by Ann Mcintosh
“Niesha, this is my friend Mina. Mina, this is Niesha.”
“Hi,” Niesha said with a grin, but Mina thought her eyes were watchful. “You’re Kiah’s friend from Canada, right?”
“Yes,” Mina said, smiling in return, although it was the last thing she felt like doing.
“I don’t know how you stand the cold up there. I like things hot.”
The look she gave Kiah made it obvious she considered him one of those hot things she liked.
“It’s not so bad when you get used to it,” Kiah said, sending Mina a mischievous grin. “Although Mina always complained all through winter, and she was born there.”
Mina made a blah-blah-blah motion with her hand back at him, which made him laugh, then Niesha leaned toward him, pressing her ample bosom against his arm.
“While I remember, I’m putting together a team for the bank’s fund-raising 5K run. Join me?”
And after that Niesha dominated the conversation, leaving Mina mostly to her own thoughts, since they were talking about places and people she didn’t know. And when Kiah tried to draw her into the conversation, she resisted, albeit with a smile, unaccountably annoyed with him, although he’d really done nothing wrong.
* * *
Kiah glanced at his watch and decided to call it a night. He’d had more than enough of Niesha, who was loud, brassy and handsy, too. She’d dragged him onto the dance floor while he was on his way to the bar, and, as hard as he tried to keep a decent distance between them, she’d been all over him like polyester on a humid day.
Normally he didn’t think twice about dancing that way. But since Niesha had made it clear on several occasions that she was willing to have an intimate relationship with him, and Kiah wasn’t interested, it didn’t feel right to encourage her.
Worse, once back at the table, she’d totally taken over, hardly giving anyone else a chance to get a word in edgewise. He’d been unable to resist making the comparison between her and Mina, who didn’t need to slather on makeup or wear a barely-there outfit to be beautiful. And although she’d consumed a number of rum punches, Mina hadn’t gotten loud or boisterous, nor demanded the attention of everyone at the table be focused on her.
Even though he thought Mina was still too slender, he preferred her more subtle curves—her delicacy—to Niesha’s buxom figure.
But he was going to have to have some sharp words with Henkel, who was hanging all over Mina as if he was about to smother her. Not that Mina seemed to particularly mind, since she just laughed and had a joking reply to most of his advances.
Kiah didn’t know why seeing the other man whispering in Mina’s ear made him so annoyed, but it definitely had to stop.
As soon as he said they were leaving, both Niesha and Henkel objected, but Kiah didn’t bother arguing with them. Instead he put his arm around Mina’s shoulders and, with a last round of goodbyes, led her out of the club.
“You can stay, if you want,” she said, once they were outside. “No need to leave on my account.”
Kiah paused. “Did you want to stay?”
“No, but I can grab a cab home, if you wanted to go back in. Niesha seemed very disappointed that you were leaving so soon.”
Kiah started walking again, tugging Mina along with him, his arm still over her shoulders. She was walking steadily, but he’d seen how many rum punches she’d drunk, and wasn’t taking any chances. The unpaved, gravel-covered parking lot was uneven. “I can’t help that. Besides, I’m really not interested in her.”
“She’s very beautiful.”
Kiah snorted. “Not my type.”
They’d gotten to the car but before he could open her door, Mina turned her back to it, blocking the handle. “Kiah, when was the last time you had a relationship?”
She knew the answer, he was sure, but he replied anyway. “Not since Valerie and I broke up. Why?”
She didn’t reply to his question, just tilted her head to one side, her shadowed gaze searching his. In the faint light from the street, which cast her cheekbones and tender lips into sharp relief and made her eyes look wide and alluring, her face was mysterious.
“You never told me what happened between you. You’d sounded happy with her.”
Kiah rubbed at his cheek. This was the last thing he wanted to talk about, especially on the heels of their earlier conversation about Karlene and Roy.
“We had a parting of the ways, Mina.”
She huffed out a little breath, her lips curving, although she didn’t really look amused.
“What caused it, this parting of the ways?”
“We...disagreed on the advisability of my taking custody of Charm. Valerie was very up-front about not wanting to raise another person’s child.”
“Wow.” Mina sounded genuinely shocked. “So what did she think should happen to Charm, then, if you didn’t take custody?”
“I don’t think she much cared.”
Mina scowled. “That’s the worst thing I’ve heard in...in forever. I hope you told her where to get off.”
He couldn’t help the bitter, rueful bark of pseudo laughter he gave. “I’m afraid I did, and I’m not proud of it. I hadn’t lost my temper like that in years.”
Mina shook her head, her lips firming for an instant. “You’d just gone through the tragedy of Karlene’s death, and were under the stress of your mother and her nonsense. No one could blame you for losing it. Charm’s future was at stake.”
He blamed himself, though, for the loss of control, for expecting Valerie to be more supportive than she was. “I should have expected her reaction. She’d already told me she wasn’t interested in having children at all.”
“And you agreed with that? Before this...disagreement?”
Kiah nodded, watching Mina’s expression, wondering where she was going with this entire conversation.
“It didn’t really matter to me, whether we had kids or not. I actually would have preferred not to. You know I’ve always said that between my father dying so young and my mom’s emotional instability, it’s probably better these genes don’t get passed on. My thoughts on that haven’t changed.”
“Even though you’ve been tested for the congenital condition your father had?”
He noticed she didn’t mention his mother and was glad. He didn’t want to discuss her if he could help it, nor talk about how much of her he sometimes saw in himself. Like the night he and Valerie got into it, and he’d said some truly hurtful things before walking away, knowing he desperately needed to cool off.
“It’s not worth the risk,” he said. “I didn’t plan on it, but I have Charm to take care of, and that’s enough for me.”
“Is it really?” She held up her hand, as though knowing his answer already. “Forget I said anything. It’s the rum talking. I worry about you, want you to be happy.”
“I am.” Even as he said it, he realized it was true, and a lot of his present happiness came from being there just then, with her. “And I want the same for you.”
Something changed in her expression. If he didn’t know her as well as he did, he’d have missed it, but even so, he couldn’t interpret the emotion that suddenly shadowed her eyes and fractionally tightened her lips.
When she reached out and trailed her fingers along his cheek, so lightly they could have been butterfly wings, he froze, startled by the surge of emotion engendered by her tender caress.
“Let me tell you a secret,” she said, leaning in so her face was close enough that he could have kissed her, if he dared. “Sometimes it’s far easier to accept your limitations than it is to fight against them and get your heart broken.”
Before he realized her intention, Mina closed the gap between them and placed her lips on his. Soft and sweet and warm, they teased his mouth, moving ever so slightly, and now he recognized what he was feeling.
Desi
re.
Need.
But this was Mina.
Mina!
And although he wanted to pull her closer, deepen the kiss into something carnal and fierce, he held himself as still as possible, hardly daring to breathe, lest she figure out what he was feeling.
She pulled back, her gaze searching his, then she turned away, fumbling with the handle of the car door, saying, “Dammit, Kiah. You got me drunk again, and now you won’t take me home to bed.”
“Lawd,” he groaned, hoping she would think he was just grousing and not wishing he could do just that—take her home to his bed, and make love to her all night long.
And he knew she’d interpreted it the way he hoped when she laughed, and would have tumbled headfirst into the car if he hadn’t had a firm hold on her arm.
CHAPTER EIGHT
MINA AWOKE ON the morning after Kiah had taken her to the club by the beach, and lay staring at the ceiling, trying to sort through what had happened the night before. It was a complete departure from her usual self, almost beyond comprehension.
Why’d she been jealous of Niesha monopolizing Kiah’s time and dancing so erotically with him? It wasn’t as though she’d never seen Kiah flirting and dancing with women before. Hell, she’d teased him about his amorous adventures since they were fourteen or fifteen.
But last night had been different. She’d seethed, wanting his attention for herself, not on the beautiful, bountiful Niesha.
And then, if that weren’t bad enough, when they were standing in the parking lot, she’d had the overwhelming urge to kiss him, and she had. The jolt of awareness and desire rocketing through her body when their lips touched had made her sudden physical attraction toward him abundantly clear.
Rolling over onto her side, she stared sightlessly at the window.
She wished she could put it down to the rum, but she knew that while she’d been a little tipsy, she was nowhere near drunk enough to use the alcohol as an excuse.
And there’d been no reaction from him to the kiss. Not that she’d expected him to grab her and ravage her on the spot. That would have been ludicrous and hysterical. But wouldn’t he have at least tried to kiss her back, if the thought had even fractionally crossed his mind? And when she’d seen his expression afterward, it had been blank, with perhaps a hint of a question in his eyes.
No interest or passion.
Not even a touch.
The entire situation was embarrassing. And confusing.
Where had these feelings even come from?
Sighing, she sat up, since she could clearly hear the rest of the household stirring. Hopefully, Kiah would think nothing of what had happened between them, and look at the kiss as one of their usual friendly salutes. If he brought it up with her, she had no idea how to react, or what to tell him.
Thankfully, he didn’t mention it, and everything seemed normal, except for her heightened awareness of his every move.
Kiah came into the kitchen, where she was helping Miss Pearl fix breakfast, and asked, “Hey, you want to go for a drive after breakfast?”
“Sure,” she replied, although wondering if it was a way to get her alone to talk about the night before. Then she turned to Charm. “You coming with us, kiddo?”
Besides the fact that she enjoyed Charm’s company, the little girl would be a good buffer between Kiah and herself, until Mina could figure out what was going on inside her own head.
“Yes,” was the reply, laced with more eagerness than she’d expected. Then she understood why. “It’ll be much better than staying here and reading my history book. I have to do an essay, but it’s so boring.”
“Wasn’t my favorite subject, either,” Mina confessed. “But it’s important to understand why things in the past happened the way they did. You know the famous quote about forgetting the past, don’t you?”
“The one about having to repeat it?” she asked. When Mina nodded, Charm sighed. “Granny says it all the time. Usually when I make the same mistake twice.”
“If you’re tired of hearing it, then don’t make silly mistakes over and over again,” was Miss Pearl’s tart remark from over at the stove.
Charm wrinkled her nose, and Mina swallowed her chuckle. No sense in letting the old lady know her great-granddaughter was silently sassing her!
“When is your essay due?” Kiah asked.
“Not for two weeks,” Charm replied, turning her best begging face to her uncle. “I have lots of time.”
“Okay, you can come,” he said, continuing over her cry of jubilation, “but I want to see a first draft by the end of next week.”
“Can we stop at Salty’s and get roast corn?”
“Sure,” he said, earning another whoop from Charm.
The day was gorgeous, with just a few puffy clouds drifting overhead in the azure sky and a nice breeze coming off the coast. Port Michael, the capital of St. Eustace, was situated on the southeast side of the island, and Kiah turned the car east, following the road that hugged the coast.
Charm was in high spirits and carried on a running, largely one-sided commentary of the music she liked, TV shows she’d watched, and the latest drama going on at school. Kiah put in an observation or answered when necessary, leaving Mina to follow her own muddled thoughts.
But despite doing her best to appear as if nothing at all had changed, she found herself noticing little things about Kiah that she hadn’t really paid attention to for a long time.
The deep, warm timbre of his voice; the rumbling laughter that flowed from him so easily.
How broad his shoulders were, and how the muscles in his arms and legs flexed and relaxed beneath his clothes.
Those sensual hands, with their long fingers and broad palms.
The absolute, breathtaking beauty of his smile, and the way the corners of his eyes crinkled when he was amused.
In a strange way, it was like seeing him anew, all her favorite things about him enhanced and more appealing than ever.
Yet, she was sure she couldn’t, shouldn’t trust what she was feeling right now, as it could be just a by-product of the upheaval in her life. Coming to terms with the losses she’d sustained didn’t automatically inure her to the pain, and the fear of losing more. Maybe Kiah represented stability, and she was grasping at the safest straw she had, because she’d been adrift so long?
Thinking about it that way made her a little sad, and she sighed.
“Everything okay over there?”
Kiah’s question shook her out of her reverie, making her realize the conversation between him and Charm seemed to have stopped. She half turned to send him a smile.
“Fine, just wondering what they’ll have me doing at the hospital on Monday. What time do we leave to get there?”
His eyebrows quirked up slightly as he threw her a quick glance. “I’m on call tomorrow night, but if there’s no emergency and I’m not called in, I’ll leave home at about seven, drop Charm off to school and head into the hospital then.”
“And what happens if you’re called in and already at the hospital?”
“There’s a taxi driver who’ll come for Charm. He can drop you off then, too, or come back for you afterward, if you don’t want to be up so early.”
“My friends at school like it when Uncle Kiah drops me off.” Charm’s comment, dripping with scorn, came from the back seat. “They think he’s cute.”
“I think he’s cute, too,” Mina couldn’t help saying, casting Kiah a mischievous grin. “Don’t you?”
“He’s all right,” Charm said grudgingly. “But my friends get all silly over him and that’s gross. He’s so old.”
They’d turned off the coast road and were going up into the hills. Kiah took his foot off the accelerator.
“Okay, that’s it,” he said, shaking a fist in the air. “I’m letting you out here. You
can walk home, missy.”
“How far are we from Salty’s? I’ll just stay there,” came the irrepressible reply, and Mina couldn’t hold back her laughter.
As it turned out, it wasn’t that far from the roadside shack. As they pulled up, Mina was surprised at the number of cars filling the small parking area and overflowing onto the road.
“Ah, the parking gods are with me today,” Kiah said, when a car backed out of the lot just as they pulled up.
After he’d slotted his car into the space, they all got out, and Charm ran off right away to join the line, leaving them to follow at a slower pace. Kiah slung his arm over her shoulders, the way he often did, but today it felt heavier, his muscles more solid, and a shiver of awareness traveled down Mina’s spine.
“So you think I’m cute, huh?”
“Don’t be fishing for compliments, Hezekiah.” She tried to channel Miss Pearl, making her voice stern, but he just chuckled, tightening his grip on her.
“I don’t find it complimentary that a bunch of twelve-year-olds are standing around ogling me. It fills me with self-doubt. Are they the only ones who think I’m cute? Is that why I can’t get a date?”
They’d paused under a shady tree, where they could see Charm’s slow progress toward the head of the line without having to join her in the hot sun.
“You can’t get a date because you’re not looking for one,” Mina reminded him.
“True,” he replied easily. “But speaking of dates, Henkel looked like he was putting some serious moves on you last night. Did he ask you out?”
She glanced up at him. There was something almost too casual about the way he’d spoken, but with his dark glasses firmly in place, she couldn’t read the expression in his eyes.
“No offence to your friend, but I think he’d make moves on any woman who crossed his path. I didn’t take him seriously at all.”
“He’s not a bad guy, and usually is more talk than action, but I got the impression he really was into you.”
“I’m not interested in anything like that, right now.”
“Like what? Going out? Having a little fun?”