This was paradise. Lying on Ipanema Beach as the fading rays of the sun baked her skin and body in delicious heat. There was a low hum of conversation from nearby, the beautiful sing-song cadence of Portuguese, people were laughing, sighing, talking. The surf of the sea was crashing against the shore. And then she felt Luca’s mouth on hers and her whole body orientated itself towards his. She opened her eyes with an effort to find him looking down at her. Her heart flip-flopped. She smiled. ‘Can we stay for the sunset?’ Luca was trying to hang on to some semblance of normality when the day that had just passed had veered out of normal for him on so many levels it was scary. ‘Sure,’ he said, with an easiness belying his trepidation. Serena’s open smile was doing little to restore any sense of equilibrium. One day spent walking around Rio and then a couple of hours on the beach was all it had taken to touch her skin with a luminous golden glow.
