He smiled for the first time. Touché. Her eyes lit up and her hair shone in the last of the evening sun.
He loved the brass-necked cheek of this girl. He certainly admired her beauty, and yet still he couldn’t believe his…luck.
Fifteen minutes later he had convinced the owners of the Motu Kitchen – Whitianga’s finest restaurant – that he genuinely needed a table for two and that the ‘need to know’ was a matter of national security. The owner Ian knew him well and answered his prayers.
He recommended a few great local wines to accompany her meal – she chose seafood and he the quail. They nibbled on some freshly baked bread, dipping it into an exquisite green virgin olive oil as their conversation, along with the wine, finally started to flow.
He’d extolled the virtues of the Lonely Bay 2012 chardonnay, suggesting that it would be a great match for her scallops, pancetta, black truffle and cauliflower, whilst he dined upon the quail roulade with thyme flowers. He was right; the wine’s tropical notes and flavours of grapefruit, nectarine and peach complimented her scallops perfectly. She was in seventh heaven, having never dined so opulently in her life; at that moment, she decided that from then on only the finer things would do.
Finishing the meal with a buffalo mozzarella panna cotta and local strawberries they sat back and for a while stared at one another. In the end, he spoke first.
“OK. Why me?”
She faltered, trying perhaps to refine her English, “I, I’m, look, I don’t know. I saw you. You saw me. I am here, on holiday, a big girl, in a small country and I felt like some adult company. I like you straight from the first time. You call me whore and yet I still forgive!” She threw her head back revealing a perfectly formed neckline, hinting for a brief moment at what lay below.
She emptied the last of a Taylor’s port and allowed her tongue to linger on the rim of the glass as he finished a 12-year-old Bowmore malt whisky.
“And that’s it? Just how I would say, fate? Nothing more, you don’t just want me for my car?” He winked to re-affirm that he was playing mind games with her.
“That? In Sofia they call it ‘the…hairdresser’s car’!”
Convinced she had been talking to Big Stan he threw his napkin at her. Although intended to be playful it caught her square on the chin, causing her to wince. She feigned injury long enough to draw him in and then she struck. A piece of panna cotta left her hand; it had been debated over for long moments after she had declared that she had finished for the second time.
It flew almost expertly through the air and hit him on the cheek, just below his left eye. And it stayed there. Neither it nor its new host prepared to yield.
The resultant giggling from the pair attracted more attention than they had anticipated. Most of the female patrons despised her and the males simply looked on in awe, desperate to understand how this fellow male could attract such a mate. Most formed the opinion that she was his secretary or better still, his long-lost daughter. All were wrong as it happened.
He looked up and saw the proprietors Ian and Emily standing together, arms folded and tutting at his antics.
“Come on, it’s time to go…I’m getting that look from the owners. You are bringing out the worst in me.”
He paid the bill and apologised to the host who simply shook his hand and asked for his secret – in doing so earning him a gentle clip around his left ear from his wife.
She allowed him to walk her to his car. Opening the passenger door he stopped.
“Sorry, I can’t…I’m really sorry.”
She looked hurt, almost upset. “But I thought we have the most wonderful night. I thought we…”
“Yes, yes, we have, it’s been remarkable, in fact better than I could have ever hoped for.”
He raised his hands up into the darkening sky before continuing, “and seeing as though we’d never met until three hours ago and all was going well until I suggested that you were a high-class prostitute – well yes I too thought we were having a wonderful night. When I say I can’t, I mean I can’t drive; I’ve had too much to drink. Shall we walk?”
She readily agreed, not wanting the night to end. To date, this had been the best night she could remember for a very long time. Where it would end, she simply didn’t know.
He locked the car which responded with a multitude of orange flashes which lit up the surrounding space – he walked away, quite frankly not caring whether it was there the next morning.
At sea a storm began to build, the heat of the day finally coming to a climatic conclusion; typical at this time of the year it would soon make its way inland, often accompanied by intense lightning and eventually, rain. For him it was not unusual. For her, it added to the intensity.
She slipped her shoes off and stepped onto the sand, feeling the still-warm grains wrapping themselves around her painted toes.
An hour later, via a slow walk along the beach, they arrived at Spindrift. He slid open the door and pressed an indigo-blue wall switch, which initiated a set of low-light features in the kitchen. The light reflected off the industrial worktops and onto her face, creating an even more attractive view.
He opened a bottle of Roaring Meg pinot noir as she walked slowly around the lounge gazing at some photography; land and seascapes featured. They were simply framed and initialled.
“You know this photographer?”
“Carrie? Yes, you could say that. I practically taught her everything I know!”
“She’s good. She was your girlfriend?”
“She…no. She, is, was, a very…” It was obvious he was struggling for words.
“She’s an old…colleague who I haven’t seen for a long time, but that’s a long story and we haven’t got all night, but all I can tell you is I owe her a great deal indeed and vice versa. I miss her enormously, but I made a decision to leave her behind; best I leave it that. By the way, make sure that photo is straight, would you? Now if you like wine, you’ll love this,” he offered her the bottle to read as he selected two large glasses.
The deliciously dark red liquid was decanted into the glasses as she slipped off her shoes once again. She felt at home, any risk of harm seemed negligible.
“That is shame; I was hoping we would have…”
He looked, raised an eyebrow and continued pouring.
“Would have?”
“All night.”
They moved from the industrial steel of the kitchen to the softer tones and furnishings of the lounge, where he selected some music and turned the volume to a level that allowed them to enjoy both the selected disc and their own conversation.
He chose the red leather Danish-inspired armchair and she the more conventional cream coloured chaise longue.
She lay back on the chair and stretched out, allowing her summer dress to move gently up her leg. Thankfully, his thought process was interrupted when she clapped her hands together like a teenager.
“Bruno Mars! I love Bruno…you love Bruno?”
“Well, I don’t love him the same way as you might, but I happen to think his music is great.”
“What it is with you men? Are you afraid to love someone because he is a man too?”
He was not quite sure how to respond to this, but went with his instinct.
“No.” he started to laugh. “No, it’s not that at all, it’s just where I come from and where you come from, well, things are different.”
“So, like I am a woman and you are a man, no?”
“Yes, but…but Bruno and I well…” He was now completely lost and unsure which direction to head in and quietly she was enjoying every moment. “Look, shall we start again?”
She agreed, they chinked the overly large red wine glasses together, which created an enduring mid-range tone.
“So, why me?” he asked, almost unsure if he wanted to hear the answer; at forty, here he was, at a point in his life when he had only just recovered from the last ‘relationship’, and God knows how long ago that was. Now he found
himself in his own home, alone with quite the most delectable girl he had possibly, probably ever laid eyes on.
He struggled to avoid her gaze, wanting to take a moment to admire her whilst not appearing to be overly lustful. She was as perfect as a Michelangelo sculpture, her skin exquisitely clear, her figure clearly honed by exercise; why even her hands were bloody perfect.
Her feet, recently benefiting from a pedicure, were a foot fetishist’s day dream and her legs resembled those of a runner, no, a thoroughbred, shiny from a recent gallop down a windswept shoreline.
As she wriggled about on his chaise he saw, for the second time that evening, that she was not wearing a bra; the image was beyond tantalising. Her breasts were so perfect that he only just managed to regain eye contact with her – his timing, as ever, immaculate.
“Why you? If I said I saw you arrive in your sexy sports car, would that be enough?”
“No, not really, anyone can own a car like that – it’s not an Aston Martin after all, is it?”
“No, Mr Bond, it isn’t and if you were Daniel Craig you would, erm, what it is you would say – have me by now!” She giggled, adding another dimension. When she smiled her nose screwed up; God, if he was a foot and nose fetishist this was eighth heaven indeed.
“You haven’t answered my question, please don’t misunderstand me, I am incredibly flattered, but why a man who must be twenty years older than you. Why?”
“Thirteen.”
“Sorry?”
“I am thirteen years younger than you!” She answered so quickly, so confidently that for the first time since they met he paused, acutely aware of who she might be, what she might want and whether in fact their meeting was indeed purely fortuitous.
“I look at your driving permit. See, it is on the kitchen top, by the sink, you leave it on the side, I pick it up and look. Simple. You are forty and I am twenty-seven. It’s easy, what is problem?”
She was right, he’d lived a life of caution, cynicism and downright mistrust – the job did that to you, but now he was at risk of ruining a beautiful evening and one which he would be the envy of his select group of friends. Now who was the hairdresser?
“Sing to me!”
“What? I can’t sing, I have never been able to sing and I’m not going to start now.” He was most indignant, as if she had touched a nerve.
“But it is only song…sing with Bruno, he won’t mind…”
And there on that balmy evening he found himself singing along to bloody Bruno bloody Mars, without a clue why and suddenly, for the first time in a very long time, he relaxed.
She teased him but encouraged at the same time.
Miming the words to the romantic ballad.
She left the chaise and moved towards him.
For a man with so much experience – so much international experience of names and places, of culture, of people, of corners, light and dark, of time zones that most never knew existed, of training and sixth-sense responses he suddenly felt very inept, impotent and almost scared.
His wife was a redhead too, and she had destroyed everything he ever held dear to his heart. Never again; until now.
She moved across the wooden floor, her bare feet skilfully carrying her lithe frame around the room as she danced in perfect time to the music, pretending to carry a bouquet of sweet-smelling flowers and feigning heartbreak.
He smiled, ‘My God, she is good’.
Arriving at the chair, she lowered herself to her knees and gently laid her head in his lap. He leant back slightly, hesitating for a second, then relaxed once more. He heard his heart beating and felt her presence against his legs. He could smell her hair, a mix of natural oil and a vague hint of something tropical – it couldn’t be anything but passion fruit. He found that once again and for the second time that day his senses were focusing at infinitesimal level.
Her head remained in situ for a few minutes until it became rather too impossible to avoid his natural feelings towards her. He was a man after all. He continued to suppress these feelings until the intensity was such that he could no longer disguise or repress the increasing urges of arousal, an aroused state that he had not experienced since ‘she’ had left him. And now, in the presence of this profoundly beautiful and intensely captivating vixen, he finally let go.
She looked up and straight into his eyes. She nodded as if endorsing that it was alright.
This time it was her outstretched hand that he took.
He stood up, picked her up in his arms. His strong hands gripped her hips, leaving imprints on her flawless skin; unable to turn back from the tide-like pull of this entrancing girl, he seamlessly and powerfully lifted her up towards him, displaying a level of strength that made her gasp – his sudden display of authority and sheer potency had truly taken her by surprise.
She wrapped her legs around his waist, gripping like a vice to his hips. She let herself go now, her total body weight falling back towards the ground. He was ready for her. With one swift, fluid movement he directed her upwards again, where her face met his. Without hesitation, she bit his lower lip.
She was his.
And he knew it.
With renewed vigour he carried her across the lounge to the chaise, lowered her gently onto it and then lowered himself, equally gently onto her. She kissed his neck and then began to open his shirt, kissing his chest, licking his throat.
Sensing that she was starting to take control, he found himself wondering whether to let her – or do what he imagined most women wanted and overwhelm her with his own sense of power and control.
Somehow ‘she’ came flooding into his bloody mind again, yet every time he thought of her now it was with a sense of hatred and pity. She had her chance and now he had his. This made his decision easier; if she wanted to take the lead then what man wouldn’t let her have her wish? And the truth was, he loved her energy and sense of wickedness. He loved it very much. He found himself thinking, ‘Teach me things I don’t yet know and whatever you do, do not spare the horses…please’.
This was quickly followed by another thought.
‘And if she so happens to be outside in the growing tempest, watching through the opening in the curtains, well frankly, fuck her, so much the better!’
He sat up and onto the edge of the chaise before standing. She knelt behind him; her slender fingers unbuttoned his shirt, slipped it over his head before dropping it onto the floor. His other clothes followed, as slowly, building the anticipation, she freed him from the restraints of the warm fabric until he was naked.
She paused, admiring him in what was left of the natural light. She caressed his thighs with her raspberry-red lips, licking them before gently blowing air onto the moistness of her kisses. It felt incredible.
The first flash of lightning lit up the room, creating intense brightness across the walls. It made her jump, she laughed; he laughed too and then pulled her towards him, reassurance – for the first time in a while he was back in control.
He held her for a moment, then once more he picked her up – physically, but without obvious aggression. Her own feelings were now fuelling her desire to take things so much further than she could have ever had thought possible only a few hours before. He lifted her up and gently lowered her to her feet. She stood in front of him for a brief moment until he turned her around. He unzipped her dress, kissed the nape of her neck and slid the narrow straps off her shoulders.
A whisper of breeze entered the room, dancing around their intense bodies, cooling them momentarily.
The dress slid from her body, pausing as it traced every outline of her figure and finally onto the wooden floor. Without encouragement he placed his hands around her waist, lowered himself onto his knees and as he did so, he removed her white lace underwear, causing her to let out a gentle sigh.
As he stood, his hands traced the outline of her thighs, almost imperceptibly touching her pear-shaped behind as they continued their journey upwards. He stopped momentarily at her hips,
his fingertips reaching around into the cleft in her pelvis, almost unsure of the reaction, almost out of respect he paused further until they completed their journey, purposely walking around the front of her body until they reached the silky smooth and final destination.
He placed just enough pressure onto her to make her inhale.
“Oh God, to the left, just…there.”
Her own hands slipped behind her back; she teased him with her fingers, hearing his own response she took hold of him. He was intensely hot, and the touch of her hands only increased the sensation.
A bolt of lightning struck nearby; this time accompanied by a massive clap of thunder. She grabbed him even harder, causing him to let out a loud cry.
“Sorry…I…”
“I don’t care, please, don’t stop.”
She didn’t, continuing to take him closer all the time until he forced the situation to change. Either that, or for now, at least, the night would come to an untimely end.
He turned towards her, and once again picked her up, her legs instinctively locking around his hips. They were one now.
He walked with her towards the sliding door, slid it in its runners and stepped out onto the wooden decking. He could feel the grooves of the platform upon his feet as he guided her up against the outside of the door.
Her skin slid against his, moist with humidity from the effect of their actions. Her body left marks upon the glass that he subconsciously thought he’d never, ever clean.
Their rhythmic movements began in time with the distant pounding of the waves, with every few becoming more powerful, more intoxicating.
The seventh wave came all too soon, beating down upon the shore, before dragging the myriad grains back out to sea. He knew he had to control things.
Inside the house Bruno continued to sing, to no-one in particular.
If nothing else, the pulsating beat added to their increasing rhythm.
Another flash of lightning lit them up for all to see. He doubted anyone would be looking and right now cared little if they were. His movements were faster now, more deliberate, and she mirrored every one.
Seventh (The Seventh Wave Trilogy Book 1) Page 6