Page 32 of Kiwi Gold
“Yeh,” he said. “I heard you. But I have a feeling that I’ll enjoy the hell out of it until it does.”
14
RULE NUMBER ONE
Laila
I made it through the rest of the barbecue by not looking at Lachlan too much. He didn’t stay with me after the meal, but joined the kids in the cricket game and offered to bowl. Not making a big deal of it, but seeming to enjoy himself.
Amira and Yasmin hung around the edges, watching, until he noticed, handed off the bowling duties to Poppy’s son, Hamish, then jogged over and crouched down to talk to the girls.
I wanted to know what he was saying, and I didn’t want to care. His face was serious, and then he was smiling, putting a hand on Amira’s shoulder, and eventually, taking back the bowling duties.
And bowling to the girls. Making it clear to the other kids, somehow, that this was happening, and they needed to wait their turns, without making a big deal of that, either. He was the most natural, low-key in-charge male I’d ever met, and it was making me melt.
While he was coaching mychildren.Encouraging them, and teaching them, the same way he’d taught me to dance last night. The same way he’d taught his sisters cricket, I was sure of it. Yasmin was smiling, a little shyly, and then he bowled to her, so softly, and she hit the ball, looked surprised, and laughed. Delighted. Blooming under his attention like a flower turning toward the sun.
And, yes, I was looking at Lachlan even though I was meant to be chatting with Poppy and Matiu. Fortunately, Lachlan wasn’t looking at me, so he didn’t know.
The very moment I thought it, he caught my eye and smiled. Not much, just a flash of a thing, before I looked away in a hurry.
Poppy said, “What’s got you so distracted today? You look very pretty, by the way. Never seen you this …”
Uncovered,she meant. Or possibly,inappropriately dressed.I said, “Yeh, wrong clothes. They’re my best, though, so …” And then faltered, wondering how I explained that I was wearing my best clothes to a barbecue.
“Uh-huh,” she said, and glanced over at Lachlan herself. She may have seen me watching. “What happened last night, exactly? I heard there was a fight. Didn’t see it, though. Did you? Why do I always miss the exciting part?”
I said, “Oh, well. I’m sure it was nothing. Uh, so I …” I wasn’t sure how to tell her. I wasn’t sure why Iwantedto tell her. “I met Lachlan last night. Well, you know that. Obviously. So I …” How did you go on?
Matiu said, “Am I listening to this? Or not?” Looking, as always, smooth, assured, and amused. I wasn’t sure how Poppy managed it. He was as charming as any man I’d ever met and as good-looking as Jax, very nearly beautiful in that sculpted Maori way, and he did nothing but rattle me.
Poppy said, “Not. Go away, please.” Upon which he laughed and ambled off, if you could call the coordinated way he moved “ambling,” and Poppy said, “I’ll probably tell him later. Fair warning. Matiu never tells, though. Heaps of practice with discretion, being a doc. But if it’sreallysecret, if you want to talk about … positions, or sex toys, or post-sex etiquette or something, I can keep it to myself. Just tell me what the secret parts are. But don’t ask me the thing about sex toys, actually. I don’t know much about sex toys, and I know less than that about post-sex etiquette. Matiu knows about all of it, of course, since he was pretty slutty before. It’s quite astonishing, his range of knowledge, so if youdoneed advice …”
I’d been trying to cut her off since about Sentence Two of that. “No,” I finally managed to say. “No, no, no. My first time around the track, and you put me in the Olympic hurdles? No. But—do people really do all those things? I mean, normal people?”
“Only the lucky ones,” Poppy said. “Not my first husband. Not yours, either, eh.”
“Uh … no. He was very … focused.” I’d never talked about Kegan that way. Who would I have told? My dad? A girlfriend? I hadn’t told Poppy much in high school, probably because there hadn’t been much to tell. I could manage it even less now, because I understood now how odd I was.
“Focused on something other than you, you mean,” Poppy said. “Or somebody. I know about that, too.”
No. I couldn’t. When I’d been married, especially after the girls, I hadn’t wanted to share my disappointment, or my … frustrations. I’d reckoned they were normal, or if they weren’t, it was because I didn’t know how to be fascinating and sexually alluring. Also, I’d realized by then that men didn’t think your total lack of sexual experience was a precious gift. They weren’t honored and humbled to be the first man to touch you that way, like my mum had told me. They were impatient with your shyness, and that was about all.
Shame. Shame could make you mute. Which made it even harder to share this. The dating school idea would end soon enough, and the fewer people who knew about it, the easier on my pride. As in,zeropeople. Other than the girls, and I could tell them …
That we were friends. That was it. Friends. You went out with friends.
Got me on my knees, and so forth,Lachlan had said. That was a no.
“So what did you want to ask me?” Poppy asked. “Whether Lachlan’s a good bloke? He seems like one today, and Jax says yes, but men’s friendships, eh. Especially when one of them’s a soldier on deployment, and the other one is … whatever Lachlan was, back then. And how much does Jax know about Lachlan, really? That they both like cricket, probably. Or women. Even worse. My brother was pretty slutty himself, I have a feeling. Two men, far from home in the Middle East, sexual frustration, R&R … He may be a bit high-octane for you, I’m thinking. Different goals for a relationship, and so forth. What can I help with, though?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Nothing. I’m fine.”
* * *
Lachlan
Laila was quiet on the drive home. Maybe tired, and maybe regretting our bargain. I could’ve asked her if she wanted to change her mind, but I didn’t. I wasn’t all that noble, was why. I wanted to be her dating coach.
