Try Easy: A Slow-Burn Vacation Fling Love Story (Aloha Series Book 1)
Page 14
“I want to show you the other reason I got this house,” he said. “Do you want to see it?”
“Do I need to put on clothes?” she asked.
They were both completely naked. Keoni’s eyes wandered over her body. “Absolutely not.”
“K’den,” she said, grinning.
Keoni realized she was making fun of him again and he grabbed her around the waist and swung her into his arms.
“I want to see everything,” Lou said, clinging to his shoulders.
Keoni chuckled, holding her tighter. “You’ve already seen me at my worst. My face was a real mess that first day at the airport.”
“I thought you were…” Lou paused and thought. Then a slow smile spread across her face, and she said: “Majestic.”
Keoni tipped back his head and laughed. “Majestic, eh?”
“It fits you.”
“You think I’m majestic?” Keoni asked. “With a face like this?”
Lou smiled and reached up to kiss his throat. “Yes,” she whispered.
Keoni cupped her chin and tilted her face up to his. “You need glasses or what?” he asked.
Lou smiled. “I can see just fine.” Her eyes sparkled, and her dimple flashed. “Now what did you want to show me?”
“The bathroom,” he said, turning to lead the way down the hall.
“The bathroom?”
“If you think the view from my room is good, wait till you see the bathroom, eh?”
Keoni led Lou down the hallway and into the darkened bathroom. He pulled her inside and positioned her in front of the shower.
“Close your eyes,” he said.
“You love this, don’t you?” she asked. “You love showing me new things.”
“Yeah,” Keoni said, realizing it was true.
It had been one of the best weeks of Keoni’s life, sharing Hawaii with Lou. She was so enthusiastic about every small detail that he was able to see his home through fresh eyes. For the first time in his life, he thought he really understood the spirit of aloha. It meant more than a greeting and an endearment, it meant unselfish sharing.
Keoni said, “Close your eyes, Lou. You are going to love this.”
She closed her eyes and Keoni switched on the light.
He walked over to the glass door of the shower and said, “Open them.”
Lou opened her eyes and looked first at Keoni, then behind him to the outdoor shower. Her mouth dropped open, and her eyes widened.
“My god,” she said. “This is paradise.”
The bathroom was the real reason Keoni had taken the tiny house. It was a small square room with a sink and a toilet on one wall and an iron claw-foot tub on the other. A double glass door that led to an outdoor shower made up the third wall.
Keoni opened the glass door and stepped out onto the wood-planked floor, beckoning Lou to join him.
“You are so lucky to live here,” Lou said.
“We Hawaiians have a saying about that.”
“What is it?” Lou asked.
“‘Lucky we live in Hawaii,’” Keoni said with a half smile.
Lou burst out laughing.
Keoni was going to miss that sound. He smiled with a tinge of sadness and turned on the shower.
Warm water rained down on them from the showerhead he’d mounted to a wooden pole. Bamboo trees and banana plants formed high walls around them, and the sky was their ceiling.
“Come here,” he said, reaching out for Lou.
She hesitated before joining him. “Can anyone see us?” she asked.
“No.” Keoni tugged Lou under the spray of warm water.
She sighed and tilted her head back, letting the water soak her hair. The moonlight turned her skin a pale gold.
“Have I told you I love your hair?” Keoni asked, running his fingers through her wet hair.
Lou smiled and said, “You can tell me again.”
“I love your hair.”
Lou laughed and reached for a bar of soap on a tray next to a bottle of shampoo and a washcloth on the wooden bench. She brought the soap to her nose and inhaled deeply.
“Ah,” she said. “This is why you smell so good. Coconut soap.”
“My sister Miriam makes it by the truckload. Always giving it to me for a present,” Keoni said.
Lou lathered the soap between her hands and ran them over Keoni’s chest. “Tell her thank you for me,” she said.
They started to kiss again as Lou ran her hands over Keoni’s body, washing him thoroughly. He took the soap and washed her with the same attention to detail she’d given him. Then he shampooed her hair with the coconut shampoo—also made by Miriam.
When they were both clean, Keoni wrapped Lou in a towel and took her back to his bed where they made love much slower this time and dozed off in each other’s arms.
Later in the night, Keoni woke up and covered them with the quilt. He lay on his back, and Lou propped herself up on one elbow beside him and traced her finger down his bearded cheek.
“Can you turn on the light?” she asked.
Keoni reached over to turn on the bedside lamp. He blinked at the sudden brightness and pulled Lou back into his arms, settling himself against the pillows. “You don’t want to sleep?” he asked.
She shook her head against his chest and pushed the quilt down so that she could trail her fingers along the thin line of hair that grew down the center of his body.
“I think the rumors I heard about you might be true,” Lou said.
Keoni could feel her smile against his shoulder. He reached up and took her hand, lifting it to his mouth for a kiss. “What rumors?” he asked.
“I heard you were a descendant of a god,” Lou said.
Keoni made a little noise in his throat and pushed Lou’s damp hair off her cheek. “That isn’t a rumor,” he said.
Lou lifted her head and looked at him. “Are you saying it’s true?”
“Of course. Do you want to hear the story?”
Lou laid her head back on his shoulder, chuckling. “Is this another one of your made-up stories, Keoni?”
“Do you want to hear it, or what?” he asked.
Lou nodded. “Tell the story,” she said.
“A long time ago,” Keoni began.
“Oh, boy,” she muttered.
Lou started running her hand over Keoni’s abdomen again, causing him to lose focus.
Keoni pulled her tighter against his chest. “Try listen,” he said. “A long time ago, the goddess Pele came down to Maui for a swim in her favorite pond. She happened to see a warrior chief training for battle at the top of a waterfall, and she fell in love with him.” Keoni swallowed hard as Lou’s hand dipped lower under the quilt. He cleared his throat and said, “He felt the same about her, and they spent a few precious days together. When Pele had to go home, the warrior chief wanted to ask her to stay, but she was a goddess, and he was only a man. He knew he couldn’t.”
Lou’s hand stilled, and she lifted her face to look at him. “Did he let her go?” Lou asked in a quiet voice. Tears sparkled in her eyes.
Keoni cupped her cheek and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “He had to. But he told her that he would wait for her if she wanted to come back.”
“And then what happened?” Lou wanted to know.
“She came back.”
They fell into a deep silence. Lou rested her hand on the flat of Keoni’s belly, and he worked his fingers through the tangles in her damp hair. Her breathing became so regular that Keoni thought she might have fallen asleep.
“Keoni?”
“Yeah?”
“That story doesn’t explain how you’re descended from the gods.”
“Sure it does.” Keoni kissed the top of her head, smelling his shampoo in her hair. “The warrior chief was my great-great-great-great-grandfather.”
Lou laughed and shook her head against his chest. Keoni pulled her tighter against him, and a few minutes later she drifted off to sleep in his arms.
The sun on his face woke him with a start. Lou was curled against his side, and her body was so warm and soft that he closed his eyes again, drifting off briefly before he was awakened by a feeling of cold dread in his belly.
Keoni turned toward Lou, intent on waking her slowly when he realized the cause for the sinking feeling in his gut. He sat bolt upright and looked at the clock on the nightstand.
It was 6:30. He’d overslept. He should have been at Henry’s a half hour ago. Keoni jumped out of bed and ran naked down the hall. In the kitchen, he yanked the phone off the wall and dialed Henry’s number.
Leaning his head against the wall, Keoni waited for an answer. “Come on. Come on,” he begged.
The phone rang, but no one answered. Keoni slammed the phone down, nearly knocking it off the wall.
“What’s wrong?” Lou asked. She was standing in the hallway, wrapped in the quilt. Her voice sounded sleepy, but her eyes were alert. “Is everything okay?”
Keoni took one look at her and felt his heart stop. Lou was beautiful in the morning, with her face naked of any makeup and her hair in a mess of waves that his hands had created. The quilt slid off one shoulder, revealing her bare skin.
“Nothing to worry about, nani,” Keoni said. “I’m late is all. I messed up.” He walked down the hall and stopped in front of her. He kissed her swollen lips and pulled the quilt tighter around her shoulders. “Can you get dressed real quick?”
Lou nodded, impressed by the quiet urgency of his tone. They gathered their clothes from the floor of his bedroom, dressed in a hurry, and were in his car headed south in less than ten minutes.
Keoni drove straight to the marina, hoping to catch Bones and Henry there. He sped through the country roads toward Honolulu, once again pushing the VW Bug to its maximum speed. When he peeled to a stop next to Bones’s truck at the marina, it was 7:30.
They’d made it in record time, but it was still too late.
Keoni stood at the empty space on the dock, balling his hands into fists.
Clyde Ho, a man Keoni had known since junior high school, was washing down a boat in the next slip. “Bones gave me a message to tell you,” he said, shutting off the water and straightening. His eyes darted to Lou as she came to stand beside Keoni on the dock. “But I shouldn’t say it with a lady present.”
“Fuck,” muttered Keoni.
Clyde smirked. “That’s pretty much what he said.”
“He left without me.”
“Looks that way,” Clyde agreed.
Keoni glared at Clyde, then turned away to stalk down the dock. “I cannot believe he would do something so stupid.”
“What’s going on?” Lou asked.
Keoni took a deep breath and then sighed it out. He reached out for Lou’s hand. “Bones left without me.”
“Where did he go?” she asked.
Keoni looked up at Clyde, who was observing them with interest. He pulled Lou closer. “Come on, I’ll tell you over breakfast.”
At that moment, the bright side of the situation became clear: Keoni could spend more time with Lou.
He opened the door to the VW for Lou and decided to take her to Arthur’s Diner, his favorite place at Waikiki.
A few minutes later, they were sipping hot coffee and waiting on pancakes. Keoni thought about how much he would tell Lou about the dive. Usually, he wouldn’t share the details with anyone. Not even Henry knew all of it. But Keoni asked himself why it mattered when he wasn’t likely to ever see Lou again. So what if she knew the details of a hidden treasure? She was never coming back to Hawaii.
The thought depressed Keoni but made his decision easier.
“This was no ordinary dive,” Keoni began, keeping his voice low.
Lou stopped stirring her coffee and looked up at him. Her eyes were more green than blue and fringed with long lashes. They were wide with curiosity. “What do you mean?” she asked.
“We were hunting for black coral,” Keoni said.
Lou raised an eyebrow and sipped her coffee. “Why?”
“The jewelry stores pay top dollar for black coral. They turn it into fancy bracelets and earrings that cost a fortune. It’s very rare and grows at the bottom of the ocean.”
Lou put down her coffee and leaned closer. “What aren’t you saying, Keoni? Is it dangerous?”
Keoni shrugged. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Bones is the best diver I know.”
Keoni fell silent as the waitress brought their food. He had been starving a minute ago, but as he looked at the plate, all he could think about was Bones on the dive—alone. Bones should have waited for him. It was never a good idea to go on a dive solo. Diving that deep without a partner was reckless.
He remembered the first time they had found the coral. It was an accident. The depth finder on their boat was on the wrong scale, and they thought they were at 200 feet. It wasn’t until they came up that they realized we were closer to 300 feet. The deep ocean had made an impression on Keoni that he’d never forget.
Keoni pushed his food around on his plate. “It’s like an alien planet under there that deep,” he said, his voice hushed.
“I’d love to see it,” Lou said.
Keoni thought of how much Lou would love the tall trees of bright coral, the strange-looking fish, and the rocky bottom of the ocean that looked more like a mountaintop than the deep sea.
“I wish you could,” he said.
They smiled at each other, both knowing the chances of it ever happening were little to none. Lou had never been on a dive before, and diving that deep was for experts only. Managing the time without air, the heavy equipment and the threat of predators were too much for all but the most skilled divers.
The ball of dread that had woken Keoni that morning grew bigger.
“He should have never gone alone,” he said.
“He’s not alone if Henry is with him,” Lou pointed out.
Keoni shook his head. “Henry isn’t good for anything but driving the boat.”
Lou pushed her plate aside, she said: “This is all my fault. I kept you up all night.”
Keoni glanced up from his plate of uneaten pancakes. “It’s not your fault,” he told Lou. “Besides, I kinda liked the way you kept me up all night.” Keoni reached across the table and cupped Lou’s face in his hands. He leaned over the table and kissed her mouth. “One good thing came outta Bones leaving me,” he said. “I get to spend more time with you.”
Lou smiled. Her eyes turned up, and her dimple winked. “That is nice,” she said.
Keoni grinned and sat back in the seat. He pointed to her plate. “Eat,” he said. “You’re gonna need it.”
Patterson’s Point
Lou
* * *
After breakfast, Keoni took Lou to Patterson’s, where he’d learned to surf. It was a small break near the foot of Diamond Head, named after the people who used to live there.
They stood barefoot on the soft sand in the same clothes they’d worn the night before, looking out at the waves. The waves were thick and dark blue, with peaks that jumped up at random and crashed down with a violence that made Lou shudder.
She was still shaken by the experience at Makaha, and she leaned closer to Keoni, who sensed her fear and put his arm around her shoulders.
“This is where I first met Declan,” Keoni said. He pointed out to the whitecaps beyond the reef that spilled into the turquoise sea. “Right out there.”
“What was he like?” Lou asked, unable to contain her curiosity.
Keoni smiled crookedly. “He was short and skinny.”
Lou laughed. “That isn’t what I meant.”
They walked along the shoreline under the shadow of Diamond
Head Crater.
“Do you want to know the real story of how Diamond Head got its name?” he asked.
“Do I have a choice?”
“There’s always a choice,” he said, sounding serious.
“Okay,” Lou said. “But Henry already told me the story.”
“Not the one for tourists,” Keoni said. “The real story.”
Lou tensed at the way Keoni said the word tourist like it was dirty. She decided not to be insulted and brushed it off good-naturedly.
“It wasn’t named because the sailors thought the sparkles in the crust were diamonds?” she asked.
“No.” Keoni led her over to a patch of grass under a palm tree. “A long time ago,” he began, settling in the grass with his back to the tree, “there was a prince who wanted to find a wife.”
Lou rolled her eyes, and Keoni pulled her down into his lap and kissed her.
“It’s true,” he said, tucking her against his chest. “I swear.”
Lou laughed and rested her head against his shoulder. “Go on,” she said, thinking she was going to miss the stories Keoni spun. She’d never known anyone quite so entertaining.
“The prince decided to go to every island and search for the most beautiful woman he could for his bride,” Keoni said. “He took a double-hulled canoe with forty men to navigate the seas. Every time he dropped anchor, he lost a few men. They went off with local women for their own wives. By the time the prince got to Oahu, he only had a dozen men left.”
“They didn’t get attacked, did they?” Lou interrupted.
“No,” Keoni said. “Nothing like that. Try listen.” He tucked her hair behind her ear as had become his habit in the last few days. He dipped his head to kiss her. After a moment, he went on. “The men were tired of sailing, tired of eating fish, and tired of each other. They all hoped their prince would find a wife, and Oahu would be their last stop before home.”
“Keoni?” Lou interrupted.
“Yeah?”
“What does this have to do with Diamond Head Crater?”
“I’m getting to it,” he said.
Lou sighed. “You’re making all this up as you go along, aren’t you?”
Keoni gave her the crooked smile that made her heart lurch. “It’s a true story,” he said, kissing her again.