"I know you are," he says. "We're not going anywhere."
"This isn't heat," Tomas says quietly, from my left. "Your rose is soft. Heat makes it sharp." He looks at me directly. "This is something else entirely."
Santos's hand covers mine on the table. Warm and broad, his thumb moving once across my knuckles, and the saffron in his scent wraps around my strawberry and my rose and settlesthere, certain and warm, and I breathe through it and let it settle and look at all three of them.
"The tiramisu," I say.
"After," Santos says, and his voice is low and gentle and entirely without urgency.
My omega is making absolutely no effort to conceal her feelings about the situation.
I push my chair back and stand up, and three pairs of eyes follow me, and I smooth my green shirt down over my stomach with both hands, the gesture I make when I want my hands somewhere, and I look at all three of them one more time.
"I'm calling Anna," I say. "Then tiramisu."
"Let us come with you. I want to make sure you get to the guest house safely. You don't look well," Santos says.
"I'm fine," I say. Then I swiftly make it out of there. I can't even thank them. My throat is dry and my head is pounding. All signs that I'm going into heat, but I can't be, because I just had pre-heat.
In the corridor I lean against the wall for one moment with my hand over my stomach and my rose scent soft and warm in the air and my strawberry doing whatever it wants, which is what it has been doing since the moment I walked through that door.
She kicks. Vivid and certain and entirely unbothered, the kick of someone who has been waiting for me to catch up and is pleased that I finally have.
"I know," I tell her.
I can smell their scents behind me. I told them I could make it, but they still followed me, clearly to make sure I got back safely.
Once I'm in, I don't hesitate in shutting the door and calling Anna.
"Well?" she says.
"They made pasta," I say.
A pause.
"And?" she says.
"There's tiramisu," I say. "His grandmother's recipe. The boat is at four."
"Jennifer," she says.
"I'm staying for tiramisu," I say.
She loses it. The real laugh, the one from the chest, the one that takes over. "Obviously you're staying for tiramisu," she says. "Obviously. You were always staying."
"I hadn't decided," I say.
"Call me after the tiramisu. If you can, and you've actually told them. If all goes well, which I'm sure it will, then I need to figure out how to get on that island," Anna says.
"I will," I say.
"I love you," she says.
"I love you too," I say. "Even though you're insufferable."
"Oui," she says, and hangs up.
I take a few deep breaths then head back to the kitchen where Santos is already at the stove and Matteo has his notebook open and Tomas is reading the label on the biscuit tin with the focused attention of a man who takes ingredient lists seriously.