For the next three days I play tour guide to my parents. We visit the Pantheon, the Colosseum, The Spanish Steps, the Piazza del Popolo. All Dad wants to do is eat gelato, all Mom wants to do is complain abut her feet and how the Romans should really get off their asses and pave this place with asphalt like normal human beings, because the cobblestones are irritating her corns.

The whole time, I have to admit that I’m totally preoccupied with very pleasant thoughts. Counting down the days until Friday, when they’ll finally leave for Florence. I can’t wait to drop them at the train station, pretend to be sad to see them go, then spend my last two weeks here with Dylan by my side. His time in Rome is coming to an end, too; he’s supposed to head back to New York a few days after I leave.

I have no idea what will happen after that. All I know is that I want to make the most of the time we have together.

He and I have talked about our little experiment with “going hard.” We’ve talked about the present—a lot. We’ve touched on the past too of course, but mostly, we’ve been smart enough to leave it in the vault where it belongs.

What we haven’t talked about is the future.

It seems stupid to even think about. We’ve only really been together for a few days. They’ve been amazing days, but it’s not like a few amazing days ever end in a “let’s get married” or anything, except in story books. As much as I hate to say it, this romance of ours really will probably amount to little more than a pretty intense summer fling.

The thing is, though, that I care about him. So much that it almost hurts. After denying my feelings, after pushing away attachment and intimacy for so many years, something in me has finally opened up and let him in. I’m not ashamed of my feelings, though I’m terrified to use the word love, even in my own mind. But what else can I call it when every time I see him, I feel like the world becomes a better place? Every time I think about him, I feel like I understand what I’ve been waiting for all my life.

When I’m away from him I sometimes come close to forgetting how much I love his smile, the way his eyes narrow a little when he’s being mischievous. I forget how sexy his voice is, the way he growls “Loose” when he’s looking at me a certain way. How good it feels to have him worship at the altar of my body, how sweet it is to feel his mouth on me, kissing every inch of skin. How generous he is. How thoughtful.

I forget how he makes me feel like a kid again. But he also makes me feel like a woman.

He’s offered to take my parents out for gelato, to walk them through the back streets of Rome and show them the hidden gems that tourists never get to see. He’s taken them to see Bernini’s amazing statues in the Piazza Navona, explained the intricacies of classical architecture to them.

My father loves him now. My mother already did; what woman wouldn’t? Of course, they’re also naive enough to think I haven’t been sneaking over to give him blowjobs at night or to moan while he eats me out and brings me to multiple climaxes with his fingertips. Not so sure they’d love him if they knew he’d done the nasty with their daughter quite so many times since their arrival.

On Thursday night, Mom and Dad, as always, are exhausted and in bed. It’s 9:30 and I’m getting myself ready for my nightly trip over to sexual heaven. I pop into the powder room to check my face and quietly saunter out to the living room, listen for dad’s snores and tiptoe over to the door that leads out to the balcony. Thirty seconds later I’m in Dylan’s arms. Thirty seconds after that, we’re both naked.

“Am I an addict?” I ask him when we’re lying in bed half an hour, content and utterly spent. “Addicted to you, I mean.”

“If you are, I’m a Lucy junkie. Maybe we can do rehab together.”

“Hmm. Let’s hope rehab involves a hell of a lot of sex.”

“Cheers to that.”

“Listen—I wanted to thank you for being so nice to my parents. They’re not always the easiest to get along with.”

“It’s fine,” he replies. “I enjoy them, actually.”

“My dad likes you. And my dad never likes the men I date.”

“Well, he and I have something important in common,” Dylan says, “so it makes sense that we’d get along.”

“Oh? What exactly do you have in common? Please don’t say a penis, because I don’t want to throw up all over the bed.”

“Not that at all,” he replies, tucking a strand of my hair behind my right ear. He locks his eyes on mine, his expression totally, utterly earnest. “We both love his daughter.”

Okay, I’m not going to throw up. But something insane is happening to my insides that may or may not be healthy. In a totally good way, except that I’m paralyzed now. Like, I literally can’t move. Or breathe. Or think. Or talk.

“That’s fine,” he says, and I feel like I’m hearing his voice from under water. “I just said I love you and you’re staring at me like a deer caught staring at a strobe light.”

“I…” He just said it again. I love you. He really said it. Dylan Emerson just said he loves me. “I love you, too.”

It’s the first time in my life I’ve ever said it to anyone other than my parents. “I’ve loved you for a long time.”

He’s got this look in his eyes that tells me he’s serious. This isn’t some fleeting, superficial summer fling to him. We really did somehow pick up where we left off all those years ago, minus the stupid drama in the interim.

“So you’re not freaked out?” he asks me.

I shake my head. “Not freaked out. Are you?”

He shakes his head back at me. “I think I knew I loved you even back in the days when we were basically kids. It’s why…” he stops himself, turning his face away, like he’s trying to decide if it’s really a good idea to keep talking.

“Why what?” I ask.

“Why I broke up with what’s her name,” he says.

“Chloe,” I reply. The very mention of her name makes my stomach turn over. Chloe, who was instrumental in my downfall. “Wait—what do you mean, you broke up with her for me?”

“You didn’t know?” he asks. For some reason he seems genuinely surprised.

“Hell no. I mean, I knew that you’d broken up but I never thought it had anything to do with me. I always figured you were torn about it. I figured that was why…” No. I’m not going to mention the incident. Not going to rehash that horrible night. “I guess I thought you didn’t care that much about me.”

He props himself up on one arm. Damn, he looks sexy like that. Stop looking so hot when I’m busy being confused. “Is that why you ran away?” he asks. “You thought I didn’t care?”

“Of course I thought you didn’t care,” I reply. Uh-oh. It’s coming out. “After what I saw, I figured…”

“Figured what?”

I’m about to answer him. To spill my guts and tell him everything, when a series of bright lights flash through the bedroom curtains, reflecting circular beams across the room onto the walls around us.

“That’s weird,” I mutter.

“Those are flashlights,” Dylan says.

“Neighbours?” I ask, but too late. A walkie-talkie blurts out some rapid-fire Italian from somewhere on the other side of the window.

“No. It’s Polizia,” he replies. “Cops.”

A hard knock sounds on the door. No two people have ever leapt out of bed so quickly as we do, throwing on any piece of clothing we can find.

Dylan walks over and opens the door, wearing nothing but pyjama bottoms. Meanwhile, I’ve managed to make myself relatively presentable in my clothing. I march out into the living room, only to see a police officer standing in the doorway.

To my shock and horror, my tiny mother is standing next to him.

Dylan and the cop are discussing something in Italian, and when the officer sees me he raises his eyebrows approvingly then mutters something. My mother, meanwhile, has crossed her arms over her chest and is giving me the look of death.

“I had no idea what had happened to you,” she scolds. “No idea. You could have been abducted, killed, raped.”

“In that order?” I ask, my inner smart ass in no mood to deal with her treating me like I’m five.

“Don’t get clever with me, young lady,” she says, proving that I am indeed still a child in her eyes.

Dylan says something to the police officer, who nods, gives me one final glance and takes off with his buddies.

“Come, Lucy,” my mother says. “You ought to be in bed.”

“You mean on the couch. I was in bed,” I mumble. “Quite happily, too.”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

Sigh.

“I’ll follow in just a sec,” I say. “You can head back to the apartment. I know the way.”

Scowling, she leaves us alone.

Fuck, this is going to be a long night.

“I’ve got to go,” I tell Dylan quietly, closing the door behind my mother. One more day and they’re out of here. “Sorry about all this. My mother has forgotten that I’m supposed to be an adult by now.”

“No worries. We’ll finish our conversation tomorrow,” he assures me.

“Okay,” I reply, pissed beyond words that everything was so rudely interrupted, but there’s no time to get back into our conversation again. My mother will have an aneurysm if I take more than two minutes to get back to her.

I’m about to leave when Dylan grabs my hand, pulls me to him and kisses me. “I meant what I said earlier, you know,” he tells me. “I love you, Lucy.”

“I know,” I reply. “I meant what I said, too.”