Fighting attraction

"Stop looking at me like that."

Gus's words cut through the quiet of the restaurant kitchen where we'd been working side by side for the past hour, me prepping tomorrow's sauce while he replaced something else in the kitchen.

It has been three weeks since I'd arrived in Sicily, three weeks of this dance we were doing, pretending the tension between us didn't exist.

I looked up from the tomatoes I was crushing, meeting his eyes across the kitchen. "Like what?"

"Like you're trying to figure out something about me."

"Maybe I am." I went back to my work, my hands moving automatically.

"You show up here every day, fix things and refuse to let me pay you. Normal people don't do that."

"Who says I'm normal?" He shrugged

"Exactly my point."

He huffed something that might have been a laugh and returned to scraping grout.

We fell into comfortable silence that should have felt wrong between a stepdaughter and her mother's husband but somehow didn't.

I'd stopped trying to hate him around day ten. It was exhausting but now I was in a worse position: I'd started looking forward to his presence.

"Your mother used to make that sauce," Gus said without looking up.

"Every Sunday. She'd start at dawn and let it simmer all day."

"I remember." The memory was more emotional than expected.

"She'd make me stir it every hour. Said it needed attention or it would burn."

"She was right."

"Did she tell you about my father?" The question had been building for days.

Gus's hands stilled on the tile. "Some."

"What did she say?"

"That he was a good man who died too young." He met my eyes. "That you blamed her for moving on too quickly, and she felt guilty each time she considered dating again."

Guilt twisted in my stomach. "I was a terrible daughter."

"You were a hurt daughter, it's different."

"Is it?" I abandoned the sauce and moved to the sink, washing my hands more thoroughly than necessary.

"I left her here alone to go to Milan and barely called that I forgot she was here getting sick and I didn't even know until it was too late."

"Nyx." Gus stood, crossing to where I stood. "Your mother was proud of you for leaving. She wanted you to chase your dreams, even if it meant being apart."

"Then why do I feel like I failed her?"

"Because grief doesn't care about logic." He was close now, close enough that I could smell him.

"You're allowed to miss her but torturing yourself won't bring her back."

I turned to face him fully, our bodies almost touching in the small space.

"How are you so calm about everything? She was your wife and you're just okay?"

"I'm not okay." His voice dropped lower. "I'm holding it together because falling apart doesn't help anyone."

Something in the way he said it made my chest ache. Before I could overthink it, I reached out and touched his arm.

It was supposed to be a simple touch of my hand on his forearm, but he went completely still like I'd electrocuted him.

"Gus," I said softly.

"Don't." But he didn't move away.

"Don't what?"

"Don't look at me like that and don't touch me like that. Don't make this harder than it already is."

"I'm not trying to make anything hard."

"Yes, you are." He pulled back, putting distance between us.

"You've been doing it for weeks. You're testing boundaries that shouldn't be tested."

Heat flooded my face because he was right. "Maybe I want to know if you feel it too."

"Feel what?"

"This." I gestured between us.

"Whatever this is that makes the air feel different when we're in the same room."

"There is no this, Nyx. There won''t be."

"Why not?""Because you're twenty-four and grieving and I'm forty-nine and was married to your mother."

He ran a hand through his hair, frustration evident in every line of his body.

"Because this town would crucify both of us and it's wrong on every level that matters."

"But you do feel it." I took a step toward him. "You feel it and you're lying by saying you don't."

"What I feel doesn't matter."

"It matters to me."

"It shouldn't." He backed toward the door. "I'm going upstairs."

The next few days were torture and Gus maintained careful distance, never getting close enough to touch, never staying longer than necessary.

The comfortable silences turned awkward. On Friday, my old friends from Sicily convinced me to go out. Anna and Marco, who'd known me since childhood, who didn't care about Milan or photography or dead mothers.

They just wanted to drink cheap wine and dance to terrible music and pretend we were still teenagers with no responsibilities.

I went because staying in the restaurant was driving me slowly insane.The bar was packed with locals and too loud music accompanied by too strong drinks and for a few hours, I forgot about Sicily and restaurants and stepdad I had no business wanting.

I got drunk enough that the walk home required concentration and when I stumbled through the restaurant door at two in the morning, I didn't immediately notice Gus sitting at the bar in the dark.

"You're still up," I said, my words slightly slurred.

"I was waiting." His voice was tight. "You didn't answer your phone."

"Didn't hear it." I fumbled for the lights but he stopped me.

"Where were you?"

"I told you I was going out with friends."

"You told me you'd be home by midnight."

"I'm an adult, Gus. I don't need a curfew."

"I didn't say you did." He stood, moving into the thin light coming through the windows.

"But I spent the last two hours imagining every terrible thing that could have happened to you."

"Nothing happened to me and I was just having fun."

"With who?"

"You've been avoiding me for days, telling me there's nothing between us, but you're jealous that I went out with other people."

"You're drunk."

"I'm not that drunk." I moved towards him, my hand finding his face. "I know exactly what I'm doing."

"Tell me you don't want me," I whispered. "Look me in the eye and tell me this is all in my head. Tell me I'm imagining the way you look at me when you think I'm not paying attention. Tell me I'm wrong about everything and I'll walk away right now."

He stared at me for a long moment, his breathing uneven, his hand still wrapped around my wrist. I could see him fighting it, see the war happening behind his eyes.

"I can't," he finally said. Then his lips crushed mine, it was soft at first, then his tongue pushed into my mouth, hungrily sweeping around my mouth while his hands were in my hair, mine fisting in his shirt as our bodies pressed together in the dark restaurant where anyone could see through the windows.

I kissed him back like I was drowning, barely holding back the moans escaping through the kiss.

When we finally broke apart, we were both breathing hard, foreheads pressed together.

"This is wrong," he said, but his hands were still in my hair but I could feel him putting distance between us even before he physically moved away.