Meet Me in Tahiti

Chapter Twenty-Four

So that’s what all the fuss is about.

Zoe woke with those words in her head, then grabbed Finn’s pillow, brought it to her face and inhaled.

True to his word, he had not been gentle last night. Well, actually he had. When he’d whispered that he had to be—that he needed to be, for her—as he’d eased inside her, telling her it was wonderful, that she was everything, all he could ever want.

Other than that, though? Whew!

In the lead-up he’d found every single part of her body that could feel and made every single nerve explode. He’d done it effortlessly, easily, exuberantly, with hot words spilling out telling her what he was going to do next. Lick you, suck you, kiss you here, put my tongue there. And even better: Do it back to me, I am so hot for you I’ll let you take anything you want, do anything you want.

Zoe didn’t know what she’d expected, but it hadn’t been anything quite so vocal!

And yet it had been perfect.

The fact that she was sporting a series of love bites all over her breasts was amazingly good. The fact he was sporting them all over his chest too? Even better. He was hers. She wanted him marked as such.

She wished she could do it all again immediately.

Except he wasn’t there.

She remembered a soft kiss pressed to her mouth, a murmur that he’d be back, a stroke of her hair.

She eased up onto her elbows, and saw that Finn had brought her wheelchair in from the living room and positioned it absolutely perfectly beside the bed.

It wasn’t until she was in the chair that she noticed a small box on the bedside table, sitting on top of a handwritten note, which read:

Happy birthday, my heart,

Had some work to do so the room is all yours until 9:30, when I’ll be back with breakfast. I’m bringing extra napkins for when you slurp mango juice and get it all over your face.

Cristina knows where you are and isn’t expecting to see you until it’s time to get ready for tonight’s farewell cocktail party—and no, I didn’t call her, she called me when she couldn’t get you on the phone so don’t punch me when I get back, or do punch me, I can take it. (Memo to Zoe: turn your phone back on.)

Today we’re practicing screaming. Don’t worry, we’re going off-the-grid, there’ll be nobody else around.

Finlay

XX (The kisses seem kind of girly, but since I used to run with a gang I figure I can get away with them.)

PS: A travel writer once told me a girl can never have too many hair clips. Actually, she didn’t tell me, she wrote it in a blog, and I found it online.

Zoe stared at the note for a full five minutes, not understanding why she was crying but crying anyway.

With one trembling hand she picked up the box and stared at it for so long anyone would have thought it was a bomb and she was working out how to neutralize it, but then she lifted the lid, and inside were two perfect hair combs, studded with black pearls and diamonds.

And it was at that precise moment that Zoe fell in love.

“Ready to scream?” Finn asked, once they were in their swimsuits.

Zoe looked so freaked out Finn almost laughed.

“Snorkeling it is, then,” he said. “This is where we sort out the Gravity thing once and for all. And no need to rub your thighs like that, just trust me.” He crouched down beside her, took her face in his hands and kissed her. “I’m going to strip you naked and have my wicked way with you tonight and nothing’s going to stop me. You can therefore take it as a given that I’m not going to let you drown.”

She laughed, as he expected, and he stood. “This motu we’re on is uninhabited, and so is that one...” pointing to an islet to the right. “Between these two motus is a channel where the current peaks. It’s not strong like a rip, but you also don’t need to expend any energy to get from one motu to the next. All you have to do is float and let the current carry you—it’s called ‘drift snorkeling.’ This is one of my favorite places in the world so I know what I’m doing.” Crouching down again. “And Zoe, I will not, will not, let you drift more than a foot away from me. Understand?”

“Yes,” she said.

He kissed her again, short and hard, and then grabbed the purple noodle and handed it to her. “OK for me to pick you up now?”

“You didn’t have to ask.”

“I’m asking anyway. We both know I’d be perfectly happy having you in my arms twenty-four hours a day so best not to let me take anything for granted.”

“Oh well, if this is going to be a regular thing—”

“Count on that!”

“Then we’re going to have to work out a signal—like the signal I have with Cris, the royal wave we call it, that lets her know to back off.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen that wave. How about if I do this...” he laid his forehead against hers, “and if you’re OK with it, you put your hands...ah hell, put them anywhere and—”

“How about for yes, I put them here...” she said, giggling as she wrapped her arms around his neck, “and here...” she shifted, so her hands were pushing against his chest, “for no.”

“I can work with that. As long as you tell me, as we go along, how you want me to do it, what works, what doesn’t, if I hurt you, whatever. No Hawke’s Cove/Mrs. Whittaker/snowdrop Zoe, mind; I want Crab Shack oak tree Zoe giving it to me straight. Deal?”

“Deal,” Zoe said, and rewound her arms around his neck before burying her face against his shoulder. “But just so you know, I kind of liked it when you hauled me out of the chair last night when we got to your bungalow.”

“Note to self,” he murmured as he carefully lifted her, “in moments of extreme passion, haul Zoe out of chair.” He kissed her again, just because he could. He could! He was breathless when he raised his head and looked into her face. “I hope you realize that on that basis I’ll be manhandling you just about every time I see you so you’d better practice our signal.” One more kiss, all the more wonderful because they were both laughing. And then, “Let’s go defy gravity,” he said.

True to his word, Finn didn’t stray more than one foot away from her for the next hour.

And when he carried her back onto the beach and she ripped off her mask and snorkel, and he’d settled her on a towel on the sand to dry off, she said, “Finn?”

“What do you need?”

“I need...” she said, giggling like a naughty schoolgirl.

“You need?” he said, laughing because it made him happy just to look at her.

“To SCREAM!” she screamed, and then she threw back her head, and did it again.

“My work here is done,” Finn said.

And then he thought, why not? and he screamed too.

Zoe chose her favorite dress for dinner—a Victoria Scott design, because she always wore V’s clothes for important events.

Her makeup was flawless, her hair twisted into an elaborate updo. All that was left to do was position the hair combs Finn had given her but she didn’t want to do that until the last possible moment because she liked looking at them and wasn’t about to spend the next half hour sitting in front of the mirror just so she could see them.

She took the combs with her to lay beside her computer while she wrote another long email to her parents, describing last night’s dinner and today’s snorkeling adventure.

They’d left her a “Happy Birthday” voice message while she’d been snorkeling, reminding her to open the gift they’d sent to her in Sydney to be opened on her birthday and not a moment before, which she’d dutifully packed (five diamond butterfly hair clips), but surprisingly there had been no anxious email making sure she was all right when she hadn’t responded to their phone call. Not that Zoe was complaining.

She hovered over a mention of Finn (it really was time to tell them) but when a call came in from Victoria, Malie and Lily—her birthday call, right on schedule—she hit send because there was already too much to do and no time to choose the right words for such a delicate topic and any mention of him might elicit one of those please be careful Zoe emails and she did not want one of those, not on this perfect today.

She was, however, going to blurt it out to the girls, just as soon as the “Happy Birthdays” were done.

But before she got a chance to say a word, Victoria said: “Zoe! You look divine!”

Zoe beamed at her. “Thanks to my fashion designer girlfriend.”

Victoria blew on her nails and gave them an over-the-top polish against her shoulder. “I know you love blue but I adore you in every shade of green—that dark color looks amazing.”

“It’s perfect for tonight’s farewell cocktail party,” Zoe said. “It reminds me of the iridescent green you see in Tahitian pearls—black pearls—which of course aren’t really black, at least not black like onyx, more like deep peacock. I got some gorgeous new Tahitian pearl hair combs today as a birthday gift and they’ll go wonderfully with this dress. Poerava, the name of this resort, actually means black pearl.”

“Speaking of gifts and resorts and...and whatever,” Malie cut in none too smoothly, “that certain someone I saw last night striding across the sand, why have you been holding out on us?”

Zoe laughed. “Well...”

“I knew it was him!” Malie pounced. “Zoe and Finn sitting in a tree, K.I.S.S.I.N.G.!”

“Seriously, Zo?” Lily said. “You knew Finn Doherty owned Poerava all along and didn’t tell even one of us, not on any of our calls?”

“I didn’t know until—hang on, how did you find out Finn owns...? Oh.” Eye roll. “Don’t tell me. Google!”

“I’ve got something better than Google,” Lily said, looking smug. “Mrs. Whittaker! She stopped by for a cup of tea today with my mother and told her Finn Doherty had bought that manor house just outside Hawke’s Cove. You know the place? The one with the fortifications? Very run-down. I’ve hoped for so long someone would buy it and turn it into a boutique hotel. The view is spectacular. And if they do it right there’s an opportunity for a wonderful restaurant. You know what I say about—”

“Restaurants,” Malie, interrupting. “Yes, yes, the more good restaurants in one location, the easier it is to become known as a cuisine location, blah blah, Devon, potential food capital of sustainable eating! But get to the good part.”

“The good part,” Lily echoed. “That would be the part about it being Finn’s sixth property! How did nobody know? Why didn’t you tell us, Zoe?”

But Zoe, sitting like she’d been poleaxed, could only gape.

“Nope,” Malie said, and hooted out a laugh. “Look at her—she didn’t know the whole of it!”

“According to Mrs. Whittaker nobody knew, at least nobody in Hawke’s Cove,” Lily said. “I mean, really, even she didn’t know? Of course, he hasn’t been back since he left forever ago so it’s not exactly surprising that no one knew but—”

“That’s not the good part!” Malie, interrupting, and blowing an errant curl out of her eyes.

“Sounds pretty good to me,” Victoria said. “I mean, Finn?”

“I’m getting to the good part if you’d let me draw breath, Malie!” Lily said. “Sheesh, that’s what I get for telling you first! Right! So strictly speaking it’s Doherty Berne, a company, that bought the property, not Finn personally. He hasn’t even seen it. He left the negotiations up to his wife.”

Zoe’s entire body went numb. “Wife?” It was her voice, but she didn’t recognize it. No. Not true. Please not true!

“Not wife,” Malie said. “Ex-wife.”

“Ex-wife?” Zoe, still not recognizing her own voice.

“So!” Malie again. “What do you think of that?”

Zoe shook her head, trying to clear it. “I...I don’t think of it.”

“Oh Lord, that’s Todd yelling at me!” Malie said, and turned around to call out, “Hang on a sec! Need to pick Zo up off the floor, metaphorically speaking, and see her new hair clips!” Back to the phone. “That’s the phrase, isn’t it, Madam Writer? Metaphorically speaking?”

She had to get off this call. Had to vomit. Had to faint. Had to die. “Actually,” Zoe said, and forced out a laugh, “my new hair clips are awaiting placement so I’d better go and...and place them. You go, Devil. And V, I’m sure you have a million things to do. And Lils, the funeral, I can’t imagine what you’re dealing with. And I...I...that cocktail party tonight...hair clips...things to do...”

“Zo, you’re babbling,” Victoria said, frowning. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Liar!” Malie said, bringing her face all the way up to the phone.

Zoe’s heart was aching so badly she couldn’t think. But there was one thing she knew. “I miss you all so much.”

“Nah. Not buying it. I mean, I am buying it because I miss you guys, too, but nah, that’s not it.”

Zoe’s breath hitched. “It’s that thing I talked to you about, Malie, about being homesick.”

“So come home,” Victoria said gently.

“It’s not that simple, not now, not anymore,” Zoe said, and dragged in a shuddering breath. “Listen, I really have to go. I’ll call you and tell you all about everything when...when I can. And don’t forget we’ve got your birthday call coming up soon, V! Meanwhile I’ll email my measurements. And I have a recipe to send you, Lily. And Malie, my surf school story is up so I’ll send you a link. But right now—”

“Zoe, wait!”

“Zo!”

“Zoe!”

“That’s Cris calling me, and I still haven’t finished doing my hair. Gotta go!”

Zoe disconnected, wheeled herself back into her bedroom and grabbed a tissue from the shell-encrusted box on the dressing table. A dab at the corner of one eye where a tear had started to escape but otherwise she was ready.

Except that she was not ready. Not ready to see Finn.

How was she supposed to live in Sydney with him there?

But how could she go home to Hawke’s Cove knowing that Finn and his ex-wife—an ex-wife he hadn’t mentioned even in passing—had bought a property there together and she could run into them at any time?

Where did she belong?

“Nowhere,” she said. “I don’t belong anywhere and I don’t belong to anyone, and I never will.”

“Zo?” Cristina called from the living room. “Ten minutes?”

“Ten minutes,” Zoe confirmed.

She thought about the Tahitian pearl combs beside her computer and shook her head.

Malie had a butterfly tattoo at the base of her spine. A symbol of freedom, of rebirth, of moving on.

Perfect, she thought, and picked up the butterfly clips her parents had given her.