He only nods.
“I ended up not being alone, actually. My dad’s girlfriend . . . showed up, and she was remarkably kind.”
“That’s good, yeah?”
“Yes.” In the dappled sunshine beneath the tree, he looks like everything good and calm in the world. His eyes rest on my face without judgment. “It’s not hurting so much this morning. I was having a little breakdown over . . . everything. My dad. The winery. The whole big”—I wave my hand around—“everything.”
“I have had those moments,” he says, lifting his face to the sunshine and closing his eyes briefly.
“It’s hard to imagine.”
“What is?”
“You, having a meltdown.”
A smile crinkles his eyes. “Perhaps our methods are different, but the emotion is the same.”
A low stirring washes through me and I realize I’m reacting to the scent of him, salty and green, layered with faint perspiration in his hair or on his skin, which seeps into my pores and slams into my heightened hormones and gives me a picture of kissing him, not lightly, but with extreme and possibly sloppy attention. A lusty heat burns my cheeks.
I take a breath, look away, focus on the horizon. After a moment, it cools. When I look back, I see that he’s studying my face, my throat, and some of the same heat burns across his temples. He sees me looking, drops his gaze to his steepled fingers.
And then we just sit there in awkward, burning silence. The old me would have set aside the ginger tea, offered a hand, and taken him upstairs, living for the moment.
The me I am in this minute doesn’t want to risk the friendship I feel here, and he has come to visit, so it’s up to me to make it more comfortable. I pick up the bag of cookies and offer it with my good hand.
Only then do I remember that I’m braless beneath my thin T-shirt, my breasts swinging with the gesture to reveal their unbound state. It feels weirdly slutty, but why? It’s perfectly normal to be braless on my own patio, when a broken arm means a bra is a massive challenge.
No. Even that is a dodge. I’m braless. So what.
Better. I lift my chin.
He takes a cookie and our eyes meet. A current of desire burns down my spine, crosses my thighs, and I give him a half smile. For once in my life, I just tell the truth. “Under different circumstances, I would be very attracted to you.”
“Would be?” He takes a bite of cookie, waiting.
“Am,” I correct.
His calm British politeness drops away, and he inclines his head. “Same,” he says simply. “And same.”
I smile naturally. “Good. I could really use a friend right now.”
“So can I,” he said, and brushes crumbs from his hands. “Do you play backgammon?”
“I love it, actually, and there’s probably a set in the library. I’ll go see.”
“I can fetch it if you like.”
I shake my head. “No, that’s all right. I’ll be right back.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Meadow
Rory calls me as I’m arriving in town. “Can you come over today? I told the girls that their grandpa is gone.” She pauses. “Dead.”
“Oh, honey.” Why does it seem that both children have a crisis at the same time? This happened over and over when they were young, one having trouble with a friend while the other was struggling with a subject in school. I pull the car over into the parking lot of a gym. “How are they?”
“I don’t think they really get it. Maybe I’m bad at this.”
“You’re not bad at it. It’s hard.”
“I guess.”
Something in her voice makes me lift my head. Rory is always the even-tempered one, the easy one. She was never much trouble, even as a teenager, blessed with that easygoing way. I have no idea where she got it.
Now, my mother-nerves are prickling. “How are you, sweetie? Did the police call you, too?”
“Yes.” A pause, and I can hear the emotion in her voice. “How could he have had cancer and not said anything?”
“Maybe he didn’t know,” I say.
“I didn’t think of that.” She sounds broken. “When can you come?”
I was not always the best mother to this child, and I want to do the right thing now, but Maya’s need feels more urgent. The light changes and I turn right to go up the road toward Belle l’été. “I can come in an hour or so. I’m on my way to see your sister. Did you know she broke her arm at work yesterday?”