“Yes,” he said as he filled our glasses again. “If you fancy them that much.”
“I definitely fancy them. I’ve been dreaming of those for years.” I twisted in my seat and tucked my legs underneath me. “She was always smiling, I do remember that.”
“She’s an amazing woman. Both my parents are great people,” he said fondly.
“Call her. She’s worried. Okay?”
“I did.”
“Oh? Good.”
Ian chuckled, and I looked to him in question.
“Are you feeling a little loose then, Koti?”
I realized then I was rocking back and forth to the beat of the music. And I don’t mean casually, I mean shoulders and head into it like the guys from Night at the Roxbury.
“Oh, crap.” I pressed an embarrassed hand to my forehead. “I do it at the store too. It’s in my genes.”
“Your father is a musician, right?”
“No, he was a sound engineer, mostly for reunion concerts. He was the guy with the big soundboard in the middle of the crowd. He did a lot of reunion tours for seventies and eighties rock bands.”
“Oh,” he said perking up a bit in his lazy seat. “Anyone I would know?”
“All of them,” I said without missing a beat. “I’m not kidding. All of them.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah, my favorite was Stevie Nicks. She is incredible.”
“So, your father knew rock stars and your mother was a model. Some childhood you must’ve had.”
“Yeah, their life.” I shrank in my seat. “Not mine.”
He smirked at me. “And you are the castaway.”
“And loving it.”
He raised a brow. “Right,” he said as he lifted his glass, “to the castaways.”
“To the black sheep.”
“Baaaa,” Ian belted out and we both burst into laughter.
“You look like you’re shedding a little wool,” I noted, glancing at his rapidly slimming physique.
“Yeah, and it’s hell,” he said, patting his stomach. “While you’re clearing naked dead men from rentals, I’m hauling my ass down the beach regretting about a thousand fast meals I ate during my divorce.”
“That bad?” I asked.
“That bad,” he muttered tonelessly as he studied the fire.
I picked up the wine this time. “But it didn’t kill you.”
“No, no it didn’t.”
So, what did?
Just on the tip of my tongue lay the intrusive words but there was no way I was breaking up the carefree vibe. I needed a reprieve from my own shit, just as much if not more than Ian did from anything that had to do with his hurts and I wasn’t about to stir things up. I’d watched him tax his troubles for weeks. And I considered every smile, every laugh that erupted out of him a small miracle.
“You know, professor, every day I woke up when I got here… I was just numb. I’d been blindsided. It took me weeks to truly see the ocean and feel the sun on my face.”
“I’m there.” We exchanged a long look before he spoke. “It’s a shame it wasn’t the flying sand ball that did the trick.” He smirked before he took a sip of wine.
“Yeah,” I winced. “Not my finest moment. I’m sorry.”
“I deserved it.” He hesitated. “I have to admit, I was a bit resentful toward you when I arrived.”
I gawked at him. “What in the world for?”
He leaned in toward me. “You know.”
“No clue. My great taste in music?”
“No, I kind of like your nightly concerts,” he said pensively. “You just…”
“Yes?” I drew out the word.
“You were all sunshine and smiles, just so fucking happy,” he said with slight humor. “I wanted no part of it, still don’t. I’m allergic.”
“How inconsiderate of me.” Still, his words stunned me and inwardly I beamed at his confession.
He gauged my repressed elation. “I don’t expect you to apologize for being happy, Koti.”
“Ha!” I said remembering my episode earlier that day. “Please don’t take this the wrong way but you have no idea what you’re saying.”
“I’m pretty sure I may sneeze if you smile any wider. I can count your teeth.”
“It’s the wine.”
“You’re happy here,” he said looking back at our matching houses. “And I want some of that for myself.”
I sat up in my seat, leaned over and gripped his hand. He flinched and turned to face me. “It’s already yours.”
He shook his head in disbelief. “You’re so sure.”
“I am. Trust me, okay?”
He pushed the hair that stuck to my gloss away from my lips. And it took every bit of strength I had not to lean into his touch.
“You sure about everything, Koti?”
Buzzed, I willed myself away from his lingering fingers. “Lord, no. I had an anxiety attack today when I saw a dead man on a sun chair. I’m afraid of my own shadow some days and I blur out the bad parts as quick as they come, but I know this island and it’s magical healing powers. This has nothing to do with me. I don’t have the answer to anything. But here, this place is where everything wrong can be made right.”
“I’ll just choose to believe you.”
“Hmmm, you’re a skeptic.”
“Realist.”
“Okay, tell me this. Of all the places in the world you could have fled to, why did you come here?”
Ian sat back and harrumphed. “I never thought about it.”
“Because you remember being happy here.”
“I guess so.”
“Me too. I hadn’t been back since I was seventeen. And now onto s’mores.”
Ian chuckled. “Well, that’s random.”
“No, I’m buzzing, and this is s’mores. I take them seriously.” I grabbed the metal skewers from my bag and divided the ingredients between our laps. With practiced precision, I loaded a skewer with marshmallows and stuck it in the fire. Ian waited with a loaded cracker.
“Here, spread that on one of the crackers.”
“Nutella?”
“Yep, and chocolate. If I’m feeling wild, I’ll use Ferrero Rocher.”
“You do take this seriously.”
I placed a bubbling marshmallow on his cracker and pushed it toward his mouth.
“Ladies first,” he said pushing it my way.
“That one’s yours.”
I put my own s’more together in seconds and shoveled it into my mouth. I was ravenous because I’d missed lunch and dinner.
“Holy shit,” he said with a mouth full of goodness, “that’s delicious.”
I waggled my brows with my own mouth full and chewed.
His full smile had my heart pounding.
I’d told Jasmine he was handsome.
I was such a liar.
Ian Kemp was beautiful at fourteen. He was gorgeous when he was twenty-five and stood on his parents’ porch waving at me before he left me with a crush. At thirty-eight, he was devastating, sitting next to me watching me inhale my dessert.
“More wine to wash that down?”
“Please,” I said extending my glass.
The breeze kicked up at that moment and neither of us saw the tide had come in until a rogue wave came through and wiped out our fire.
Ian leapt to his feet and swept me out of the chair just before the gasping flames licked my dress.
His hands were all over me as he checked to make sure I was unharmed. I squirmed beneath him as I saw the bag with my dinner began to wash out to sea.
“Damnit!” I dropped my shoulders, helpless as we both watched the tide’s greedy retreat and I managed to reclaim my soaked bag.
Ian gripped the corked wine and brushed it off before he presented it to me with a wry smile.
“Well, grapes are in a food group,” I sighed nodding at his offering. “Come on, I have more of them.”
“You sure love your wine,” he said following me up the stairs into my house.
“My only vice.”
Inside my house, I lit candles and turned down the music. Ian stood unsure at my kitchen counter.
“What?”
“I hope I haven’t given you the wrong impression.” He glanced at the candles and then back at me.
It had been an eternity since I’d entertained a man sexually, it took me a second to catch on. “Yeah, uh, I light candles every day of my life.” I clicked on a lamp. “It’s an anxiety thing.” I turned to face him head-on. “But, should I be pissed you don’t want to make love to me with all this highly romantic ambiance?” I lifted my hands, palms up.
He sheepishly put the bottle on the counter and moved to find glasses.