Page 22 of Falling for Mr. October

He doesn’t look appeased. “I didn’t think it was that bad.”

“You’ve done it now, Luanne,” Emily says. She’s smiling, though, enjoying the show.

I’m not. Because Giovanni’s staring at me with those puppy dog eyes, fringed with long, dark lashes. They’re the kind of eyes that could get a woman to do just about anything if she’s not careful.

“I could do a whole lot better now,” he finally says, his voice throaty.

My pulse starts racing. “You don’t actually expect me to let you kiss me to prove you have more game than you did as a teenager?”

He shrugs one shoulder, his eyes fixed on me. “The fair thing would be to let me prove myself.”

“Are you looking for a judge?” a customer asks. “I judged a pie-eating contest once.”

I glance over to see a middle-aged woman holding a pumpkin. She’s a few steps away, watching us with an interest that suggests she’s overheard everything, not that it would be hard, given who I’m conversing with. Luanne and her husband, who passed on years ago, ran the best diner in town—The Clean Plate Club—but she also starred in almost every community theater production for more than forty years. She doesn’t have an “inside” voice.

“Aren’t pie-eating contests judged by the number of pies eaten, not the quality of the experience?” I ask.

“I could kiss you a lot of times,” Giovanni says in a teasing tone.

“I’m not kissing you,” I object, feeling sweat form at the back of my neck. Because a very stupid, very horny part of me would like to see how an adult Giovanni kisses.

He holds up both hands. “Okay, okay. I’m not going to push it. But if you change your mind, I’d like a chance to prove myself. I don’t want everyone in Apple Ridge thinking I’m a bad kisser.”

“Fair warning,” Emily says with a smile. “Luanne has no vault for secrets. Everyone’s finding out. It’ll probably be on the town whiteboard before the end of the week. You’ll have women showing up here hoping you’ll be as generous with your kisses as the prince was with Cinderella’s slipper, wanting to see if they’re the one you’ll kiss just right.”

Luanne starts laughing uncontrollably, and everything that happens next seems to be at warp speed.

Luanne spills her full cup of warm cider all over her lap. It’s not boiling hot—it’s probably somewhere between warm and tepid—but Giovanni glances around wildly, completely missing the big roll of brown paper towels on the refreshments table, and strips his black henley shirt clear off, taking his ball cap with it. He pushes the shirt into Luanne’s hand.

“You can shove it under your clothes so the heat won’t burn you,” he says urgently.

She takes the shirt and starts rubbing at the splashes of liquid on her person, but she doesn’t say a word. None of us do.

We’re all too busy staring at Giovanni Cafiero’s abs.

They’re chiseled and tanned, and his chest has the perfect amount of hair.

The tourist who likes pie points at him with a choked gasp, her finger quivering in the air. “The North Star.”

I don’t know that I’d go that far, but then I notice the little distinctive starburst over his ribs. A birthmark. For half a second, I have the unhinged desire to run my fingertips over it, but I latch onto what little sanity I have left and shove my hand deep into the pocket of my dress.

Emily is the first to do something sensible. She pulls paper towels off the roll and starts patting Luanne’s sweater.

Giovanni flinches, obviously embarrassed that he stripped for no reason. “Oh. Oh my God, I’m sorry. I thought…I didn’t⁠—”

I touch his arm. “You were trying to help.”

He reaches out to Luanne, presumably for his shirt, but she tightens her grip on it.

“It’s hers now,” I tell him. “You’d best accept that. I can grab you an Evergreens & Apples shirt from the barn.”

The woman who was pointing at his chest seconds ago drops the pumpkin she was carrying. Just drops it. It was a big one—at least a twenty-pounder—and it spews its guts across the floor.

“You broke it, you bought it,” I say. “That’s a firm rule.”

But she’s not listening to me. She’s scrambling into her pocket for something. Moments later, she pulls out a phone and snaps several photos of Giovanni’s naked chest before my brain catches up.

“Excuse me?” I step between them without a second thought, my blood pumping hot. “No harassing the staff. You delete those, now.”