Felix and the Prince (Forever Wilde 2)

“We’re okay. Everything is fine,” he told Jon in a soothing voice. The big guy studied the pair of us as if looking for signs of trouble.

“You sure, Your Hi…” He seemed to grit his teeth before continuing. “Hi… hidey-hole is warm enough? It’s awfully cold outside,” Jon stammered.

Lio’s eyes narrowed at him. “Is that right?”

Jon rolled his eyes before grunting and turning around to walk back outside.

I looked up at Lio. “What was that about?”

“He’s protective.”

“And weird,” I muttered under my breath. Lio laughed and squeezed his arms around me before dropping a kiss on my head and letting me go.

“Let me get something warm inside you.”

I gulped. Surely he didn’t mean…

“This is like a fish stew,” Lio said, pulling a container out of the basket.

Oh right. Something warm like soup.

“It smells good,” I said with a cough. “What’s in it besides fish?”

“Tomatoes, garlic, onion, black olives. All the good stuff,” he said with a wink in my direction. The wink made my heart do little twirly things.

“Sounds delicious. You said it was a Monaco specialty?” I wondered if I sounded as awkward as I felt.

“Yes. And this is a recipe that has been in my father’s family for a very long time. Mari has made it for me for years.”

I helped him unpack the supplies from the basket and set out soup bowls, spoons, and water bottles.

“There are only two of everything,” I said with a frown. “What about Jon?”

“He already ate.”

Something about the Jon situation seemed off to me, but I didn’t dwell on it. I inhaled the steamy aroma of the soup as Lio ladled it into the pair of bowls on the table, and I moaned after bringing the first spoonful up to my lips.

“This is amazing,” I admitted. “Beats the hell out of chili any day.”

Lio laughed and settled onto the bench beside me. We still wore our bulky coats, but as the fire took hold in the nearby fireplace and the warm soup hit my stomach, I realized I could take off my hat and scarf. Lio did the same.

“I brought some wine but didn’t know if it would make you too cold,” he said. “Would you like some?”

“No, I’m good with the water and coffee. I’m kind of a coffee junkie if you want to know the truth.”

“Is that right? Why is that, do you think? Just like the taste of it?”

“No. Well, yes, I do. But I got addicted to it when I started graduate school. I was juggling two specialties—art history and glassmaking. All the time spent between the library and the studio meant little time left over for sleep.”

“Mari told me you were here as a student. Are you studying Gadleigh glass as part of your master’s?”

“My doctoral dissertation,” I corrected. “I finished my master’s a few years ago.”

Lio set his spoon down and shifted until he was facing me. “You’re pursuing a PhD in glassmaking?”

I felt my face heat up with embarrassment. “It’s actually a PhD in chemistry. My hope is to teach at a university as a professor instead of a TA.”

“Why would a chemistry professor come study at Gadleigh?”

“Well, the study of chemistry is part of glassmaking, which is my real love. The chemistry of the different minerals creating the various colors of glass. Gadleigh boasts the most unique sand mineral combinations on the planet. It’s one of the reasons Gadleigh is known for its glass. It’s always been a dream of mine to come visit the island in person and study the glass up close. I’m kind of a stained glass nut.”

Lio’s face relaxed into a smile. “Well, then, you’ve certainly come to the right place.”

“Right. And that’s why I made the mistake of pressing the jewel in the floor earlier today. I couldn’t keep my stupid hands off it,” I confessed. “It’s just so… exquisite.”

I found myself gazing past Lio’s face into the warm light of the fire. The colors of the flames were their own study in chemistry, and I began to babble.

“The gold that’s prevalent on the beaches here makes the most amazing shade of rose. But when you combine it with the neodymium, you get a completely different result. The fact that the island is controlled by a singular owner who won’t allow the gold to be mined for its cash value means it can go into the glass. Obviously, it’s rare to get glass with gold used in its coloration. That’s one of the reasons Gadleigh glass is so unique. And there’s also erbium here, which was originally discovered in Sweden. That gives the glass a lighter pink coloration than the gold.”

“Go on,” Lio said, encouraging me. “Tell me more.”

Rather than second-guess myself, I took the opportunity to talk about something I loved. “These beaches have magical sand,” I explained with a grin. The subject made me a little giddy. “It’s like a glassmaker’s wet dream. So, one of the main ways of coloring glass is by adding metal oxides, which absorb certain wavelengths of light. Manganese, one of the metals found in the sand here, can be used to achieve a lovely purple color. There’s also a coloration process using heat treatment to create colloidal properties. The colloidal properties basically scatter light in the glass to cause the color effects. Then a third way of coloring glass is simply to add already colored particles to the glass. Milk glass is made this way by adding tin oxide.”