrought-iron tables. He orders for us in fluid Spanish, and a minute later, we’re presented with two glass coupes. Mine is a vibrant yellow mango sorbet. His is a dark, bitter chocolate.

“Predictable,” I say, nodding at his choice as we take a small table in the corner.

“Classic,” he corrects, taking a precise bite. “Yours looks like sunshine incarnate. Terribly optimistic.”

I take a spoonful. It’s tart and sweet and so cold it makes my teeth ache. “It’s perfect. You should try it.” I extend my spoon toward him.

He looks at the offered bite, then at my face. A faint, wicked smile touches his lips. He leans forward, but instead of taking the spoon, he wraps his hand around my wrist and guides it to his mouth. His eyes never leave mine as he closes his lips over the metal, his tongue sweeping the sorbet clean. The intimacy of it, the deliberate slowness, is more obscene than the kiss in the alley. My breath hitches.

“Sweet,” he pronounces, releasing my wrist. “But lacking complexity.” He pushes his own dish toward me. “Try mine.”

It’s a challenge. I mimic him, my fingers trembling slightly as I take a spoonful of his chocolate. It’s rich, deep, with a hint of chili that blooms heat at the back of my throat. “Bitter,” I say. “Complicated.”

“Exactly.”

We eat in a silence that isn’t silent at all. It’s full of shared glances, the click of spoons on glass, the brush of his knee against mine under the small table. I feel hyper-aware, like my skin is tuned to his frequency. The performance is gone. Here, we’re just a man and a woman who escaped a family errand for ice cream. The simplicity of it is devastating.

“We’ve been gone twenty minutes,” he says finally, checking his watch. “Amelia will have noticed.”

“Let her.” I chase the last bit of mango around my bowl. “She’s probably relieved. I was one sombrero comment away from causing an international incident.”

He laughs, a real, quiet sound that crinkles the corners of his eyes. “The human condition, carved from straw. That was inspired.”

“I have my moments.” I put my spoon down. “What’s the plan, Professor? Do we slink back and pretend we got lost?”

He considers, his gaze drifting over the bustling street. “I find I have little appetite for pretending just now.” He looks back at me, and his expression is open, unguarded in a way that makes my chest tighten. “We have three days left. They will be a montage of family meals, polite conversation, and scheduled activities. I propose we schedule our own.”

“A rebellion.”

“A negotiation,” he corrects, echoing me. “You get your sunshine. I get my… complexity. We meet in the middle. But only when we can steal it.”

“Parameters,” I whisper, the word from last night hanging between us.

“No.” He shakes his head. “Just… stolen moments. Like this one. Agreed?”

It’s a terrible idea. It’s the only one we have. “Agreed.”

We return to the group not with shame, but with a shared, secret calm. We find them at the silver market. Amelia’s eyes narrow as we approach, but Sebastian is already speaking, his voice a model of polite regret.

“Apologies. I spotted a first edition of Don Quixote in a bookbinder’s window. Got entirely sidetracked. Imogen, thankfully, speaks enough Spanish to rescue me from a truly embarrassing bargaining attempt.”

It’s a flawless lie. Arthur chuckles, buying it completely. Elizabeth smiles. Amelia just looks at me, her gaze sharp enough to cut glass. I give her my best, breezy, ‘what-can-you-do’ smile.