Page 44 of Catch a Kiwi
Did I think, driving home from Owaka after my shift, about Roman? About how hard his body was in his swim trunks, about the water beading on that bronze skin and the breadth of his shoulders and chest? I tried not to. I focused onremembering the icy-hot shock of the water on my skin, so cold it was nearly painful, and the roller-coaster almost-terrifying sensation of diving under a wave and feeling the water take me in its grip and tumble me, and how I’d clambered to my feet again against the pull of the outgoing tide, laughing, and found Roman beside me, watching for me. Every time. How I’d asked him to help me, and he had.
Wait. That was the part Iwasn’tthinking about. That, and standing next to him in the kitchen as I pressed paninis on the stove’s built-in griddle and he heated soup in bowls, and how, when he stepped around me in the confined space, he’d put a hand lightly on my low back, so faintly I almost wouldn’t have felt it, except that I felt it. How his eyes had smiled when his mouth hadn’t, listening to Delilah complain, and how his face had looked when I’d told him thanks for the swim. Softer. Harder. Something.
Intense. That was the word. He’d looked intense.
Stop it. You’re a good-looking woman, and he’s used to going to bed with good-looking women. With good-looking women who are living in his house? He’s completely used to it. That doesn’t make him your prince.
I wasn’t exactly relaxed, coming down the drive and getting out of the car. And when I walked up to the house and saw him sitting on the patio in the fading light, the sky already tinged with pink, I really wasn’t relaxed. Even though that was how he looked. His long bare legs stuck out in front of him, his feet crossed at the ankles and resting on another chair, his laptop on the table, scrolling through a document with a slight frown on his face.
I said, “Hi.”
He looked up. “Hi. Good night?”
“Yeah.” I dropped down beside him, because why not? Why shouldn’t I take a minute and enjoy his company without overthinking it? “How about you? You look busy.”
He shut the laptop. “I’ve done enough for now. Want a glass of wine? I’ve waited for mine, and it sounds good. Some of that pizza? Got a pretty good salad as well.”
“You really made it.” I was absurdly gratified.
“Told you I would. I think I mentioned that I keep my promises. Did you believe in me enough not to eat dinner already, that’s the question.”
“Well, yes,” I said. “I did. Believe in you.” It felt like an admission. I reached back and took the tie out of my hair and shook it out. It was getting long, since I hadn’t been excited about paying for haircuts, and shaking it out made me feel a little like the sea had today. Lighter. Freer. Like the person I wanted to be and had never managed to find.
“Five minutes, then,” Roman said, and went into the house.
I could have gone in with him, said hi to Delilah. I didn’t, because … because the low lights in the landscaping had come on with the fall of dusk, and were shining up into the well-tamed greenery in the beds around the turquoise gem that was the salt-water pool. Light and shadow on ferns and subtropical plants edged by artfully placed boulders, with fern trees, lemonwood, and peppertrees rising above them, while a fountain splashed its way down rocks that looked as natural as a waterfall, burbling away with that watersong that’s more relaxing than any music. Below the house, green hills undulated down to the sea, the corrugated folds of water glowing aqua with the sunset, the wisps of cloud at the horizon tinged with purple and pink. Roman had lit the outdoor fireplace, too, and it was warm against my side, taking away the evening chill. I slipped off my shoes and socks, put my feet on another chair in the same way he had, and let myself drift with the day. And, possibly, let myself feel that this was a little romantic. Which I wasn’t interested in, but how long had it been since a guy had cooked for me? Had sat with me with Roman’s stillness, hissureness?
Never, that was how long. Never.
Sure enough, he came back with a tray. A plate of pizza showing the red, white, and green of the Italian flag, a bowl of salad, a bottle of wine, and glasses.
“See what you think,” he said after he’d poured two glasses of the straw-colored stuff. “Te Mata Cape Crest Sauvignon Blanc. Happened on it when I was working up in Hawke’s Bay. Quite nice, I find, especially for summer.”
I sipped. And sighed. “That’s so … I don’t know. Tropical? Creamy? Complicated? Like …”
“Mango and lime,” he said, and grinned when I looked at him in surprise. “I’m no connoisseur. I read the label.”
“Hawke’s Bay is in the North Island, though,” I said. Sauvignon Blanc wasn’t a very expensive wine varietal, but I’d bet this kind was. Not that it mattered to me. I wasn’t into rich-guy porn.
“You know your Aotearoa geography,” he said, sitting down beside me again. “I have a new wind field going up there. Probably.”
“Probably? Mmm, margherita pizza. Tomatoes and fresh basil and cheese; what could go wrong?” I took a bite and sighed. “Wow. That’s got the blackened bubbles on the crust and everything.”
“Pizza oven,” he said. “I told you. Don’t be too impressed. It takes about sixty seconds to cook. And ‘probably’ because the storm did some damage. We’re still working out how much.”
“Is that why you were tense earlier?” I asked. “What the phone call was about?” He was being so open tonight, with none of that hard look, was why I asked.
“No,” he said. OK. Notthatopen.
“Which wife was this house?” I asked, folding my nextslice of pizza in half so I could preserve some dignity, mess-wise, while still gobbling it down. I could tease him out of it, maybe. “Somebody who liked pizza, obviously. Let me tell you, it’s not easy to be arm-candy hot and enjoy your pizza. If she could manage it, she’s a better woman than me.”
“She could afford it,” Roman said, but his face had lost the tautness. “First wife. Audrey. Adventure racer. Very keen.”
“Oh,” I said. “Not so much the arm candy, then.”
“No. Well, yeh, she was hot, if you like strong women. Which I do. Pretty driven, though. Like me.”
“Which you thought would work,” I said, and when he glanced at me, “Hey. It’s a conversational topic. Remember, I was married to a professional athlete myself. We can do group therapy.”
