I woke up slowly, not knowing where I was and why my legs were wrapped around a naked man. I held my breath, remembering what we had done and hoping we could do it again before I had to leave this pleasure zone. The moon was reflected in the harbour and it gleamed on his tanned bare shoulders. I moved slightly, and he turned to me without waking, his face burrowing into my breasts. He opened his eyes, smiled, and pulled me to his body. We were both half asleep, but bits of us were soon wide awake. He ripped open another foil packet. “Thank god I’ve got shares in Ansell,” he quipped as he slid into me again.
The sun was streaming into the room when I woke again, and Jace was sitting on the lounge chair, hair wet, wrapped in a bathrobe.
“Good morning, sleepyhead. I like an early morning swim, but I really like watching you sleep, too.” He walked over to me and handed me a glass of juice. “Orange juice? I’ve ordered some breakfast but I wasn’t sure what you like, so I got everything.” He tossed me a white robe and gestured towards the dining table, which was set up for a hungry football team. “Now, eat something and then we will have to talk.”
I took the glass and drank thirstily. Pulling on the robe, I picked up a strawberry and smiled. “Anything you say, Mr Jameson.”
He handed me a short black and I added a splash of milk. The caffeine kicked in and I started on some eggs Benedict. Delicious. “I like to watch you eat. You eat like you fuck, Maddie. You really go for it.” Oh yeah.
“Well, a girl has appetites.” I licked some egg yolk off the fork and grinned at him.
“Can I ask who you were supposed to meet last night? Is there a Mr Griffiths? Is there a boyfriend? Was last night a beginning or is this morning the end of us?”
Us? I loaded up my fork with egg and smoked salmon, and chewed carefully to give me time to think before I answered.
“No, Mr Griffiths was my father, and he died of embarrassment three years ago. I’m not sure about a boyfriend. I think he’s more like a Ken doll with working attachments. Not much of a conversationalist but fun to play with. I live in Paddington. By myself since my bird died.” I took another sip of coffee. “And I need more time to categorise last night and this morning. I think I need time to think.”
He stood up and walked over to the window.
“I’m leaving for Hong Kong this afternoon, so you can have some time to think about me. I’m not my father. He was undisciplined. I’m not.” One look at that amazing body told me that, and I noted that he was eating Bircher muesli and fruit. “He was unprincipled. I’m not. My weaknesses are adrenaline and winning. I love beautiful women, thoroughbred horses and Impressionist art. I hate spiders. Actually, I’m shit-scared of spiders, which is why I run the Inca Trail instead of walking it and prefer to sleep as far from ground level that I can. I have the Flick Man on speed dial. I’ve never married, probably because my father made every mistake in the book and I learned from them, so I suppose you could say that I’m shit-scared of marriage, too. No kids that I know of. Not sure if I’m father material.” He looked straight at me. “My father didn’t know how to love me, and I hated him for years for that. I used to think that he was to blame for everything bad that happened to me, from teenage pimples to my terrible singing voice, but luckily I met a really fabulous bird who taught me to dance and then dumped me so brutally that she drove me to a shrink for a couple of years. Which was the best thing I ever did. And then I pitied my father, because he missed out on so much. But he was buried yesterday and it’s time for me to get on with being me. I didn’t go to his wake because as far as I was concerned he was gone and there was nothing to celebrate about his life or his death. Yesterday was a day when I drew a line in my life. After-dad-time started then.
“I don’t need his money because I have my own. I read too much. I love my mother and every one of her bloody dogs. I’m a lapsed vegetarian. I’m HIV negative and I really hope you are too because I hate frangers. I’m a reformed smoker but every now and then I crack and light up a cigar. I learned to tango in Buenos Aires years ago and I take classes with the Sydney Dance Theatre whenever I can because I enjoy it and it feels good to move to music. Which makes up for the not singing thing. I jog when I can and one day I’ll run a marathon. I love ‘South Park’, ‘Blackadder’ and anything on the History Channel. I have two godsons and I take my responsibilities very seriously, even though I’m an atheist.” He grimaced. “Oh, and please don’t tell my mother because that would break her heart.
“I’m into serial monogamy but that hasn’t been working lately because I’ve made some bloody stupid choices, which includes the realisation that I groped my brother who is now my sister in Rio, and that’s going to take some pretty intensive therapy to get over. You’ve seen Gabbie, so I hope you can understand my confusion because I’m pretty freaked out. But that’s my problem and I’ll deal with it. I’m not interested in wishy-washy women. I was intrigued when I met you at Bowral, and then on Thursday I saw you outside the church and your hair was flying in the wind and you were magnificent and strong and completely in control. And you looked so damned fuckable.” He kissed me on my forehead. “I had a very dirty dream on Thursday night that involved someone who looked remarkably like you, so when I saw you in the bar downstairs I seized the day, as they say in the classics.
“Now,” he reached out to the belt of my dressing-gown and pulled me to him, “Where were we? I was about to remove this completely unnecessary item of clothing.” He undid the ties, very, very slowly and I felt my body responding. “We have exactly two hours until my new Chief Operating Officer is coming here, and then I have to get to the airport.”