Mr. Family. Margot Early
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out.”
Erika wished she’d chosen something Hiialo didn’t have.
Hiialo put the pens back in the gift bag and hugged her stuffed puppy. “Thank you, anyhow, Erika.”
“You’re welcome, sweetie. I hope you enjoy them.”
“I’m going to go make a little bed for my dog.” A moment later she disappeared into her room.
Kal shrugged, an apology. “She’s only four.”
“She’s darling,” Erika replied politely. She lifted out another gift sack, this one heavier and decorated with suns and moons, and handed it to Kal. When he took it, she saw the veins in his sun-browned forearms and the calluses on his hands. He had nice hands.
Kal opened the. bag and pulled out a thick navy blue T-shirt with a primitive design in black, white and rust on the front. The figure of a whale was circled by a field of white dots.
“It’s a design of the Chumash Indians of Santa Barbara,” said Erika.
“Thanks. I’ll wear it now.”
He set the bag, not yet empty, on the bed and started to unbutton his aloha shirt with the eagerness of a man who hated to dress up.
As he took it off, Erika had an impression of a lean muscular chest and roped abdominal muscles. Trying to ignore him, she memorized the colors in the flowers outside the window. When she sensed that he’d put on the new shirt, she glanced back at him.
He was holding out the hem, checking the fit, which was good. “Thanks,” he said again.
“There’s more.”
Kal picked up the sack and withdrew a quart of beer from a micro-brewery in Santa Barbara. She saw him hesitate before he said, “Thank you. We’ll have to share it tonight.”
“Thank you, Kal. This bed…” It was bigger than his.
Wide enough for two.
“The drawers came off an old dresser. The rest was easy.” He edged toward the window, touching the frame.
His legs, Erika noticed, were long. Even covered by the loose twill of his drawstring-waist pants, they suggested muscle. Though his skin was golden brown from the sun, it was also smooth, the kind of skin that made her want to touch the area around his lips and his mouth, touch that tiny scar. And the bare abdomen, the chest, the shoulders she had glimpsed when he changed his shirt. He was powerfully built. Six years younger than me.
The thought was not unappealing. He was certainly a grown man.
But her observation was distant. Uninvolved. She assessed him as she thought another woman might.
When he turned from the window, Kal found her staring. Shot by a feeling he hadn’t expected—something sexual—he hurried to end the moment. “You probably want to rest. Are you hungry?”
“The food on the plane was good. I’d just as soon spend some time with Hiialo.”
“Look, I don’t expect you to baby-sit. That wasn’t the idea.” Not exactly.
Good. Maybe he wouldn’t mind if she had to get a job. “Well, she’s why I came,” she said, suddenly needing to make that clear. He could have changed his shirt in the other room.
“Mmm,” Kal agreed. Hiialo’s door was opened just a crack, but he could hear her playing in her room, talking make-believe with her stuffed friends. He leaned against the wall he had framed. “So…you probably want to make sure you like us before we go any further with this.”
Erika felt the quilt beneath her—and the bed. Things had gone pretty far. “I don’t see anything likely to make me run away.”
You haven’t seen my daughter throw a tantrum.
But Erika Blade struck him as a woman who wouldn’t flee difficulty.
“We can give ourselves as much time as we need,” he said. “I was thinking of about six weeks.”
Panic stricken, Erika thought she might break into hysterical laughter. Six weeks to decide if she wanted to spend the rest of her life in a celibate marriage to a man with more sex appeal than Brad Pitt?
But even making contributions to household expenses, she should be able to make her money last six weeks. And surely she could produce some marketable art in that length of time. “Six weeks sounds reasonable.”
Kal nodded. The air in the room felt oppressive, stuffy, and he knew it was because of the topic, the future he’d planned, the prison of a marriage without touch, a marriage to a stranger.
He said, “I’ll leave you alone. Maybe we can go swimming later.”
She nodded and so did he. Kal hurried out of the room, then the house. Moments later as he stood on the lanai quaffing the air, he realized he hadn’t been fleeing the awkwardness. He’d been getting away from Erika Blade’s tawny arms and legs, her narrow bare feet, her brown hair and eyes. He was fleeing the woman herself.
Because he found her very beautiful, which was the last thing he’d expected.
THEY AGREED ON A SWIM before dinner.
At five Kal threw on some faded red surfing trunks and went into Hiialo’s room to tell her to put on her swimsuit. She was playing with her new stuffed puppy, whom she’d named Fluff. Kal wondered if Erika liked dogs.
“Hiialo, want to go swimming?”
“Yes! Hooray!” She tucked Fluff in a shoe box she’d lined with doll blankets, and then hurried to her closet, which looked about like his, a pit, and began throwing her clothes around, looking for a swimsuit.
Kal went out into the front room.
Erika was on the lanai, dressed in a coral swimsuit, a sarong around her waist. He could see the muscles in her suntanned back. Strong. Unaware of him, she crouched to touch a Mexican creeper growing beside the veranda. She studied it with the intense concentration he’d noticed before, as though she had to take a test on it later. He saw her eyes drop slightly, her lids brush her cheeks, and she swallowed.
Emotional…Whatever she felt, Kal understood. She’d just moved in with a stranger she’d met through a want ad.
He walked out onto the lanai and Erika straightened. He said, “You’ve got a towel. I was going to ask if you needed one.”
“No, I—I brought everything.”
“Literally?”
Erika met his eyes, and her heart moved from her chest to her throat. “Yes.” She’d even sold the Karmann Ghia. “I don’t own much. I’ve always lived on boats.”
The way she said it made him wonder. She must have traveled all the time as a kid. No neighborhood. No best friend, unless it was her brother. Kal had never known anyone who could put all her worldly goods in four pieces of luggage and a cardboard box. “This house is kind of like a boat,” he said, “that stays in one place.”
His half smile, combined with the sober look in his eyes, made Erika feel he knew things she’d never told him.
Hiialo bounded out of the house, clutching her Pocahontas beach towel. “Let’s go. Come on, Eduardo.” She shouted, “Can we go in the outrigger, Daddy?”
Erika made the kind of involuntary wince someone does when the music comes on too loud. Because of Hiialo? Kal wondered. That would be bad. If his daughter was an amplifier, she would go up to eleven. Higher than high, louder than loud. “Not today.”
Barefoot, Erika stepped down to the