Page 80 of Love Is: Two Bodies One Soul

ChapterTwenty-Seven

Sawan– Saturday 22nd October

Owen stood beside Lexie, watching the helicopter rise into a clear blue evening sky. Alone now, he thought – a peculiar mixture of excitement and trepidation churning inside him. Despite the warmth, Lexie shivered. Owen turned to her, worried what the shiver might mean. Was she having second thoughts? He slipped his hands around her waist, pulling her close, wanting to do more but only asking. ‘You okay, Lex?’

‘I’m fine.’ She smiled. God, that smile! It was like bathing in sunlight. He pulled her closer. She rested her head against his shoulder. A loose blonde curl caught the breeze and fluttered across his mouth. ‘It’s exciting, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘I can’t wait to explore.’

‘It’s going to be great.’ He rubbed his face into her curls and breathed in deeply. ‘I don’t think I have the words to tell you how pleased I am that you’re here with me.’

She murmured, ‘Me too.’

He held her in silence for a moment longer, pondering on the sheer wonder of being in love, before he put aside a need to kiss her properly, and forced himself to be practical. ‘We’d better get the camp set up. It’ll be dark soon.’

‘Okay,’ she stepped out of his hold and clapped her hands together, signalling readiness to join in. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Will you make supper while I get the tents up?’

‘Tents?’ she queried, following him to the kit that had been unloaded from the helicopter.

‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘Was that sexist?’ He glanced at her and, with a grunt, heaved a giant tarp roll out of the pile. ‘I didn’t mean it that way.’

‘And I didn’t take it that way,’ she laughed. ‘I was just wondering why we couldn’t share a tent?’

‘Oh, sorry. My mistake.’ He picked up the roll and walked a few paces, inspecting the ground, wondering why it felt like he was walking on eggshells. He and Lexie hadn’t had a disagreement for a whole week, so why did the potential for everything to go disastrously wrong seem so huge now they were alone together in Paradise?

‘Well?’

He dropped the roll on a suitably flat section of land and looked across at Lexie. She was standing, arms on hips, head tilted, both eyebrows arching at him, waiting for an answer to her question.

‘Sorry, no reason … except that it never really cools down here even at night. I thought maybe you’d want some space.’

She shook her head at him.

‘One tent it is then,’ he said. ‘If that’s what you want.’ Owen squatted to unfasten the tarp.

‘Of course, that’s what I want. Don’t you?’ He heard a slight doubt in her voice and looked across at her again. She’d dropped her hands to her sides. The breeze was lifting her curls. She looked so beautiful – so vulnerable. He felt out of his depth. One week into this thing with Lexie and he was already in deeper than he had ever planned to be with anyone. But still … there she was – needing his reassurance.

Leaving the unrolled tarpaulin, he sprang up and closed the space between them. ‘Definitely, it’s what I want.’ He pulled her into his arms. ‘I want to be with you all the time. But I want you to be comfortable. It will be hot in the tent. No air conditioning.’

‘I’ll take my chances.’ He leaned back and looked into the granite determination in her violet-blue eyes. There was no arguing with Lexie when she was certain of something. Hadn’t George said she was a young lady who couldn’t be forced to do something she did not want?

‘Then it’s decided,’ Owen said, tugging her close again and dropping a kiss into her curls. ‘We sleep together.’

* * *

LeavingOwen to put up their sleeping accommodation, Lexie went to find the makings for their supper and thirty minutes later, with the light fading and the sky turning a shade of pale purple, the meal was ready. Reconstituted dry vegetable curry and rice. Carrying the food, she wandered over to Owen, who was standing by the tent, looking doubtful.

‘It’s not very big,’ she said, eyeing the tent dubiously as she handed Owen his bowl of curry.

‘No, it isn’t.’ He looked at the tent again and then anxiously at her. ‘I can still sleep outside if you like?’

‘I don’t like.’

‘That’s all right then,’ Owen said, putting aside his supper. She saw a definite gleam in his eyes, as he took her bowl and placed it next to his.

‘Aren’t you hungry?’ she asked.

He pulled her into his arms. ‘Oh, my lovely Lex,’ he sighed and dropped his head against her shoulder, his lips gentle on her neck as he murmured, ‘I’m ravenous, for you. It was torture not being able to touch you during the flights.’

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