Chapter 7 Sunset Sparks

Amelia Noah POV

I change outfits three times before admitting what I'm doing.

The blue sundress gets discarded for being too eager. The black cocktail dress feels like I'm trying too hard. I finally settle on a white linen dress that splits the difference—effortless but intentional, the kind of thing someone might wear to dinner whether they're meeting a charming British photographer or not.

It's just dinner. Casual. Two travelers sharing a meal.

I'm putting on mascara for the fourth time when my phone buzzes with David's text: Table's reserved for 7:30. Meet you in the lobby?

My fingers hover over the keyboard. I could still cancel. Claim exhaustion, a headache, sudden commitment to my solo journey. Instead, I type: See you there.

The woman in the mirror looks nervous. Hopeful. Exactly like someone who hasn't learned her lesson about charming men and easy conversations.

The lobby glows with evening light filtering through floor-to-ceiling windows. David stands near the entrance in a white button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, dark jeans that look effortlessly expensive. He's studying something on his phone, his profile sharp against the golden hour.

Then he sees me, and his entire expression shifts.

"You look lovely," he says, and it doesn't sound like a line.

"Thanks." I gesture to his outfit. "You clean up well yourself."

"I do own one shirt without camera strap wear." He offers his arm with mock formality. "Shall we? The reservation's at that place I mentioned—walking distance if you don't mind the stairs."

"I think I can manage. Especially with my designated step-guardian."

His laugh is warm, genuine. "I take my guardian duties very seriously."

We descend through the resort's terraced levels as the sun paints everything amber and rose. Other couples pass us on their way to dinner, and I catch a few envious glances from women who clearly appreciate David's aesthetic appeal. The observation should bother me, but instead it feels oddly validating—like I made a choice that others recognize as worthwhile.

Stop it, I tell myself. This isn't a competition. He's not a prize.

But my hand rests lightly in the crook of his elbow anyway.

The restaurant perches on a quieter section of the caldera rim, away from the main tourist clusters. White tablecloths and blue-cushioned chairs, candles already flickering in glass hurricanes, the scent of grilled fish and wild oregano.

"David!" The owner embraces him like family. "You didn't tell me you were bringing someone special tonight."

"This is Amelia," David says smoothly, ignoring the 'special' comment. "First time to Greece. I promised her the best food on the island."

"Then you came to the right place." The owner—Dimitris, according to his enthusiastic introduction—seats us at a corner table with an unobstructed view of the water. "I'll bring you the good wine. The one I don't list on the menu."

"You know everyone here," I observe once we're alone.

"I've spent enough time in Santorini that the locals have decided I'm not entirely terrible." He picks up the menu, though I suspect he already knows it by heart. "Dimitris's wife makes the best spanakopita I've ever had. Outside of my Greek grandmother's kitchen, which she'd kill me for saying."

"You have a Greek grandmother?"

"Quarter Greek on my father's side. Enough for Yaya to insist I'm basically Athenian, not enough to actually speak the language properly." He grins. "She'd love this place. All the drama of family recipes and competition with neighboring tavernas."

Dimitris returns with wine the color of pale honey, pouring generous glasses while rattling off specials in rapid Greek that David translates with surprising fluency for someone who claims to be dangerous with the language.

"The grilled octopus is mandatory," David says. "And if you trust me—which you shouldn't, we barely know each other—the lamb kleftiko is life-changing."

"Bold claim."

"I stand by it."

We order both, plus spanakopita and some vegetable dish I can't pronounce but David promises is essential. The wine tastes like sunshine and volcanic soil and something indefinably Greek.

"So," David leans back in his chair, completely at ease. "Marketing executive. What does that actually mean when you're not being mysterious about it?"

"It means I convince people to want things they didn't know they needed."

"That sounds either incredibly cynical or brutally honest."

"Both?" I take another sip of wine. "I work for a firm that handles luxury brands. Hotels, resorts, high-end travel experiences. We create the narrative that makes people willing to spend four thousand dollars on a week in Santorini."

His eyebrows lift. "Is that what you spent?"

The question is direct but not judgmental. I should deflect, make a joke. Instead, I say: "Every penny of my savings. This trip is either the best decision I've ever made or evidence of a complete mental breakdown."

"Maybe both?" He mirrors my earlier response with a smile. "The best decisions often look like breakdowns from the outside."

"Is that what your photography career was? A breakdown disguised as a decision?"

"Oh, absolutely." He refills our wine glasses from the bottle Dimitris left. "I was supposed to be a proper solicitor like my father. Oxford law degree, position waiting at his firm, sensible girlfriend who'd already picked our wedding venue."

"What happened?"

"I realized I'd rather eat glass than spend my life arguing contract disputes." He says it lightly, but something shadows his expression. "So I bought a camera, broke up with Properly Sensible Charlotte, and told my father I was taking a gap year to 'find myself.'"

"How'd that go over?"

"About as well as you'd expect. My father's still waiting for me to come to my senses. It's been eight years."

The spanakopita arrives, steaming and perfect, followed by a parade of dishes that transform our small table into a Greek feast. David orders more wine without asking, and I don't protest because this—the food, the view, the conversation—feels exactly right.

"Tell me about the Hartfield campaign," he says between bites of octopus. "You mentioned it on the phone with your sister, in the lobby earlier. You sounded proud when you said it."

I'm startled he remembers such a small detail. "You were eavesdropping?"

"I was standing nearby. There's a difference." His eyes hold mine. "But you deflected. Which means it matters to you."

He's right. I did deflect. Because talking about work with Marcus always felt like bragging, like I was trying too hard to be impressive. He'd change the subject or check his phone or make some comment about me being "obsessed" with my job.

"Hartfield makes watches," I say carefully. "Luxury timepieces that cost more than most people's cars. They wanted to expand into the younger luxury market without alienating their traditional clientele."

"Sounds impossible."

"That's what everyone said." I'm leaning forward now, animated. "But I pitched this campaign around 'time as investment'—not just money, but how you spend your actual hours. We featured young entrepreneurs, artists, adventurers. People who wore these watches while doing meaningful work, not just displaying wealth."

"And it worked?"

"Their sales increased forty-two percent in the target demographic." I can't keep the pride from my voice. "The campaign won three industry awards."

"That's brilliant." He says it like he means it, like he's actually impressed rather than just being polite. "You took something that could have been tone-deaf and made it aspirational without being obnoxious. That's rare."

The validation hits differently than I expected. Not because I need his approval, but because he engaged with the actual strategy, asked real questions, understood why the campaign mattered beyond just numbers.

"What about you?" I ask. "What's the best thing you've photographed?"

He considers this seriously. "There's a small island off the Croatian coast—barely inhabited, mostly just sheep and wildflowers. I spent three weeks there documenting the last family of traditional weavers. The grandmother was ninety-three, teaching her great-granddaughter patterns that hadn't changed in centuries."

His phone appears in his hand, and he swipes through images that make my throat tight. An elderly woman's hands, weathered and precise, working a wooden loom. A child watching with fierce concentration. The finished textiles glowing with natural dyes and geometric patterns.

"These are stunning," I say. "Where did they run?"

"They didn't." He pockets the phone. "That's the problem with art versus commerce. Magazines want the pretty beach shots, the luxury resort spreads. Nobody wants to pay for three weeks of documenting dying traditions."

"So you paid for it yourself?"

"I did." He shrugs. "Some things matter more than getting published."

The lamb arrives, and he's right—it's transformative. We eat in comfortable silence punctuated by appreciative sounds, the kind of quiet that feels intimate rather than awkward.

"Can I ask you something?" David says eventually. "You said this trip was about proving you could be happy alone. But you're here. Having dinner. With me."

The observation hangs between us, accusatory and fair.

"I'm still figuring out what 'alone' means," I admit. "Whether it's about physical solitude or just not making someone else the center of my emotional universe."

"That's a good distinction." He traces the rim of his wine glass. "The ex-boyfriend—Marcus, was it?—did he make you feel like your emotions were too much?"

The accuracy startles me. "How did you—"

"You mentioned he called you suffocating. That's code for 'I want the benefits of a relationship without the emotional responsibility.'" His voice carries an edge I haven't heard before. "My ex did something similar. Said I was 'too intense' about things that didn't matter. Turned out she meant anything that mattered to me."

"Properly Sensible Charlotte?"

"The very same." He raises his glass. "To terrible exes who did us the favor of leaving."

I clink my glass against his. "To terrible exes."

The wine and conversation flow together, time becoming elastic. We talk about books—he loves Margaret Atwood, I defend Donna Tartt. About travel disasters—my lost luggage in Barcelona, his food poisoning in Morocco. About the strange intimacy of being strangers who can say true things because there's no history to protect.

Somewhere during dessert—baklava that tastes like honey and childhood—he says: "I'd love to photograph you tomorrow. If you're comfortable with it."

"Photograph me?"

"At sunset. You have good bones. Interesting face. The kind that catches light well." He says it clinically, professionally. "No obligation. But I think we could create something special."

My marketing brain recognizes what he's doing—making me feel seen, selected, special. But my treacherous heart responds anyway.

"I've never modeled before."

"You don't have to model. Just be yourself in beautiful light." He leans forward, and his eyes hold that intensity I noticed this morning. "Say yes. Let me show you how I see you."

The words should sound like a line. Instead, they sound like a promise.

"Maybe," I say, which we both know means yes.

Later, walking back through lamp-lit streets, our shadows stretching long across white-washed walls, he doesn't take my hand. Doesn't press for more than this—dinner, conversation, the promise of tomorrow's sunset.

At the resort entrance, he pauses. "Thank you for tonight. For taking a chance on dinner with a stranger."

"Thank you for the life-changing lamb."

"I told you." His smile could sell anything—watches, dreams, the idea that maybe I'm not too much but just enough. "I never make false promises about Greek food."

He walks away toward his wing of the resort, and I watch until he disappears around a corner.

In my suite, I stand on the terrace with the remains of wine warmth in my veins and the night air cool on my skin. My phone shows 11:47 PM. Four hours of dinner that felt like forty minutes.

This is dangerous, I think. This easy conversation, this feeling of being understood, this seductive possibility that maybe David Sterling is different from every man who came before.

But my journal remains closed on the nightstand.

And when I finally sleep, I dream of cameras and sunset light and the way his eyes crinkled when he laughed at my terrible joke about Greek philosophers.

Tomorrow I'll be more careful. Tomorrow I'll remember why I came here.

Tonight, I let myself feel hopeful.