Compared to yesterday though, I felt a lot better now that I was with Mateo. He made a lot of the fears go away, though there were still some dark worries lurking around in the back of my heart. I worried that I wouldn’t be able to fit in here—yes, I did well with the Spaniards at Las Palabras, but this was the city of Madrid, and in some ways a whole new game I knew nothing about.

I worried that his friends and family wouldn’t like me—while Lucia was darling, and according to her, her parents were accepting of me and Mateo, I didn’t know that for sure. As for his friends, I had absolutely no idea. His friends were all going to be in their mid to late thirties. What the hell were they going to think about me? I still liked to party, go out and get drunk, go to concerts where you got stale beer thrown in your face and people kicking you in the head from crowd-surfing. I wasn’t a martini-sipping in a fancy lounge, gossiping about boring shit kind of girl. I didn’t have children, or even a pet. I didn’t have a prestigious career or a well-paying job or a job in general. Fuck, I didn’t even speak Spanish.

And of course my biggest worry was the divorce itself and all that involved, particularly Chloe Ann. I was worried that the little girl would resent me for doing this to her, for taking her father away from her. I worried that Isabel and her semi-royal family would turn hateful and come after me for being the other woman, the villainous homewrecker. And more than anything, I worried that it would become too much for Mateo and I to carry on. We’d survived Las Palabras and seeing each other every day; we’d survived a long-distance relationship where we never saw each other, but this would be the final test. If we could survive my moving to Madrid and being with Mateo while all of this shit was whirling around us, then we could truly survive everything.

I just had no idea how things were going to pan out. I’d have to start living in the moment, not worrying too much about the future, or I’d go insane. I already made all the right steps—now it was time to see where they would lead.

Eventually Mateo came out of the bedroom, having slipped on his boxer briefs, and stood in the hallway, staring at me with sleepy eyes while scratching his bedhead. As usual, he skirted the line between sexy as hell manbeast and being absolutely adorable.

“I had the most wonderful dream,” he said with a yawn, padding over to me. “That you had come to live with me in Madrid. Now I see you in my kitchen, drinking my shitty coffee, and I have to ask…am I still dreaming?”

I grinned at him. I don’t know why I bothered with coffee when the mere sight of him made my heart turn into a rocket. “I may be dreaming too. Some things seem far too good to be true.”

He came and kissed me on the forehead. “I like you like this, my dream Estrella.” He walked over to the fridge and opened it, and I took a long moment to admire his ass. “You, in my kitchen, like a vision.”

“Well, I like you in the kitchen too. Especially when I’m up here,” I said, patting the counter with a wicked gleam in my eye. I jumped up so I was sitting on it, opened my legs, and gestured to my pussy. “And when you’re right here.” I expected him to laugh. I didn’t expect him to be interested right away, not after the night we had, but he closed the fridge door and strolled over to me, a smug look on his face.

“You want more?” he murmured, reaching for my underwear. I lifted my hips and he pulled them right down my legs. I kicked them off to the floor as he pulled his cock out of his briefs, already thick, hard and at attention.

I bit my lip, wondering how the fuck I got so lucky. “Of course I want more. What about you?”

“Vera,” he whispered feverishly, coming up against me, my legs around his hips, his hands in my hair. He gazed at my face, blinking as if in disbelief. “I can never get enough of you, ever. I could fuck you every day, several times a day, for the rest of my life, and I’ll still never get enough.” He kissed me, soft and wet, then slid a finger down into me. I gasped at the intrusion, immediately wanting more.

“Tu coño es mi hermosa prisión,” he said breathlessly.

I grinned and pulled back, trying to look at him. “What did you say? Something about my pussy?”

“It is a good thing and it is the truth,” he said, lazily returning the grin. He then proceeded to fuck me right there on the counter, my legs wrapped around him, my nails digging into his ass.

It was a good morning.

My first week in Madrid flew past in the blink of an eye. Maybe jet lag had something to do with it, but it felt like one big airy dream filled with nothing but sex and food. If we weren’t in the apartment making up for lost time, we were out exploring Madrid. We ate at a lot of tapas bars in very youthful and vibrant parts of town. It was not at all what I would have expected. I thought once I was with Mateo, he’d be taking me wining and dining to the fancy restaurants, the trendy bars where everything was made of ice and the waiters didn’t smile, the lounges for the elite.

Instead, we were almost slumming it. When I brought it up, he told me that he didn’t care much for those types of places anyway and thought I would be more comfortable in laidback environments. Frankly, I thought he was probably trying to avoid running into his soon-to-be-ex-wife’s crowd and I couldn’t fault him for that. I enjoyed living in the happy bubble that the first week brought me, and I wasn’t looking forward to the reality that would come crashing into us one day.

On a sunny Saturday, the city still sweltering and strangely empty with most of the locals escaping to Mallorca or the coastal beaches, I finally got to meet up with Claudia. She was working longer hours at her job since so many of her colleagues were on vacation, and we hadn’t had a chance to hang out. Ricardo was now living with her in Madrid as well, having been able to get a job transfer.

Mateo and I walked down to Plaza Mayor where we were to meet them at an outdoor café that had an assortment of beers on tap. That’s really all I required when the weather was like this—a patio and beer. Though being sticky was never fun, I always took advantage of the sun and heat whenever I could, thanks to Vancouver’s mild and rainy weather. You’d never hear me complaining about hot weather.

“It will be nice to see them again,” Mateo remarked to me as we waited to cross the street. When the coast was clear, he grabbed my hand and led me across the road. It was the little things like that that made me do an internal squee, that got the butterflies racing. I loved it when he held my hand or put his arm around my waist in public.

It especially meant something to me because I often saw the looks that other people gave us, the sight of the business man with the tattooed girl. The men looked envious and the women looked disgusted. The good thing was that Mateo certainly didn’t look thirty-eight, so really, it wasn’t that scandalous, people just liked any reason to pass judgment. It also helped that Mateo started dressing down a lot more, like he did at Las Palabras—his signature “business” look was jeans and a blazer—and I’d made sure to start dressing up. It wasn’t a stretch for me, especially in the summer—I loved a good sundress.

“Look who it is, the Anglo and the Spaniard!” I heard Claudia yell from across the square. Sure enough, there was Claudia and Ricardo, getting out of their chairs, big smiles on their faces. Claudia looked radiant, her skin deeply tanned, wearing a plain green v-neck and a white skirt. Ricardo was clean-shaven, and in shorts and a soccer jersey.

I hugged her and we exchanged pecks on the cheek. “You look great,” I told her, looking her up and down.

“So do you. Like Marilyn Monroe,” she said. I was wearing a white retro-styled dress with cherries on it. I wasn’t sure if I looked Marilyn or just very Rockabilly. Either way, the boobs were definitely getting some sun.