I didn’t have time to react before he kissed me.
It went deep, deep inside, stoking a fire I never knew had been building.
I heard his shoes drop to the sand as he sank his hands into my hair. They tugged a little bit at the strands, and I cried out into his warm mouth. His tongue was silky and smooth, making me wet. He slid one hand down to my ass, cupping it firmly. I had never felt a need so powerful, and from the way he pressed his hard erection against me, I could tell he felt the same.
Until Darth Vader’s theme song filled our ears.
“Shit!” Esteban groaned and pulled away, pulling the phone out of his pocket.
I felt like I should be annoyed, but knew I had no right to. “It’s been more than fifteen minutes, hasn’t it?”
He nodded and adjusted his pants before turning his back to me, the phone to his ear.
“Sí,” he said quickly. There was a pause, then he hung up. He slowly turned to face me and a sober smile graced his lips. “I have to go. Now. I am so sorry.”
I shook my head. My heart was still beating so fast, and my clit was throbbing like I was going to die without release. But I understood. I took in a deep breath. “It’s fine. Go. Go do your job.”
“You can get back up the hill?” he said. “I can carry you on my back, but I have to run.”
“It’s easier to go up than down,” I told him reassuringly. “I’ll be fine. I’ll . . . talk to you tomorrow?”
“Yes,” he said. Then he grabbed my face in his warm hands and kissed me hard. He took off sprinting across the sand. I had no idea where he was going, but whatever he was about to do, it would be something bad, part of a world I would never have to know about.
Once he disappeared up the path and my hormones had calmed down, I turned to look at the ocean. There was a queer hollowness in my chest. Was this it? Was this all there was to my life? Just the waves again, beckoning me to join them, to sink into depths where love couldn’t touch me?
I stood there on the private beach, bathed in moonlight, and watched. And waited. Waited for my legs to start moving, to walk into the water and drown.
But I didn’t. Because tomorrow was another day. And someone wanted to see me smile.
Though it was dark, it was still paradise.
* * *
I woke up just after noon, surprised my body would let me sleep that long. After I climbed up the cliff back to the resort and drove home, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I went in the shower and didn’t come out for a long time. I masturbated, thinking of Esteban, of what we had started but never finished. I had a glass of Scotch, neat. I sat on the back steps and listened to the crickets until I could no longer ignore the hollowness of my chest.
Then I went inside and called Doug. I let it ring and ring and ring. He never answered and I never left a message.
It was four a.m. when I finally fell asleep.
The problem with waking up in the afternoon in Hawaii is that you lose a lot of good painting light. It wasn’t as if that was my original plan. My original plan was to call Esteban. But now, after all those dreamless hours, I didn’t feel it was the right thing to do. Now I wanted to paint. I wanted to paint until everything that was left in me was on a canvas.
I packed up my easels and paints into the Jeep and took off for the beach. I decided to go for Larsen’s Beach again, the red dirt, golden sand, and aquamarine water, the color of dazzling stones, beckoning me to recreate them with my brush.
I stayed there all day. I didn’t eat, and I didn’t check my phone—I hadn’t even brought it with me. It was just me and the ocean and the colors and my hands and the sky and my heart. I went through three different canvases, saving the best view for last as the sun was going down. Exposed coral glinted like obsidian under the dying light, the waves mirrors of gold, the sky a tangerine dream frosted with the darkest, moodiest grays as clouds swarmed on the horizon.
“There’s no light left,” I heard Esteban say from behind me. I hadn’t jumped at his presence. I had half expected him to show up, to find me here one last time.
“For once, I think I am more optimistic than you.” I put the paintbrush on the edge of the easel and, totally aware of what a wreck I must have looked like, turned around to look at him.
I gasped. His eye was totally black and his nose looked bloodied.
“What happened to you?” I cried out.
He frowned, confused for a moment. Then he gave me a reassuring nod. “Don’t worry about it. Comes with the job.”
“What were you doing last night?”
“Not for you to worry about,” he said. But I couldn’t believe him, because the carefree and casual Esteban was gone. Not counting his battered face, he looked worried.
“But something happened.”
“Everything is fine,” he said, his voice a little hard. “Let me look at your paintings.”
He came over to me, his feet bare, leather motorcycle jacket under his arm, and peered at the canvases. Normally I would have felt self-conscious—they weren’t my best work by far. But I was too concerned about him to care.
“Lani,” he said earnestly. “It would be a great honor if
