She forced herself to look forward again and concentrated on the scuba lessons she’d learnt last week from old Tom, running through the procedures.
‘Nice even breathing through the mouthpiece; no holding your breath. This is how to replace a regulator in your mouth if it gets knocked out. This is how to control the speed of your ascent and descent by letting air in and out via the buoyancy control, so your ears don’t hurt. Nothing to be nervous about. We’ll go as slow as you need.’
Two hours later as she walked home in a much more desultory fashion a glow of pride warmed her as she remembered old Tom’s quiet pleasure in her. ‘You’re a natural,’ he’d told her.
A natural scuba diver? Who would have known? But today he’d taken her to the little island just off the beach and they’d dived slowly around the tiny inlets and rocks and seen colourful fish, delicate submarine plant life that swayed with the rhythm of the ocean, once a small stingray and one slightly larger shark, and it had all been Technicolor brilliant. Exciting. And, to her absolute delight, she’d loved it.
Her mind danced with snapshots of the morning and she didn’t see the man and little girl sitting in a shallow rock pool under the cliff until she was almost upon them.
‘Oh. You. Hello,’ she stammered as she was jerked out of her happy reveries.
‘Good morning, Catrina,’ Finlay said. Though how on earth he could remain nonchalant while sitting in a sandy-bottom indent in the rock where the water barely covered his outstretched legs, she had no idea. ‘You look very pleased with yourself.’
She regarded them. She liked the way they looked—so calm and happy, Piper dressed in her frilly pink swimsuit that covered her arms and legs. And she liked the way he called her Catrina. Ed had always called her Trina and she wasn’t ready for another man to shorten her name. ‘Good morning to you, Finlay.’
‘Finn. Please. I’m usually Finn. Don’t know why I was so formal yesterday.’
‘Finn.’ She nodded and smiled down at Piper. ‘Hello, Piper. What can you see in the rock pool?’
The little girl turned her big green eyes back to the water. Pointed one plump finger. ‘Fiss,’ Piper said and Finn’s eyes widened.
His mouth opened and closed just like the word his daughter had almost mouthed.
‘She said fish!’ His eyes were alight with wonder and the huge smile on his face made Trina want to hug him to celebrate the moment of pure joy untinged by bitterness. ‘I can’t believe she said fish.’
‘Clever girl,’ Trina said and battled not to laugh out loud. She’d thought it had been more like a mumbled fiss. But she was sure her father knew better. Her mouth struggled to remain serious. In the end she giggled. Giggled? Again? What the heck?
She’d never been a giggler but this guy made her smiles turn into noises she cringed at.
To hide her idiotic response she said, ‘I’ve seen fish too, Piper.’
Finn glanced at her mask. ‘You’ve been snorkelling?’
Trina spread her arms and said with solemn pride, almost dramatically, ‘I have been scuba diving.’
‘Have you? Go you. I used to love to scuba.’ He glanced around. ‘Would you like to join us in our pool? There’s no lifeguard except me but if you promise not to run or dive we’ll let you share.’
Trina scanned the area too. Nobody she knew. She’d look ridiculous, though a voice inside her head said he looked anything but ridiculous in his skin-tight blue rash shirt and board shorts that left not one gorgeous muscle top or bottom unaccounted for.
She put down her mask and the sandals she carried, folded her towel to sit on, hiked up her sundress so it didn’t drag in the water and eased herself down at the edge of the pool and put her feet in. The water felt deliciously cool against her suddenly warmer skin.
Finn watched her and she tried not to be aware of that. Then Piper splashed him and the mood broke into something more relaxed. ‘So where did you go to scuba?’
She glanced the way she’d come. ‘Have you been around the headland?’
He nodded. ‘Around the next two until Piper started to feel like a bag of cement on my back.’
Trina laughed. She could so imagine that. She smiled at him. ‘The next bay is called Island Bay and the little rocky island that’s about four hundred metres out is called Bay Island.’
He laughed. ‘Creative people around here.’
She pretended to frown at him. ‘I like to think of it as being whimsical.’
‘Whimsical. Right.’
She nodded at him. ‘Thank you. So, Bay Island is where I did this morning’s lesson. Old Tom takes beginners out.’
Piper sat between Finn’s legs and he had his big brown long-fingered hands around her tiny waist so she couldn’t slip. She was splashing with her starfish hands and silver droplets of water dripped in chasing drops down her father’s chest. An unexpected melancholy overwhelmed Trina because the picture made her ache for lost opportunities she should have had with Ed. Opportunities Finn should have had with his wife. She wondered when these thoughts would stop colouring her every experience.
Finn smiled. ‘Let me guess. His business is called Old Tom’s Dive Shop.’
She jerked back to the present. Her brows crinkled in mock disbelief and she drew the sentence out slowly. ‘How did you know that?’
‘I’m psychic.’ His expression remained serious.
‘Really?’ She tried for serious too but he was doing it again and her mouth twitched.
‘Mmm-hmm. True story.’
‘Wow.’ She noted the little girl had found a treasure. ‘So you can see your daughter is about to put a shell in her mouth?’
Without taking his eyes off Trina’s face, his hand came up gently and directed Piper’s hand away from her lips. Brushed her fingers open until she dropped the shell and bent down and kissed the little fingers. ‘Absolutely.’
‘That’s fascinating.’ And it was. Watching this big bronzed man being so gentle and connected to this tiny girl-child. The bond between them made tears sting Trina’s eyes and she pretended she’d splashed water in them. Until she felt, and heard, her tummy rumble with sullen emptiness and seized on the excuse.
‘Well, as lovely as your private ocean pool is, I need to have food. I missed breakfast and I’m starving.’
‘Ah. So that’s what the noise was,’ he teased. ‘I thought it was an outboard motor.’
She flicked tiny droplets from her damp fingers at him. ‘Too rude.’
He rolled his eyes at her, then shifted Piper from between his legs to sit in the shallow pool and stood up easily. He leant down to offer her his hand. ‘Piper’s hungry. I should feed her too.’
She barely heard him. His so casually offered fingers were a stumbling block and she hesitated. Piper splashed and she knew she was holding them up. Reluctantly she put out her hand to his and his strong brown fingers closed over hers to lift her smoothly. Way too easily. But the touch of his fingers on hers created such a vibration between them that their eyes met. One pair as startled as the other.
When she was standing he let go quickly and bent down to hoist his daughter into his arms. His face stayed hidden as he tickled her and Trina straightened her own shocked features into a mask of politeness as Piper giggled.
‘Well,’ she said awkwardly, still rocked by the frisson of awareness that had warmed her whole hand. Her whole arm really. ‘Thanks for the swim.’
‘Can we walk back with you?’