She stiffened under his touch. “Sure,” she said lightly – too lightly – agreeing too readily for him to believe he hadn’t just hit on a topic she didn’t want to discuss.
Warily, he watched her rummaging through the contents of the fridge. Something definitely was bugging her tonight. He knew she liked to keep her feelings to herself, but he’d known her long enough now to know when she was adding another layer of veneer to her shell, and he wasn’t convinced he didn’t have something to do with her edginess.
She pulled out a container. “How does leftover Mee Goreng sound?”
“Perfect. You know it’s my favourite.”
He finished off his beer, while she scooped the noodle and prawn dish into bowls and warmed them in the microwave. She had a way of moving he would never tire of. He was no kind of poet, but it occurred even to him that watching her move was like watching silk in motion. Fluid. Graceful. And as elegant as the stylised phoenix on her shoulder. The artist must have been a master to capture the intent in just a few curved lines of ink.
He’d seen plenty of fireys with phoenix tattoos, usually rising from the flames, strong and proud – even Dare had one that just about circled her body – and there the meaning was obvious. But he’d never thought to ask Ava what the tattoo on her shoulder meant to her. He’d figured she’d picked it out from a book of designs because she’d liked it.
Stupid of him, really, but then he hadn’t known her beyond the superficial then. Now he knew there was nothing superficial about her at all.
And now he was curious.
“It’s a pretty common tatt for fireys to get – a phoenix, I mean,” he said, fishing. “You see a lot of them around.”
“Oh?” she said, seeming only half interested. “I didn’t know.”
“A lot of the guys get one after a major fire, like a badge of honour or a public statement that they’ve come through the worst that life can throw at them.”
She nodded. “Like I said, it should be something important. My father forbade me from getting a tattoo, so, of course, I was determined to get one. That was important to me. Can you get the cutlery?”
He dug out cutlery from the drawer and pulled another beer from the fridge while the microwave hummed away, the kitchen filling with the scent of garlic and spices as the machine warmed its contents. Outside the windows, the sky was inky blue, a bright moon turning the trees to dark silhouettes, while inside, his stomach growled appreciatively, and not for the first time he considered himself lucky that he’d come into Ava’s orbit. Stunning looking woman, fantastic lover, and exceptional cook. If a man hadn’t sworn off marriage for life, he could do a lot worse.
But then, there was so much about her he didn’t know. So much she didn’t share. She dropped tiny glimpses into her past life like bread crumbs scattered along a path. Once upon a time, he wouldn’t have given it a second thought. Now he felt shut out. Excluded. And that was nuts given their relationship was all about the sex, surely?
They sat down opposite each other—the tabletop between them hewn from another slab of the same timber that graced the benchtops—Caleb feeling more unsettled and off-balance than he’d been in a long time, and wondering if today’s crash had messed with his head more than he’d realised.
He took a forkful of the warmed up Mee Goreng and flavours exploded on his tongue, and he forgot all about feeling off-balance, and realised how hungry he was. “This is amazing,” he said, between mouthfuls.
“It’s hot enough?”
And whether she meant warmed up in the microwave enough or chilli hot, it made no difference to his answer. “It’s perfect. You know, you’re a genius in the kitchen. Not to mention the bedroom for that matter.” Then he remembered where they’d just made love. “Outside the bedroom, come to think of it.”
The smile in her eyes and her upturned lips put much needed balance back into his off-kilter world. “You know how to make a girl feel good.”
He raised his beer in a toast to her. “It’s the least I can do. A woman like you deserves to feel good.”
Ava watched the spinning fan above her bed. She wasn’t so sure Caleb would think that if he knew exactly what kind of woman she was – and what kind of woman she’d been. What would he think she’d deserve then? To feel good, or to feel the weight of her sordid past around her neck like the slumbering millstone that it was. She closed her eyes, feeling the beast awaken and stir inside her, but unable to block out the thoughts in her head, her mind refusing to rest even as their bodies hummed their way down after another lovemaking session. This time had been nothing like that first, frenetic act. This time had been slow to build and sensual, a pleasurable melding of the carnal with sweet, as they took their time with each other’s bodies, took the time to relish every dip and curve of each other, took the time to savour the slide of skin against skin. Even so, when they’d made it to those giddy, teetering heights and she’d come again, it had been with that spellbinding show of light against shadow, and making her wonder, when she was capable of logical thought again, was she really ready to see this end?
No.
She squeezed her eyes more tightly. She liked sex too much. She’d liked the sex almost from the start. Liked the power it had given her over the men who’d visited her bed, even when they thought they were the ones being pleasured.
She liked sex too much to give it up now, on a whim.
A woman like her? Restlessly, she tumbled in his arms again. What would he think
