Chapter 25
25
Once Dan had gone and we’d got the place to ourselves again, we talked a lot of shop. For some reason, we were a little nervous around each other now, so it was easier to focus on Dennis’s ideas. He wanted to do another open-day event, so we could invite Cornish bloggers and authors. The shop was large enough to run a workshop at the same time. He’d clearly been working on lots of ideas while he’d been away. I didn’t want to think about what else he’d been doing but by the time he left he seemed to be more relaxed.
‘What are you doing later?’ he asked.
‘What, tonight you mean?’
‘Well, for the rest of the day? And then tonight too?’
The way he looked at me made a shiver run down the whole of my spine. He looked like he wanted to devour me. I’d never felt so wanted. It was an unusual feeling. Sure, I’d fancied people in the past and they’d fancied me back, and I’d had my moments over the years but it had never set off fireworks in my body like in the books that I read.
‘I thought we could go and do some beachcombing for shells. I know you love to do that.’
I felt a little disappointed. But then realised that it was a lovely thing to do.
‘I’d love to.’
‘And then, I’d like to take you to dinner. Maybe we could go to the bistro?’
‘Oh, you are kidding me. If we go to dinner at the bistro, we’ll be the talk of the town and they’ll have us marching up the aisle before the night is out.’
‘Ha, yes, I forget that Driftwood Bay is a lot smaller than where I come from. I do think we need to go somewhere to talk though. I think we’ve got a lot to discuss.’
‘Yeah, we definitely do. I want all your ideas for this launch event.’ I smiled at him, and narrowed my eyes in what I thought was a seductive way, but hey what did I know?
‘You OK there? Something in your eye?’
I over-blinked a few times. ‘I’m fine. I think it’s gone now.’
Embarrassed, I told him about a little Italian restaurant I used to go to sometimes on a teachers’ night out. It was hard being a teacher in a small community. Parents didn’t respect the fact you might need a night off and would happily approach you in the local bistro and question you about little Tommy’s in-growing toenail over your tagliatelle.
Dennie went out the back and booked a table and then we headed off to the beach. Walking side by side seemed a little strange after we’d kissed so passionately only hours before, but he took my hand in his and we strolled along the furthest away beach, scouring the sand and collecting several large shells between us. Holding his hand seemed the most natural thing to do even if people might see us. I just didn’t want to live out the whole of our relationship in front of prying eyes. There was enough pressure itself that I was putting on the situation without everyone else throwing their oar in too. Dennie might not even be seeing it as a relationship. In fact, I had no clue what we were doing, and at that thought, I started to panic again. It was almost like I was willing things to go wrong before they’d even had a chance to go right. Even though I’d spent a lot of time with Dennis over the past few weeks, I really didn’t know him at all.
After we dropped the shells back at the shop, he gently kissed my cheek and told me that he’d pick me up at 7p.m.
I was all fingers and thumbs getting ready, trying to curl my hair when Mum came in and offered to help.
‘You really like him, don’t you?’
‘Yeah, he’s nice.’
She smiled.
‘I knew it at your book event, you know.’
‘Knew what?’
‘That you’d get together. I can tell that you had some sizzling chemistry going on under all that disagreeing with each other. I know you had your moments when you didn’t really like the way he was telling you to run your business, but I think even under all of that, you still liked him. Give him a chance, love. That’s all I’ll say. You should give you both a chance. Who knows what will happen? None of us can ever say what the future holds, but if you don’t give love a chance, then you’ll be missing out.’
‘But what if it ends up like Dan and Sabrina? They were madly in love at first and everything was fabulous and then things changed.’
‘That doesn’t happen to everyone though, love. Look at me and your dad.’
‘Yep, but love like that doesn’t come along very often either, does it?’
‘No, but it’s not always been plain sailing for us either. You have to work at things. We’re very lucky though, I know that much. Just relax tonight and get to know each other. You don’t need to plan the rest of your lives tonight. You just need to spend some time together. And you don’t have to jump into bed with each other either if you don’t want to.’
‘Muuuum!’
‘Darling, you are twenty-seven years old. We don’t need to have the sex conversation, do we?’
I put my hands over my ears and sang ‘la la la!’, blocking out what she was saying. When she finished talking, I removed them.
‘But if you do want to roger him senseless then go for it, I say.’
‘Muuuum! Enough! Get out!’ I threw a towel that had been lying on the floor at her and she ducked and laughed.
‘Just saying, it’s perfect when it’s with the right person.’
I slammed the door behind her and could hear her laughing all the way down the stairs.
If that wasn’t enough to get me wondering about how the evening might end up, when Dennie turned up on my doorstep looking as hot as hell, my head was all over the place and I was a dithering wreck. When he winked at me as he put his arm over the back of my seat, to see better to reverse the car, and I got a whiff of his expensive aftershave, I shuddered. God, if this is how I felt when we were fully clothed, imagine how I’d feel if we were…
‘Ready?’ he asked as we drove out of Driftwood Bay.
I just nodded and he laughed.
‘Don’t know about you, Nance, but I feel a bit nervous.’
‘God, me too!’ Thank goodness he was honest enough to admit it.
He held my hand all the way there and it was really rather lovely. Our nervousness melted away within minutes. Dennis asked lots of questions about my dreams and ambitions in life and what my passions were even though he already knew about them. He was quite cagey when I asked him similar questions, and a lot of his answers were routed in ambition and being the best at what he did and how much money he made. Even though we were very different, I felt now that our opposing personalities complemented each other. He was clearly an excellent listener, and communicator in general, making me feel like he was really interested in everything I said.
We talked loads about the open day. It didn’t seem to matter that we were mixing business with pleasure. Maybe when people were working together on things they were both passionate about, it all blended into one and it didn’t matter whether it was work or passions. We decided on a date which was only two weeks away and even though we knew it would be tight, we knew that we’d work together to make it happen. I showed him the social media profiles I’d set up while he’d been away and he showed me a projection plan he’d put together for the next year ahead to keep on track. I was staggered by what an amazing team we made, once we put our differences aside and had a joint goal. We set a further date, one year from the launch party, where we’d look at things again and discuss my successful bookshop and think about the plans for another year after that. At least we were talking about a year ahead and still being in contact. That was a positive sign.
Before we knew it, the restaurant staff were dimming the lights and coughing politely, to alert us to the fact they were ready to go home.
We then spent hours in the car outside my house, kissing and talking. And kissing. Much as I didn’t want to tear myself away, I didn’t want to ask him in, as I didn’t know if Mum and Dad would still be up and I certainly didn’t want Dan to be giving us the Spanish Inquisition. So we said our goodbyes and I said that I’d see him in the morning at the shop.
It had been one of the loveliest nights – and days, for that matter – of my life, and I went to sleep that night with a smile on my face as wide as Driftwood Bay itself.