“Night, Emma,” he said so softly she turned to him to make sure he spoke and met his lips as they descended on hers.
The knot in her throat rose again but she couldn’t move away. Stricken by the feel of him, she stood stock-still, not wanting to let go and also knowing there would be no turning back for her heart if she didn’t.
Again he made the choice for her.
He cupped her face and deepened the kiss, shaping her lips to his, dragging out every ounce of her. Her defenses a tumbled mess, as her hands ached to let go of the crutches and take hold of him, and her deceiving heart drummed in her ears.
She had never had so much feeling in her lips. And she knew it had nothing to do with his technique.
Nomsa was right. This was it. Not Mr. Right, even now as he thoroughly kissed to the point where her grip on her crutches slipped.
No, it was rightness. A perfect combination of chemistry, wit, and the unexpectedness of finding someone you couldn’t help but want to know for more than a moment. Someone you would take a lifetime to discover. A powerful combination.
She had another theory for Timisho, death by internal combustion.
His mouth left hers and she held herself back from blurting out something stupid.
“You sleep well,” he said.
Indeed. She watched him disappear down the hallway and into his bedroom.
***
Emma knew she should have said something, but his kiss, like before, left her incoherent. Though what that something would have been was also a mystery, but it would have been more than silence and the sinking feeling she had let another chance slip her by.
Emma always prided herself on being someone who kept away from embarrassing situations.
She avoided the pasta on the menu in an upscale restaurant because it was an all-round messy business and the last place she wanted to be seen with pasta sauce on her face was a five-star restaurant. She kept herself from harassed-looking mothers with toddlers in supermarkets. She politely declined to go to the end-of-year work function, always claiming she had a pressing family engagement, as such events always turned into circuses when alcohol flowed and tongues, and inhibitions loosened.
But, most of all, Emma prided herself on never having had the awkward, I’m-meeting-his-parents situation.
It hadn’t been lost on her she had willingly agreed to do the latter as Damian stopped his fancy, sleek Porsche in front of his parents’ Cape Holland house in one of Stellenbosch’s posh neighborhoods.
As she stepped out of the car, while Damian held the door open for her, she took in her surroundings.
The long, winding road, which Damian, in her opinion, incorrectly called a driveway, didn’t prepare her for what lay at its end.
The house stood above her and what seemed like a hundred steps led to the glaring white porch and huge front door.
However, the landscape itself had her in awe. The lush garden and green lawns—yes lawns. It had more than one, actually more than two in front. She felt like the pauper she was, when she stood on her crutches no less, staring out at the grass and suppressing the urge to lay spread out under the lush oak tree and bushes.
She didn’t know what to say other than, “Your parents have a beautiful garden.”
To which Damian made a grunting sound and some comment about hiring the best gardeners in the country.
He had started out making small talk when they left Strand that morning, but the closer they got to Stellenbosch, the quieter he became, opting to put on a CD instead.
She herself didn’t have much of anything to say, not after what had happened the previous night, so she let the music play and stared out of the window.
As they approached the front door, she took a deep breath. She was here to help Damian out. It had nothing to do with her. These people, even if they judged her, would have absolutely no effect on her because she wasn’t there to gain their approval.
At least that’s what she told herself as Damian rang the bell.
Damian gave her an encouraging smile as they listened to footsteps approaching. And before Emma could return his smile, the door swung open and there stood Damian’s mother, whom she only met once in her life, at Stephanie’s wedding.
“Damian! Emma!” Clear surprise in her voice, which she mostly aimed at Emma, because Damian’s mother didn’t know she was coming along.
“Good to see you again, Mrs. Davidson,” she said.
His mother recovered quickly. “It feels like ages since we’ve last spoken. How have you been?”
“I’ve been good.”
“Mother, are you going to let us in?” Damian teased.
“Oh, sorry. I don’t know where my mind is.” She made a gesture with her hand for them to step inside. “I’m doing the finishing touches on lunch. Your father is in his study. I’ll go get him. Make yourselves comfortable. Irene!”
His mother glanced down the hallway, a bit flustered, as if hoping the mysterious Irene would make an appearance. She turned back to them.
“Oh it’s so good to see you, Damian.”
She gave Damian a tight hug he returned. His mother did what Emma suspected she would have done if her presence hadn’t at first sidetracked her.
“It’s good to see you, too, Mother.”
Emma frowned slightly. Now she knew why Stephanie called her in-laws Mother and Father instead of Mom and Dad.
A woman dressed in a black-and-white uniform appeared and Damian’s mother turned to her.
“Irene. This is my son Damian and his…friend Emma.” The maid gave them a tentative smile.
Emma bit the inside of her lip to not grin. The woman clearly didn’t know what to make of her presence.
“They will be having lunch with us.” She beamed at them. “Would you bring out refreshments and see if the table setting is finished.”
Emma got the impression there might be a place setting missing. She gave a sneaky glance at Damian, who acted like nothing was out of place. Like he hadn’t caused an inconvenience by inviting her and not telling his parents.
Oh, I will sort him out later, she vowed.
They were ushered by his mother into the vast living room with a magnificent view of the garden below.
She wanted to drop into an armchair. However, Damian maneuvered her to a deep-seated sofa, which seemed very inviting to curl up in but would be difficult to get out of. Then he proceeded to sit down next to her, his arm resting behind her head.
Emma felt self-conscious under his mother’s scrutiny as she made sure her crutches stayed in easy reach.
She finally met his mother’s gaze and gave her a toothy smile to hide her embarrassment.
“When Irene comes, help yourselves.”
His mother’s facial expression was hard to decipher. Now she understood where Damian got his inscrutable expressions from.
“Thank you, Mother. We will.” He rubbed her shoulder.
When his mother went out the door, Emma spun on him. “What are you doing?”
He did his famous grin. “Nothing.”
“You should know by now your smile doesn’t work on me.”
He narrowed his eyes, trailing a heated path to her lips and then back up to her gaze. She swallowed hard.
“You sure?” His deep baritone vibrated through her.
She blinked to get the fog from her brain.
“You’re creating….” She cleared her throat. “You’re creating,” she started again, “the impression there is something more going on between us.”
“So I imagined you kissing me back last night?” He had her there.
Before she could answer, Irene walked in with a tentative smile. Irene was too young to have been with the household when Damian was growing up because she awkwardly went about her work throwing sidelong glances his way. She clearly was up-to-date with Hollywood as she tripped over feet when Damian flashed her a grin and he had to get up to help her with the serving tray.
“Thank you, I
rene.”
Her blush deepened and she stuttered something incoherent as he turned his well-known smile on the poor, unsuspecting woman. She backed out of the room so quickly Emma couldn’t help but smile.
Damian shrugged and put the tray down.
“I don’t see any coffee on this tray, so it’s a choice between tea, apple cider, and water.” His brow lifted.
“Apple cider,” she replied, still not having an answer to his question.
“Thought so.” He poured both of them a glass.
Damian was a carbon copy of the tall man striding into the room—upright, with a dignified set to his shoulders. The resemblance unmistakable. Mark also took after his father, though with elements of his mother. She could easily imagine Damian in scrubs racing down a hospital’s hallways.
Unable to stand up and meet him, she took the glass Damian handed to her and smiled a greeting up at his father. He didn’t seem surprised to see her.
“Damian,” his father said in a measured tone.
“Father,” Damian replied, stilted, completely different from the warm greeting given to his mother.
To Emma it seemed like his back had turned into a wooden plank.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Davidson,” she said when father and son eyed each other for longer than was comfortable.
He turned his steady gaze toward her.
Damn Damian for dragging me into this!
His father gave her a polite greeting. She was not there to meet his parents, she said to herself over and over again as she took a sip from her cider and watched how Damian and his father carefully moved around each other.
“It’s nice to see you again, Emma. How’s your mother?”
His father folded himself in the armchair she coveted, one leg over the other. He had a casual air, but Emma wasn’t fooled as he stiffly regarded them.
“She’s doing fine, glad to finally not have to have arguments over white roses for the tables or daisies.” The cool stem of the glass in her hands kept her grounded amongst so much awkward tension.
“Yes. Wedding planning can be taxing.”
Damian hadn’t said a word since greeting his father and proceeded to put his arm behind her head again, his hand touching her shoulder.
The move hadn’t been lost on his father, who gave his hand a curious look, then directed the same scrutiny to her.
Emma almost jumped up and said, “It’s not what you think!” Damian was using her as a buffer for his parents and she did not appreciate it at all.
Yep I should’ve figured it out from the get-go, but no! She was stupid to believe…and she paused. What did I believe?
His mother entered, the earlier flustered woman replaced by a capable woman in charge of her household.
“Does everyone have something to drink?” She eyed them all, including her husband’s empty hands and, without a word, poured them each a glass of apple cider. She sat down across from them after handing her husband the glass.
“So, Emma, how’s your mother?” She asked.
Emma smiled. “She’s doing fine.”
“Father asked the same question,” Damian said.
His mother’s brow lifted. “Well,” she turned to him, “how have you been? Mark said you arrived last week.”
Emma was going to draw blood if she kept on biting the inside of her mouth. She remembered Stephanie telling her Damian hadn’t been home in a couple of years.
She cringed inside. He chose to bring her along when he finally did. I’m so going to get him for this.
“Yes.” One word, nothing more. She almost elbowed him, but both his parents stared at them. His father didn’t come across as too interested in the discussion.
His mother tried again. “You’re staying in Strand?”
He took a mouthful from his cider and nodded. “Yes. It’s better than a hotel.”
At least it’s more than his last response. Until his next words. “I wouldn’t have met Emma if I had stayed somewhere else.” He stared at her like she were his next meal. “She made my stay in Strand so far…very interesting.”
Her mouth gaped open. Who says stuff like that to their parents? Is he demented? Her jaw dropped to the floor, which was probably not what he had aimed for, but if he hadn’t noticed by now, she lacked any acting skills.
His father’s uninterested gaze flickered and then went back to its former blank slate.
“Oh,” his mother replied.
She couldn’t blame the woman. What could she say to the prodigal son who came home and shoved some unknown woman in her face, one who seemed to have more appeal for him than his parents?
Technically I’m not unknown, but to them I’m still a stranger.
“Yes my sister and I are holidaying in Strand. School’s out. I…we didn’t know Damian had arrived from the States, so it kind of caught us all off guard.” She made a short sound between a laugh and a grunt and babbled on.
“So now we are all staying there, holidaying. I planned on quiet reading. Funny story actually,” she said, unable to stop herself, “My box filled with books fell on my feet the first day. They just bottomed out of the box while I lifted it and broke my pinky toe as all of them landed on my feet.” She raised up the foot with the broken toe and while doing so realized how inappropriate that might be, so she quickly put her foot down.
“Um…yeah, it was really sore. Damian helped me though. Put on salve, bandaged it….” Her voice trailed off as his father stared at her with a scrunched-up nose.
Again the hundredth epiphany in mere minutes. Damian had quit medicine; she was rehashing old wounds.
Oh I might as well get up and do the funky chicken.
When she turned to Damian, he sported a huge grin, clearly at her expense. She sneaked a glance at his mother and was surprised to see her smiling, too.
Irene made her appearance, sparing her further mortification and lunch was served in the dining room.
The dining room was in one word, impressive. It had a long glass table, with bronze claw-like design for legs. Portraits depicting beautiful landscapes decorated the walls. One in particular held her gaze as Damian pulled out her chair. A painting of a pond with a small sailboat on it and two small boys crouched down, their backs toward the viewer, as they played at the edge.
His father sat at the head, with his mother on his right. Damian had seated her on his father’s left and chose the seat next to hers. This didn’t go unnoticed and when he sat down, she gave him a kick with the shin of her good foot. The only response she got—his warm hand on her thigh.
She tensed at the contact and moved his hand away as she smiled across at his mother.
What am I doing here other than creating the impression I’m more connected to Damian than I am? How did I walk into this with my eyes wide open?
“Emma, you said school’s out. Are you still a student?” his father asked.
She got pulled from her anxious thoughts. “Um…no. I’m a teacher. I haven’t been a student in years.”
His father smiled at her. “Really? You look like you’ve only started at varsity.”
She laughed. “Yeah people always mistake me for being younger than what I am.”
His mother asked, “Where did you study?”
“Here in Stellenbosch, at the university. Actually, I didn’t really study teaching. I did my postgraduate certificate in it. I was studying Humanities majoring in English, History, and Sociology.”
His father’s brow lifted. “Three majors?”
Emma laughed nervously. “Yes. Happens when you don’t quite know what to do with your life after you graduate. Some people I think are born knowing what they want to do in life; others like me have to discover it along the way.”
His father asked after a short pause. “What did your father have to say about that?”
She blinked, not having expected the question. “Nothing. He knew I would find my way. He always encouraged us to discover the world for ourselves. I’ve had a love
for studying from an early age, so I always knew I would go to university. I just hadn’t quite worked out the rest. One semester I started to help at a non-governmental organization. They had an after-school program for kids on farms who are unable to find good resources close to them or who simply didn’t have a place to study for tests and exams. The NGO also specialized in creating awareness about social issues affecting their community, giving the kids the necessary tools to be part of the change and keep themselves away from it. Many of the kids came from broken homes or were disadvantaged.”
Emma cleared her throat. “As I volunteered I realized I don’t just like studying, I like teaching others to do the same.”
She realized she had revealed more of herself than she had meant to. Oh goodness it was one of those rare moments in life when I suffered from verbal diarrhea. She shifted uncomfortably.
It was Damian’s fault; he wasn’t making any effort to talk to his parents.
He took hold of her hand and gave it a squeeze. “Is that what led you to teach primary and not high school?” Damian asked.
“Yes, I could lay a good foundation for other teachers. Create a love for books.”
He smiled. “Like yours.”
“Not so much recently. I never knew loving books could be so painful,” she said, making them all laugh.
Lunch went on from there in a lighter note than it started.
Emma enjoyed herself. She found Damian’s father quite inquisitive as he raised some current education issues the government faced. They conversed well and his mother every now and then also joined in.
Damian however, remained silent for the most part, only occasionally came out of his shell.
It was obvious to Emma both father and son still struggled with unresolved issues. His mother tried, from time to time, to get them to talk to each other. But other than a few stilted comments, they didn’t have much to say.
Emma’s buffer status had been completely confirmed as most of the conversation had been directed at her and revolved around her.
After lunch, they had coffee, which she couldn’t decline even though Damian made eyes they should leave. His mother asked too nicely and clearly seemed to want to spend more time with her son. His father also stuck around and it had been more of the same as at the table.
Falling for Mr. Unexpected Page 11