40-Love

by Olivia Dade

  He glanced up at the stairs, then back down at her. “We can go somewhere else, if you’d like. The view’s great up there, but it’s great everywhere else too. And the overlook’s not entirely private, although there’s a quieter area off to the side with a picnic table.”

  Last chance to be honest.

  “This spot is perfect. Thank you for bringing me here.” She took the first step, then another. No pain. Not yet, anyway. “Let’s get going. I’m starving, and I can’t wait to see what you’ve packed for lunch.”

  Screw honesty. She wanted to pretend, to believe, just a little longer.

  Six

  “So what did you and your friend do for your birthday yesterday?” Lucas speared another piece of pork souvlaki from the plastic container on the picnic table. “You said you had the whole day planned out.”

  For the past minute, Tess had been mixing the tzatziki sauce with the eggplant dip as a sort of culinary experiment, one he’d watched with amused interest. Now, even though she had her wedge of pita piled high with the mixture and halfway to her mouth, she paused.

  Then she set down her concoction, wincing. “Lucas, I’m so sorry. I should have thanked you right away for the gorgeous tulips. They’re some of my favorite flowers.”

  He knew. When he’d finally managed to locate Belle—sans Tess—yesterday morning, she’d told him. Then he’d visited the resort’s behind-the-scenes floral arrangement guy. A few minutes of wheedling and a discreet handover of cash later, he’d had the blooms in hand and on their way to the front desk.

  Maybe the gesture had been too much. He and Tess hadn’t even kissed. Might never kiss. They’d barely touched, for that matter.

  But he hadn’t wanted the day to pass without his noting it. One more year of prickly, vibrant Tess Dunn on this earth was something to celebrate, no matter what did or didn’t happen between the two of them.

  “My pleasure.” He gestured toward her pita. “Try your special creation. I can wait on all the birthday details.”

  She bit down and chewed, her eyes closed, her expression thoughtful.

  Thank goodness for the resort restaurant that had supplied their meal, since his own kitchen contained a toaster, coffeemaker, microwave, and scratched nonstick skillet as its primary amenities. Sure, he had a refrigerator, but it was nearly empty. The apartment’s small oven probably worked too, but he owned nothing oven-safe to put inside it. Given his dearth of both food and equipment, cooking for Tess himself hadn’t been an option today.

  His parents had taught him how, and he enjoyed it. He still helped with their signature pork roast, applesauce, and Janssons frestelse—a creamy potato and anchovy gratin, his favorite side dish of all time—whenever he went home. But somehow, outfitting his own apartment with cooking supplies had never occurred to him.

  Buying those items would imply permanency and require an eye to his future, he supposed. And he hadn’t considered that future—hadn’t allowed himself to consider it—for a long time now.

  Tess’s throat bobbed as she swallowed, and he tried not to make that image sexual. Unsuccessfully.

  “Delicious,” she eventually pronounced, her lashes fluttering open again. “You should tell the chef to combine both dips for a new dish of some sort.”

  He snorted at that. “I’m the tennis dude. If I tried to tell Georgios what he should cook, he’d use his cleaver to separate me from some of my favorite appendages.”

  Her gaze dropped to his lap before she cleared her throat and looked away, cheeks now flushed from more than the sun.

  “I meant my hands, Tess.” He shook his head mournfully. “I’m shocked they let people with such filthy imaginations become administrators at your school.”

  Even as she flipped him a discreet middle finger, her lips curved in a reluctant grin.

  He heaved a dramatic sigh of disapproval. “Not to mention such filthy gestures. And that’s not even considering your topless escapades and unprovoked attacks on unsuspecting men’s backs.”

  “Shhhhh.” She was laughing now, low and sweet, her hand flapping in the direction of the stairs. “There’s a family coming, and they don’t need to hear about my—”

  “Bouncy bits?”

  One of the dip containers nearly overturned as she lurched across the table. Her fierce whisper in his ear was a taunting tease, one he fully deserved. “Zip it, Karlsson. They’re almost at the top of the stairs now. And besides…”

  She’d left her hair down and tumbling to her soft shoulders today. The strands, silky and fragrant with some sort of fruity shampoo, brushed against his cheek, and he couldn’t resist. Where she couldn’t see, he caught a stray lock of it and rubbed it between his fingers. Fought the instinct to close his eyes against the overwhelming pleasure of her proximity.

  “Besides,” she continued, her voice husky, “they don’t bounce in the water, really. They’re too buoyant for that. They float.”

  He’d tried not to notice. He really had. But a single glance before he’d fully understood the situation at hand—so to speak—had burned the image on his brain. Her forearm had barely covered her nipples, leaving the abundant curves of her breasts pale and wet and bare and, yes, floating deliciously close to the surface.

  When she sat back, he took a hasty sip of his sparkling blood orange soda and nearly choked on the bubbles. Through his coughing, he managed to choke out, “I stand corrected. Or, uh, sit corrected.”

  “Are you okay?” She half-stood again, obviously ready to thump him on the back as needed.

  He waved away her concern. “Fine. Just swallowed wrong.”

  “Thank you for all this wonderful food.” After finishing her dip mixture, she sighed in contentment and surveyed the expanse of nearly-empty plastic containers covering the table. “I hadn’t eaten at Georgios’s yet. I’ve been focusing on seafood up to this point, mainly.”

  He lifted a shoulder. “I think his place serves the best food at the resort, other than maybe The Sands.”

  “The Sands is incredible!” Her arms folded on the table, she leaned forward, beaming. “We went there our first night, and I wanted to order everything on the menu. Everything.”

  Last year, the resort’s CEO had wooed Lucas over dinner there, touting the island’s various amenities as the waitstaff presented gorgeous plates of perfectly cooked red snapper, spiny lobster, and pink shrimp, among countless other seafood courses.

  Lucas hadn’t visited since. Maybe because of his no-longer-limitless budget for such luxuries. Or maybe because food in general hadn’t tasted that good or seemed that important or interesting to him in a while. Not like it did today, as he sat in the sunshine across the table from Tess, the breeze high above the water whipping that bright dress around her strong, shapely calves.

  He thought back a few months. “They have a tasting menu, if I remember correctly.”

  “Oh, we had that. Believe me. During the school year, we live on grocery-store rotisserie chickens, frozen dinners, and occasional fast food. So when Belle and I get to visit a fancy restaurant, which doesn’t happen often, tasting menus are kind of our thing.” Her nose crinkled in self-deprecation. “But that didn’t stop me from peeking at what all the other tables were ordering and getting jealous when their food arrived.”

  For some reason, that thought—Tess wanting, Tess not getting what she wanted—chafed like a blister forming on his heel. “You really wanted to try everything?”

  She laughed again. “Of course I did. I think I had a weird sex dream about the tuna carpaccio and lemon chess meringue pie last night. And whenever Belle sees the menu in the lobby, she kind of makes this forlorn moaning sound and mutters about scallop ceviche for a few minutes. But teachers and assistant principals don’t exactly make neurosurgeon money, so one tasting-menu dinner there will have to suffice.”

  If the two women didn’t have enough money for sampling everything at The Sands, he could address that issue. His salary might have dropped exponentially in the past sever
al years, but he’d been smart enough to save while he could. Moreover, he and his colleagues around the resort tended to exchange unofficial favors, and he could both collect what he was owed and hand out a few markers of his own.

  Tess’s pride, though, wouldn’t allow her to accept that kind of gesture, especially from a man she’d just met. He knew that already.

  For that reason, he simply said, “I’m sorry you won’t get to taste the entire menu.”

  A flick of her wrist dismissed his concern. “Life is full of compromises, even on vacation.”

  There was no self-pity in her tone. Only practicality and resignation.

  Yup. That still rubbed him wrong.

  She might have accepted that she couldn’t get what she wanted, but he hadn’t. And if he couldn’t make her food dreams come true, maybe he could help with something else.

  “Huh.” He propped his elbows on the table. “You just said compromises. Plural, not singular. So what else aren’t you doing on this vacation?”

  After a glance around the outlook, now empty once more—that family had apparently left without him noticing—she grinned at him. “I really wanted to try the nude beach.”

  The image burst to life in his febrile brain in full color and exquisite detail, so vivid and overwhelming he was surprised his skull could contain it. In response, his pulse shot to a gallop, and the summer heat suddenly blistered every inch of him.

  By all indications, if he ever saw Tess entirely naked, bathed in sunlight, he might not survive it. Hell, he might not survive this conversation.

  He was willing to take that risk.

  “Tell me more,” he said.

  Seven

  Tess’s brow crinkled. “What more is there to say? It’s a nude beach. Palm trees. Sand. Water. Naked floppy bits. Sunburns in awkward and painful places.”

  If he thought about her naked floppy bits, his tongue would cease making intelligible sounds. “I get that part. What I don’t get is why you aren’t going there, if that’s something you want to experience.”

  Tess didn’t strike him as uncomfortable with her body. So why wasn’t she baring it on the island’s private stretch of adults-only sand?

  And why didn’t she invite him along for the experience? A person could dream, after all.

  Silence stretched between them for a few moments before she finally spoke again.

  “Can you imagine the amount of sunscreen I’d have to buy?” She huffed out a small laugh. “Besides, I’m getting enough sand in unfortunate areas. I don’t need to invite a full-body scouring.”

  Those answers sounded like dodges to him. Red herrings. And if anyone could recognize herrings—of whatever color—a Swede could.

  “Those don’t seem like insurmountable obstacles to me,” he said.

  Her chest rose and fell on a pained-sounding breath before her lips quirked again. “You’re right. I guess I was trying not to bring up how different we are.”

  “I don’t understand.” And he was no longer certain he wanted to, given what she’d just said.

  Her mouth pursed. “You’re a twenty-something Swede working at a resort where everyone turns a blind eye to…” She paused. “What did you call it? Al fresco shenanigans?”

  From her lips, the phrase sounded overly glib. Blithe and careless.

  “I’m a forty-year-old high school administrator in Virginia, Lucas. I can’t get naked in public.” She slanted him a wryly amused look, one that had grown familiar. “God bless Europeans. Do you have a national holiday celebrating full-frontal nudity in Sweden? One that involves a ceremonial dropping of trench coats in public squares before you all retire for pastries and naps?”

  That particular tone, redolent with sarcasm, was also familiar. “Only on leap years. The rest of the time, we make do with just the naked parade.”

  “Disappointing.” She shook her head. “I’d expected more, somehow.”

  The whole European angle was only part of what she’d said, and not the most important part either. “The nude beach is on the adults-only end of the island, so you wouldn’t be flashing America’s youth yet again.”

  He put special emphasis on the last bit, just to elicit the dirty look he promptly received.

  “Can the resort guarantee that no one I know and no one I’ll ever need to interact with as a school administrator will be on that beach with me?” She tipped her head as she stared at him, her gaze challenging. “More importantly, do they confiscate all guests’ cell phones and cameras before allowing them onto that part of the island? Because anything any of us do in public can end up on the internet at any time, Lucas, and I can’t afford to take chances. Not at this stage of my career, when I’m gunning to become principal in a year. Everything I want is so close, and I won’t risk it for an afternoon in the sun.”

  The principal job was everything she wanted? Or was it everything she was letting herself want? Everything she’d convinced herself was practical and possible?

  “I’m just lucky you were there to help me when I lost my bikini top.” Unexpectedly, she reached out to cover his hand with her own. Squeezed it in silent gratitude. “I work with kids, and I have to deal with American standards of so-called decency and good judgment. That incident could have been disastrous, as could a trip to the nude beach. So no, I won’t be getting naked on the sand. Even if I want to.”

  “That makes sense,” he conceded. “I get it, Tess. You obviously want that principal position a lot.”

  “More than anything.” Her eyes searched his in a seeming plea for understanding. “Not because I want power for its own sake, but because I think I can help the kids at my school. I can make Marysburg High a safer, happier, more useful place for them in every way.” She sighed. “The other main candidate from within our school system cares more about the bottom line than education. He would be a terrible principal, and I won’t let him have the job. Not if I can possibly help it.”

  To his regret, he had to concede her other point too: They were very different. In their lives, their work, their ambitions, the expectations placed upon them, the people dependent on their decisions.

  He still wanted her. His hunger to understand the twists and intricacies of her mind hadn’t eased at all over the course of the lunch. If anything, he felt more starved than ever.

  If he had another half-hour to spare, he’d ask about her plans for her students. Soon, though, his free time between lessons would come to an end, and he didn’t want to start a subject they didn’t have time to finish. Besides, he had one last surprise for her. One he suspected she’d enjoy.

  Turning over his hand, he laced his fingers through hers and slid his thumb over her knuckles in a slow, repeated sweep. With his other hand, he reached into a bag beneath the table and produced the final container.

  She peered at the clear plastic top, and after a moment, a small, tentative smile tipped her lips.

  “It’s not lemon chess meringue pie,” he told her. “But all but one of them are for you, and I managed to get a candle for the birthday girl. Well, birthday-plus-one-day girl.”

  The strawberry lemonade cupcakes had reminded him of Tess. Tart and sweet. Joyously, unmistakably large. Pretty.

  “They look delicious.” Her fingers squeezed his as she contemplated the half-dozen cupcakes within the container. “Out of curiosity, did you remember to bring something to light the candle?”

  His head dropped to his chest. “Shit.”

  “If you’d remembered, I was going to let you give me forty birthday spanks.”

  He jerked his head up so fast, he got dizzy. Maybe the new batch of tourists who’d just left the outlook had a lighter? They were halfway down the steps already, but he could catch them if he ran.

  Pushing to his feet, he spared her a quick, hopeful glance. “Really?”

  “No.” She laughed again, her solemnity gone. “I’m fucking with you.”

  The wooden bench creaked beneath him as he sat back down. “Ah. That’s a shame.”<
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  “No birthday spanks on offer, but lots of birthday thanks.” She nodded toward the cupcakes. “Those look amazing. Thank you, Lucas, for everything you’ve done to make my birthday special.”

  Her wide smile plumped her cheeks and sparkled in those big hazel eyes, and the entire wooden outlook structure disappeared from beneath him as he sank into the sight. Into her.

  He fumbled for his drink. Took another gulp and almost choked again. “No problem.”

  The sun was burning the tips of his ears, but that didn’t explain the warmth exploding through the rest of him. Especially as she opened the container, selected a cupcake—the one with the most abundant lemon buttercream frosting, a wise choice—and took a huge bite. Her little hum of pleasure as she chewed and swallowed vibrated along his spine, arrowing to his cock.

  With evident joy, she methodically worked her way through the cupcake, leaving the most frosting-intensive parts for last. He, in contrast, picked at his, too distracted by the sheer bliss etched across her expressive face to give a fuck about eating.

  She wasn’t shy in her enthusiasm. Within a minute or two, the confection was gone, and she was sucking icing off her fingers, then licking her thumb to pick up stray crumbs from her paper wrapper. He had to stifle a whimper.

  Her gaze locked on the container once more, and he lifted the lid for her.

  She hesitated, her eyes guarded. “No lectures about proper nutrition?”

  “I’ve known you for less than three days.”

  Her head tilted as she watched him. “True.”

  “That said, even if I’d been your man for eighty years, I wouldn’t lecture you. You’re in charge of your body, not me.” He paused. Winked at her. “Although, if you wanted me in charge of certain aspects of your body, I certainly wouldn’t mi—”

  “You’re a skank, Karlsson.” But she flicked him a grin as she selected the cupcake with the second-greatest frosting volume. “One with excellent taste in baked goods, however, so I’ll allow it.”