tomorrow. Meet me/ Nick ordered.
You shouldn't have gone running off/ said Bernard Wackie, showing
amazing hindsight. Before he could deliver any more pearls of wisdom,
Nicholas hung up on him.
Samantha was sitting up in the centre of the bed. She was stark naked,
but she hugged her knees to her chest with both arms, and under the
gorgeous tangle of her hair her face was desolate as that of a lost
child and her green eyes haunted.
You're going again/ she said softly. You only just came, and now you're
going again. Oh God, Nicholas, loving you is the toughest job I've ever
had in my life. I don't think I have got the muscle for it. He reached
for her quickly and she clung to him, pressing her face into the thick
pad of coarse dark hair that covered his chest.
I have to go - I think it's Golden Dawn, he said, and she listened
quietly while he told it to her, Only when he finished speaking did she
begin to ask the questions which kept them talking quietly, locked in
each other's arms in the old brass bed, until long after midnight.
She insisted on cooking his breakfast for him, even though it was still
dark outside and she was more than half asleep, hanging on to the range
for support and turning up the early morning radio show so that the
music might shake her awake.
Good morning, early birds, this is W.W.O.K. with another lovely day
ahead of you. A predicted 8 S at Fort Lauderdale and the coast, and 80
inland with a 10% chance of rain. We've got a report on hurricane Lorna
for you also. She's dipping away south, towards the lesser Antilles -
so we can all relax, folks - relax and listen to Elton John. I love
Elton John/ Samantha said sleepily. Don't you?
Who's he? Nicholas asked.
There! I knew right away we had a lot in common. She blinked at him
owlishly. Did you kiss me good morning?
I forget. Come here/ he instructed. You're not going to forget this
one. Then, a few minutes later, Nicholas, you'll miss your plane. Not
if I cut breakfast. It would have been a grotty breakfast anyway. She
was coming awake fast now.
She gave him the last kiss through the open window of the Cougar.
'You've got an hour - you'll just about make He started the engine and
still she held on to the sill.
Nicholas, one day we will be together - I mean all the time, like we
planned? You and me doing our own thing, our own way? We will, won't
we? It's a promise. Hurry back/ she said, and he gunned the Cougar up
the sandy driveway without looking back.
There were eight of them crowded into Tom Parker's office.
Although there was only seating for three, the others found perches
against the tiered shelves with their rows of biological specimens in
bottles of formaldehyde or on the piles of reference books and white
papers that were stacked against the walls.
Samantha sat on the corner of Tom's desk, swinging her long denim-clad
legs, and answered the questions that were fired at her.
How do you know she will take the passage of the Florida Straits? It's
an educated guess. She's just too big and clumsy to thread the needle
