‘But I don’t have one of those!’
Leo simply put up the ‘stop’ hand. ‘For the non-seafood-lovers there will be ricotta tortellini with burnt-sage butter sauce as an alternative first course, and either chargrilled lime and mint chicken or a Moroccan-style chickpea tagine for your fellow commune dwellers for the main course.’
‘Oh, even the chickpea thing sounds good. Because chickpeas are sort of like the meat of vegetables, don’t you think?’
‘No, I don’t.’
‘What about the cake?’
‘Four options: traditional fruit cake, salted caramel—which we can do with either a chocolate or butterscotch base—or coconut.’
‘Oh! Oh! Could we do one of those cake-tasting things? You know, where you sit around and try before you buy? I would so love to do a cake-tasting.’
‘For the love of God, can’t we just ask the guys what they want?’
‘What would be the fun in that?’ Sunshine asked, mystified.
Leo ran that hand over his head. ‘I’ll talk to Anton—he’s my pâtissier.’
‘And I have the most amazing idea for the decoration. Kind of Art Deco—my current favourite thing. Square tiers, decorated with hand-cut architectural detailing, in white and shades of grey, with painted silver accents. Wait a moment—I’ve got a photo.’
Sunshine leapt off the couch and raced into her office, grabbed the photo and raced back out. ‘What do you think?’ she asked, thrusting it at him.
But Leo was looking past her into the office.
She’d forgotten to close the door.
‘Oh,’ she said, seeing through his eyes the green-striped wallpaper, the reproduction antique furniture painted in vivid blues, reds, and yellows, the framed prints of lusciously coloured shoes through the ages hung on the walls.
The urn with Moonbeam’s ashes. In his direct line of sight.
Oh, no! Sunshine raced back to close the door.
‘So!’ she said, her heart beating hard as she came back to sit beside him. ‘So! The cake.’
‘I’ll talk to Anton,’ Leo said absently, still looking at the closed door.
Sunshine decided drastic action was needed—just to make sure he didn’t ask to actually go in there.
Going with gut feeling—and, all right, secret desire—she hugged him.
He seemed to freeze for a moment, and then his arms came around her. He gathered her in for one moment. She heard, felt him inhale slowly.
Wow! He was actually touching her! Voluntarily! Except that this wasn’t exactly touching—it was more. Better! Absorbing! He was absorbing her! Talk about exclamation mark overload!
His arms were so hard. So was his chest. It should have felt like being pulled against a brick wall...and yet there was something yielding about him. His hand came up, touched the back of her head, fingers sliding into her hair.
Good. But Sunshine wanted more. Much more.
She pulled out of his arms, sat back, looked at him. ‘I don’t know how you’re going to take this, Leo,’ she said, ‘but I want to have sex with you.’
Leo stared. Couldn’t so much as blink.
A minute ticked by.
She was waiting for him to speak, her head tilted—the curious bird look.
Had he heard correctly?
Had Sunshine Smart just told him, taking matter-of-factness to the level of an art form, that she wanted to have sex with him? And that she didn’t know how he’d take that confession?
‘What did you just say?’ he asked at last, and his voice sounded as though he hadn’t used it for a month.
‘Just that I want to have sex with you.’ Sunshine pursed her lips, considering him. ‘Are you shocked? Horrified? Appalled? Because you don’t look interested.’
‘Gary. Ben. Marco.’ He listed them without elaborating.
‘Gary, Ben and Marco?’ she said, as though she had no idea what he was getting at.
‘How many lovers do you need?’
She gave him an Aha! kind of look, then said simply, ‘Okay, I’ll tell you. I’m not sleeping with any of them. I’m not sleeping with anyone. I hoped there would be a spark with Gary, but it never developed. Ben? Twice. But that’s ancient history, and we won’t talk about his addiction to cheesy love songs in the bedroom.’
Momentary distraction. ‘Ben and cheesy love songs? What is it with people and cheesy love songs?’
‘I know—it’s crazy! So, of course, it was never going to go anywhere. Marco—well, that would be a cold day in hell.’ She looked at him. ‘But there’s no need to talk it to death. If you’re not interested let’s just move on. We have a tough seven weeks ahead, and there’s just not enough time for us to go through an awkward phase.’
‘How the hell am I supposed to move on?’ Leo asked, incredulous.
‘I said I wanted to have sex with you—not that I wanted to marry you. And only up to four times, which is my limit.’ She looked at him thoughtfully. ‘You don’t suffer from priapism by any chance, do you?’
‘From what?’
‘Guess not. Well, then—are you, perhaps, a virgin who’s signed some sort of pledge?’
‘No, of course I’m not a virgin.’
‘Well, I don’t know why you say “of course” like that. There are more virgins out there than you realise. In fact I read on the internet that—’
‘And what do you mean, only up to four times?’ he asked, jumping in before she could give him virgin facts. Because he did not want virgin facts.
‘Any more than four times and things get messy. You know—emotional. If you don’t want to develop a relationship it’s best to set a limit. And I don’t. Want to develop a relationship. I mean; I do want to set a limit. Hmm, you’re giving me that look.’
‘What look?’
‘That she’s insane look.’
‘That’s because you are. Insane.’
‘I’m just sensible, Leo. Men do this stuff all the time. Pick up a girl in a seedy bar—not that we’re in a seedy bar, of course, but you get the picture—then race her off to the bedroom, then do the I’ll-call-you routine when they have no intention of calling. So why can’t I? Well, not the I’ll-call-you thing—I would never say I’d call someone and then not do it. And there really is no reason not to call. Regardless of whether you want to have sex with them again. Because you had to like them in some way to get into bed with them in the first place, so you should want to see where the friendship goes, shouldn’t you? The sex part is kind of incidental—because sex is just...well, sex.’
Pause.
Thank God. Because his head was spinning.
‘I guess what I’m saying,’ she continued, unabashed, ‘is that it’s better to be up-front about what you want—just sex, just friendship, sex and then friendship. Whatever! But no tragic I love you just to wring an orgasm out of someone.’
‘What if you do fall in love?’
‘I won’t. I never have. And I never will. I told you before: I won’t let myself care