The Older Man (4 page)

She wanted him to touch her again, to see if that frisson of pure pleasure would return. Her heart was still thumping with the sheer surprise of it. But he wouldn’t, and she daren’t take the initiative herself. She moistened her bottom lip with her tongue. “I want to,” she said. “When?”

He seemed to hesitate. “Tomorrow,” he said. “We could have dinner together. Somewhere quiet, where we can talk.”

“I’ll pay my share,” she offered.

“Don’t be silly. You’re a student and I’m a fairly successful solicitor. Do you think I’m going to take you out and let you pay for your own dinner?”

“Are you taking me out?” she challenged him.

Again he hesitated. “We’re going out. So that we can talk. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

She wanted to ask what he wanted. But he obviously wasn’t to be drawn. Don’t push it, she told herself. That was her besetting sin, her family had often told her. Rushing in where angels feared, and all that. Something told her that in spite of his propensity for jumping to unwarranted conclusions where she was concerned, Grant was not a man to be rushed. She smiled at him, all innocence. “Yes,” she said. “Thank you, Mr Morrison.” She couldn’t resist the small revenge.

“Grant,” he said curtly. “You don’t have to call me mister.”

She refused to let him pick her up from home. He didn’t object very strenuously to meeting her in town. In fact he looked, she thought, slightly relieved. Rennie told her mother she had a late lecture and might stay in town for supper. If Marian assumed the addition ‘with friends’ Rennie absolved herself of any obligation to disillusion her.

Rennie did have a late lecture that evening, but she skipped it. There really wasn’t any reason not to tell her parents she was having dinner with Grant Morrison, but she remembered her father’s unease when Ethan had commented on Grant’s age. And she could hardly tell them that she was supposedly using him as a shoulder to cry on over her non-existent unrequited love.

He picked her up outside the friend’s flat where she had changed from her jeans and sweatshirt into a dark red silk velvet skirt and loose, heavy cream lace top, and replaced her boots with medium-heeled court shoes. She disliked really high heels because they restricted her free-swinging walk. She was watching for the car, and ran out to it with a black velvet jacket slung over her shoulder and a bag containing her daytime clothes in her hand.

“Can I put this in the back?” she asked him. “I had to change.”

He took it from her and put it on the rear seat. “You look very nice,” he said perfunctorily, as if talking to a child who had asked him to admire her pretty dress, and opened the door for her.

“It wasn’t a hint,” Rennie muttered resentfully as he closed it after her. She watched him get into his seat, her eyes steady and considering.

He gave her an enquiring smile, and said with a tinge of heartiness, “Well, do you have any preferences as to where you’d like to go? As it’s a week night, I didn’t bother booking.”

Oh, so that’s the way of it, is it? Rennie thought. Well, if you’re going to humour the little girl, you can humour her good and proper. Tentatively, she mentioned what she knew perfectly well was one of the most expensive restaurants in Auckland. “I’ve never been there. I’ve heard it’s good,” she said, “but a bit dear. Perhaps we’d better go somewhere else?”

“No, no.” He hadn’t noticeably blenched. “If that’s what you fancy, that’s where we’ll go.”

She restrained an impulse to bounce on the seat, clap her hands and exclaim, “Oh, goody!” Even a man as obtuse as Grant appeared to be might smell a rat if she overdid things to that extent.

The restaurant was on the top floor of a large hotel. Large windows gave a spectacular view of the Waitemata Harbour. A container ship was making its way slowly to the nearby wharves, smaller fishing boats and a few pleasure launches and sailboats dotted the water, and on the North Shore, across the green expanse, lights pricked on here and there at the approach of darkness. Rangitoto, the island volcano, raised its gentle slopes in the distance.

Grant secured them a table in a quiet corner. It might have been because he imagined she would want to unburden herself in relative privacy, Rennie acknowledged fairly, but she couldn’t help wondering if he was embarrassed to be seen with her. He acted like an uncle treating a favourite niece to a night out. And to give him credit he didn’t flicker an eyelid when she ordered rock lobster with lemon butter, the most expensive dish on the menu. He just said, “The same for me,” and handed the menu back to the waiter.

Rennie toyed with her wine glass, which the waiter had filled with champagne before bringing the menus. She had pretended to know nothing about wine, and Grant had ordered a Martinborough Chardonnay — a New Zealand white that was a gold medal winner.

“You like seafood?” he asked her as they waited.

“Love it,” Rennie answered. “You don’t mind that I ordered the rock lobster?” She injected a faint note of anxiety into the question.

“I’m having it, too,” he reminded her. “I think our seafood must be the best in the world.”

“Have you travelled much?”

“A bit. England, America, Australia, of course. And a few side trips on the way to and from.”

“Ethan said you’d been on one of his brother’s expeditions to New Guinea.”

“Years ago, in the days of my youth.”

“I’ve been to Sydney a couple of times, but that’s all. Tell me about your trips.”

“What do you want to know?”

He kept her entertained right through the main course, answering questions and, quickly identifying her areas of interest, expanding on his descriptions of different ways of life and the more out-of-the-way places he had visited.

When the sweets arrived on a trolley she chose a mocha cake while he asked for a cheese board. Cutting into a creamy round of locally produced Brie, he said, “I’m talking too much. Your turn.”

“I haven’t so much to talk about,” she said. “School, university. That’s all I’ve done.”

“Your family,” he said. “I could see at the wedding that you’re a close-knit lot. You get on well with your brother, don’t you?”

“Mostly, yes. We used to have the odd spat when we were younger. But Shane’s reasonably intelligent, and we talk quite a bit. He’s not a bad kid.”

She caught the amusement in his expression, but he didn’t comment. She sighed. It wasn’t hard to read his thoughts.

“Your mother seems a pretty accessible lady,” he said. “But you haven’t confided in her?”

It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him she could confide anything in her mother. “Oh,” she mumbled, taking refuge in another bite of her cake, “she’s pretty busy you know.” She picked up her wine glass and swallowed a mouthful. “She’s a legal executive in Dad’s law practice, and president of Volunteer Drivers for the Disabled, and she’s on lots of committees. And the house is usually full of people. She and Dad are always inviting someone — well, so do Shane and I. They’ve always encouraged us to bring our friends home. But it’s hard to get a chance to talk in private, if you know what I mean. Do you think we could have coffee now? This cake is delicious, but I’d love some coffee with it.”

That last hasty sip had made her realise that she had drunk quite a lot of wine, including the champagne. Coffee seemed a good idea, not only to distract Grant while she tried to decide what to tell him when the inevitable time for confidences arrived, but also to steady her surroundings.

When the coffee was put in front of them, Grant said, “Well, you wanted to talk.”

Panic set in. Rennie looked down, her chin resting on one hand while the other fiddled with a spoon. “Er, it’s not that easy,” she floundered. “In cold blood, so to speak.” Hastily she picked up her coffee.

“It’s what we’re here for.”

She ought to tell him he was barking up the wrong tree. Here he was, waiting for her to speak, the perfect opportunity. He had just given her a superb dinner that was going to make a considerable hole in his pocket. It was ridiculous to feel disappointed that he was doing it from avuncular kindheartedness and a sense of conscience. Her own conscience told her that she ought to confess her deception now, before she got herself in any deeper. It was unfair to take advantage of the man because he was sorry for her.

She gazed about the room for inspiration, and saw nearby a couple holding hands across the table, smiling at each other. Unexpectedly, she felt sadness take hold of her, and she looked at Grant, who was studying her, his eyes filled with compassion.

She blinked, shaking her head.

His hand swiftly covered hers on the table, and he said, “Rennie — “

The waiter appeared at his elbow. “Everything all right, sir?”

Grant withdrew his hand immediately, and sat back. “Fine, thank you. Would you bring the bill, please. Unless you want anything else, Rennie?”

Rennie declined. She was chagrined and angry at the way he had released her hand. It was nothing for him to be ashamed of, for heaven’s sake! And she had liked the feel of his warm palm against her skin, his fingers beginning to curl about hers. His hands were long and strong, and looked sensitive…

She shook her head again. Too much wine, for sure. She said, “You want to go?”

“Only if you do,” he answered. “It strikes me this isn’t the best place to talk, after all. Particularly if it’s going to upset you.”

He didn’t want to be seen sitting at a table with a weeping young woman. Rennie almost laughed then. That would make him feel uncomfortable. Discomfort, she diagnosed, didn’t sit easily with Grant Morrison. He liked to be in control.

When they left the restaurant she was still vaguely simmering. On impulse she said, “Let’s walk.” The night air and some exercise might dispel her admittedly unreasonable sense of anger and frustration, and give her the courage to tell him the truth, a task that seemed more impossible by the minute.

They were not very far from the waterfront, and by tacit consent they headed in that direction, past the railway station and along Tamaki Drive, where the dark waters of the Waitemata lapped at the stones along the foreshore and reflected the lights of the city. The night was cool but clear and dry, and what wind there had been during the day had died now.

“Am I going too fast?” Grant asked her once.

“No.” Rennie shook her head. “I like a decent pace.”

He smiled down at her and tucked her hand into the crook of his arm. “Good. So do I.”

Eventually they stopped and leaned over a railing, listening to the water chuckling and slapping amongst the stones, and watching the coloured ripples made by the lights. Rennie raised a hand to push back her hair, and Grant shifted his arm to put it round her, his hand cupping her shoulder.

She turned her head to him, found him gazing out at the water, and waited until he looked down at her, waited for the flare of awareness in his eyes. And it came. She held her breath. His hand tightened, and then he dropped it, leaning back on the railing apparently casually. “Ready now?” he said.

Rennie was experiencing a sharp sense of disappointment. “Ready?” she repeated blankly. “For what?”

“To talk about Ethan,” he said levelly. “Tell me about it.”

Oh, damn! she thought wildly. Couldn’t he tell that the last thing she wanted was to talk to him about another man? If he was honest, it was surely the last thing that he wanted at this moment? But maybe she was reading things into his actions from her own imagination. Certainly that brief awareness she had evoked was no longer there. He looked cool, remote, politely interested.

Okay, she thought, her temper taking over. You want me to talk about Ethan. I’ll talk about Ethan.

“I’ve always loved him,” she said huskily. “You know, he’s been around since I was a kid. He was nice to me, he used to bring presents sometimes. I still treasure a shell that he gave me soon after he first went to live on that island — Sheerwind. It sounded such a romantic place. He promised one day I could go and stay there.” That part was easy because it was true. “And when I was fourteen,” she improvised, remembering the crush she’d had on the bus driver who drove her route on most school days and trying to recall that emotion, “I thought he was the most handsome man I’d ever seen. Sometimes just catching his eye in the — a mirror would make me happy for days.”

“Go on,” Grant encouraged.

“Well, each time he came to stay, the feelings got stronger. I just … lived for his visits,” she added, glancing at Grant to see if all this was having any effect. If so, it wasn’t visible. “When he was away I felt … bereft. Only half alive. I can’t describe,” she said honestly, “how it was.”

“But he never gave any sign of reciprocating this … devotion?” Grant asked dryly.

Rennie shook her head. “Except that I knew he was fond of me. I dreamed that one day he’d see I’d grown up and ask me to marry him. Instead…” She let her voice trail off.

“He married Celeste.”

“I thought he’d wait for me,” Rennie said mournfully. Much more of this and I’ll throw up, she thought. She sighed, not noticing the sharp glance that Grant threw at her. “But,” she added an artistic little catch to her voice, “it wasn’t to be.”

Peeking at his face, she saw that he seemed quite impassive. Even faintly bored. How could he? she wondered indignantly. Here I am to all intents and purposes baring my shattered heart to him, and he looks no more interested — less — than if he were listening to cricket scores or sharemarket prices.

She grasped the railing in front of her, scowling at the shimmering darkness of the water. “I suppose this is pretty dull for you,” she said, “listening to me maundering on.”

“No, of course not,” he answered politely. “I want to hear all about it.”

Liar. She racked her brains and went on inventing incidents and feelings, throwing herself into the part of besotted teenager, until invention failed. I’m good, she thought, surprised at the conviction she thought she managed to convey. Even Grant seemed moved when she finally wound to a halt. He put his arms about her and brought her close. “My poor child,” he murmured into her hair.

Triumph mingled with guilt. What now? Pull away, point and shout “April Fool!”? Not yet, anyway, it was nice being held by him, with his hand soothing her hair, even if he did think he was comforting a child…