‘Top secret, I’m afraid, it would be more than my life’s worth.’
She laughed, the sound so easy, so perfect. ‘For real?’
‘For real.’ He looked past her to the path which led to the beach from the pergola and through a part of him, the part that was aware of the crowd and kept this side – the right side – of professional, he said, ‘We can get to the beach this way.’
‘Perfect.’
Lights secreted away in the ground lit up the path. Palms swayed in the sea breeze and the noise around them turned from party music and chatter to the waves crashing on the shore and the wildlife.
He hadn’t actually done this yet, taken a stroll on the beach at night, enjoying the beauty Hawaii had to offer. By the time he closed his laptop or came off an overseas phone call he was either ready to sleep for the few hours he routinely had, or he’d hit the gym to try and get his mind to quit. It seemed it took the appearance of someone like Malie to make it easy to do just that.
‘It is beautiful here,’ he murmured, and she turned to him with a smile as stunning as the view, although her response was cut off by a particularly high and piercing Ko-Kee cry from the undergrowth.
She looked in its direction, as did he, half expecting to see its source staring back at him.
‘They’re loud, aren’t they?’ she said.
‘What is it that makes the noise?’ He squinted into the darkness but still he could see nothing obvious. ‘There must be loads of them, it’s quite incessant.’
‘They’re Coqui frogs, the sound is in the name. They’re native to Puerto Rico but people say they were accidentally imported here on shipments back in the late eighties… They’re seen as a nuisance, but I kind of like the sound. It beats the quiet any day.’
‘I can’t imagine Hawaii ever feeling quiet.’
‘True.’ She took a long breath and let it out slowly. ‘It’s part of the reason I love it here.’
‘Not a fan of silence?’
The beach lay just ahead, the white sandy stretch illuminated by the light of the moon alone and for a second he was stunned still. How had he not done this yet? It was beautiful. No light pollution to ruin the night sky, not like the city skylines he was used to. The moon was bright white, turning the few clouds into wisps of silver, stars littered as far as the eye could see.
‘I’ve always lived by the sea,’ she said. ‘The sound of the waves breaking is home for me.’
‘And where is home? Or where was it?’
She gave him a wistful smile. ‘Devon.’
‘You miss it?’
‘Sometimes.’ They reached the path and she dipped to slip off her sandals. ‘When I think of my childhood, I miss it. Like Nalu, I was practically born in the ocean. My parents owned a surf school in Hawke’s Cove and my brother and I took advantage of that every chance we got. Even when we should have been doing homework, we’d sneak off, grab a board and hit the waves.’
She gave him a cheeky grin and he was transported back in time, imagining a younger Malie doing just that. She stood and walked onto the beach, her faced lifted to the moon and Todd just watched her, his mind on what her childhood must have been like. To have had one where you shared in your parents’ joy, had a sibling to conquer the waves with, had a home. A real home.
‘You coming?’ she called over her shoulder.
He started to move after her and she turned to face him as she backed away. ‘Take your shoes off, honestly, the sand will feel amazing beneath your feet.’
He shook his head and smiled. It was such a simple thing to take pleasure from. He toed off his shoes, his socks, and stepped into the sand. The cool grains eased between his toes, his feet sinking into the softness.
‘See?’ she cooed, her fingers holding her straw before her lips, her eyebrow raised.
He nodded. ‘OK, I’ll admit it’s… different.’
And nicer than he expected…
She stepped backwards, luring him closer to the shoreline and he followed, wanting to know more. All about the girl, Malie. Adult, Malie. The whole package.
‘What brings a woman from Hawke’s Cove all the way to Hawaii?’
‘It’s a long story.’
‘I have all night.’
She gave a soft laugh. ‘I’ll give you the cut-down version. My father and Kalani – he’s my godfather – grew up together, and when I was done travelling the world conquering the surfing circuit, he offered me a job here.’
‘Conquering the surfing circuit, hey?’
‘Total world domination.’ Her eyes laughed with her words and he knew she wasn’t taking herself seriously. But she didn’t need to. The surfing world did that for her and he knew from the research his team had done just how impressive she was on paper. He just couldn’t believe he hadn’t worked out who she was sooner, like on the beach, in his semi-drowned state…
‘But there’s only so much competing you can do, and it wasn’t enough.’ Her eyes stopped dancing, her smile once again turning wistful. ‘I wanted to help people find what I do in the sea. I wanted them to realize that no matter what their disability or their background or their rough lot in life they could find some magic in the waves… sounds corny, hey?’
She was suddenly all coy as she looked to him and he realized she was embarrassed, feeling foolish even, her hair fluttering across her flushed cheeks as the sea breeze picked up around them. And he couldn’t understand it. She was remarkable, her ability on the waves and her decision to use that skill to share that joy with others was something to be celebrated, to be proud of.
‘No,’ he said softly, watching her lashes flutter, her eyes dark and glittering in the moonlight as they held his own captive. ‘It’s not corny at all.’
Before he realized, he’d closed the distance between them, his hand reaching out to tuck the loose strands behind her ear, his fingers soft as they stayed to cup her cheek and he couldn’t seem to pull them away.
‘To want to help people isn’t corny, Malie,’ he spoke over his inability to act, taking advantage of her gaze on his as he told her the honest truth. ‘It’s special, admirable, and the desire to help comes off you in waves… if you’ll excuse the pun.’
Her laugh was quiet, caught in her throat as she continued to look at him. Then she took a breath, stepped away, her head shaking, her eyes averted.
‘Yes, well, that’s me, that’s why I’m here. How about you?’
He was slow to move in step with her again, to counteract the desire to bring back the intimacy of seconds before.
‘I own the charity,’ he said simply.
‘Cheers, Captain Obvious, I never knew!’ She turned to him with a laugh, punching him gently in the arm, the brief contact stirring up the skin beneath. ‘Here I am practically telling you my life story and…’ She waved her free hand through the air and he knew she was trying to make light of the connection swelling between them.
‘Fair point.’
They reached the water’s edge and she dipped her toe in the damp sand, tracing patterns in the grains as she waited for him to divulge a part of himself, a part he never really discussed with anyone. And it wasn’t easy. It didn’t come naturally to him. His motivations were private, they weren’t part of the sales spiel that his PR team produced, even though they insisted it should be. Telling him it would be good for others to read, to see how far he had come from nothing, to see what’s possible if you have the drive and the commitment to succeed.
She lifted her gaze to him suddenly, a frown marring her expression.
‘You don’t have to tell me… not if you don’t want to.’
But he wanted to. That was the truth of it. He’d known her just a few hours and the desire to open up, to share that passion and the reason for it with someone who also sought the same, was strong.
‘I understand completely if you don’t, but you’ll find no judgement here, just someone who shares your desire to help people.’
Her earnest words were wise b
eyond the fun aura she gave off and he felt something resonate. Something that told him there was so much more to the reason she gave for her life in Hawaii now and he wondered if she would share it with him in return.
‘You could say my childhood was very different to yours…’ His mouth dried up, a physical sign that he never did this. He cleared his throat and wished he hadn’t brought the drink with him as his hands longed to dive into his pockets. Instead he took a sip through the straw, his nose getting assaulted by the vibrant umbrella as he did. ‘Good grief.’
She laughed a little. ‘They look pretty until they almost take your eye out, don’t they? Here, let’s leave them with our shoes.’
She took his glass and whizzed them back up the beach, returning in seconds, surprising him by hooking her arm through his and encouraging him into walking beside her.
‘In what way was it different?’
It took him a few seconds to realize she was back on his childhood, he was too busy reeling from her arm being in his and just how comfortable it felt, how natural…
‘My mother died when I was born,’ he said eventually. ‘There were complications… unexpected and sudden. They were lucky to save me.’
He felt rather than saw her eyes looking up at him, the sympathy he knew that would exist in those enchanting green depths.
‘My father… well, you can imagine… he returned home with no wife and a new-born baby to take care of…’ Even now he could feel the pang of guilt, the idea that his own birth took away his mother, his father’s childhood sweetheart. He’d come to terms with it so long ago but still, the idea of it – the idea that he’d ruined his father’s life – haunted him.
‘That’s so sad, I’m so sorry…’ She shook her head, her eyes still on him but he couldn’t look at her, he was too afraid of the raw emotion painted in his face to let her witness it too. ‘Your poor father, and you, not to have known your mother…’
His chest squeezed painfully as her arm dug into his side, pressed there by his own. He loosened his grip, forced an even breath. ‘It was what it was. We lived in the poorer suburbs of London and with him struggling… he was drinking heavily…’ He swallowed past the tightness persisting in his throat. ‘I got put into care. He couldn’t look after me properly, but he couldn’t bear to give me up for adoption either. So, the authorities moved me back and forth between him and foster homes.’
‘Your entire childhood was spent like that?’
‘Pretty much.’
‘No stability, no family life?’
Exactly.
‘On the upside, you don’t know what you’re missing if you’ve never had it in the first place.’
She curved into him, her other hand coming up to rest on his upper arm. ‘I can’t imagine how you must have felt.’
‘Scared, lonely, confused, helpless… the list goes on.’
Too much information!
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, his face angling to look down at her as he forced himself to smile to take the edge off his words. ‘It’s not all bad, though, it taught me to survive, to work hard and prove my worth. All those school teachers who said I would amount to nothing, I proved them wrong.’
She smiled up at him, her eyes filled with such wonder that they stole his breath.
‘You sure did, Todd Masters.’ Her voice was soft, the emotion in it so raw… He was used to such praise from people who discovered his background, those people like his PR team that wanted him to use it to push his business, his interests, but with her, it was different, it meant something.
It made him feel something.
‘So that’s why you run the charity, to help kids like you?’
‘Precisely.’ He tried to dodge where his heart was taking him, to get back on safer footing, on what he understood and knew how to deal with. His motivation, not the alien feeling she was stirring up within. ‘I want to help those that can’t help themselves. Some of the kids don’t have any visible disability, no scars, nothing. It’s buried deep inside and they need an outlet, a way of bringing it to the surface so that it doesn’t have a chance to fester. They need to learn from it, forget the anger, the pain, and move on.’
‘But how did you realize that? You were just a child yourself back then…’
‘I don’t know.’ He shrugged as he considered her question. ‘I guess I realized that if I wanted a better life, I needed to take control of it, I needed to work hard, make myself independent of the system, earn my worth, so to speak. With wealth comes the ability to control your own destiny and I wanted that more than anything.’
‘It is incredible to have achieved all you have, especially when you think how different things could have been.’
‘Don’t I know it. It didn’t happen overnight, but I got there eventually. Life was hard and full of obstacles, but I faced them head-on and got through it, it made me stronger.’
She took an unsteady breath and he frowned down at her. Had he hit a nerve? He hadn’t meant to distress her, only to be honest.
‘Sorry, Malie, I didn’t mean to go on, to get all—’
‘No, no, I’m fine,’ she waved him down, ‘you just talk a lot of sense.’
‘I do.’ He grinned. ‘Are you giving me a compliment?’
Her own smile was slow to come. ‘Don’t get big-headed about it.’
‘I wouldn’t dare.’
She tugged him forward again. ‘How are things with your father now?’
‘You want the honest answer?’
It was a rhetorical question and the look she sent him told him she knew it.
‘Difficult… OK, awkward… fine.’
‘That good?’ she queried.
He gave a gentle laugh. ‘It’s complicated.’
‘I can imagine, what with everything you’ve both been through. He must be proud of all you’ve achieved though?’
He laughed harder this time, cynical, his mind returning to their phone call that afternoon. ‘I’m not sure about that, I think I’m a giant pain in his backside at the moment.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m sure he doesn’t see you that way.’
‘If you’d heard him on the phone this afternoon, you wouldn’t be saying that. He’s the reason I ended up on that stretch of beach. The house was teeming with PR reps, journalists, collaborators. I took his call and knew I needed to get away, clear my head before I went back to it.’
‘And instead you almost drowned, that’s some head-clearing.’
‘Well, it gave me an early introduction to you, and an eventful one at that.’
‘True…’ She looked to their feet as she pulled him along and he could tell she was building the courage to press him about the call.
‘He won’t let me help him.’
She looked up at him questioningly.
‘Crazy, isn’t it? You’d think having a wealthy son would be a huge advantage, but he won’t take anything from me, not a penny. He still lives in the house I was born in.’
‘Maybe it’s because he feels close to your mum there.’
‘Maybe…’ He felt the familiar tension building between his shoulder blades, the throb kickstarting at the base of his skull and he rubbed at it with his free hand. ‘But it’s falling apart, it needs work, and personally I’d rather just buy him somewhere new, get him to start afresh.’
‘I can’t imagine it’s easy for him to accept help from you.’
‘From his son?’ he snapped, instantly regretting it. ‘Sorry, it’s a sore point.’
‘I get it. But put yourself in his shoes,’ she said gently, ‘he will feel like he failed you growing up. Even if you never doubted his love for you, he will still feel like he wasn’t there for you in all the ways that mattered.’
She was right, wasn’t she? Didn’t he know this already? Wasn’t that exactly how his father felt. Wasn’t it how he felt?
Hadn’t he wanted a normal dad, one that took him to the park to play footie on a Saturday, one that wou
ld care when he got into trouble at school, one that was strong enough to resist the bottle and sort himself out, to fight to keep him.
‘Maybe there’s a way to reach a compromise with him, or maybe you’ll just have to accept his wishes and let it go.’
He smiled down at her. ‘Now who’s the one talking sense?’
Malie returned his smile and looked away just as quickly. What was she doing?
She wasn’t kidding herself. She was the one who had linked arms with him. She was the one who had probed into his past and cared about what he had to say. She was the one enjoying their stroll along the moonlit beach and likening it to something out of a romantic film.
Soft. Perfect. Dreamy.
And none of it was real.
Tomorrow she would take on the role of surf instructor and he would be the guy that ran the charity from which her students came. Yes, they would have lessons together. But they would be just that: lessons. Nothing more.
Although right now, she couldn’t seem to care. She only cared about the bond building between them. The warmth enveloping her as they strolled along. The moon, the stars, the surf washing over her feet.
‘Do you think you’ll go back to Hawke’s Cove eventually?’
The question was like an iced spear straight through the comforting warmth, and she faltered mid-stride.
‘I assume your parents are still there,’ he continued, unaware of the messy terrain he had hit upon. ‘And what about your brother?’
She swallowed, her grip over his arm tightening.
‘Malie?’ She could hear the frown in his voice.
‘My parents… my parents live in Hawke’s Cove still. My brother…’ Another swallow. ‘He died a long time ago.’
Todd stopped walking, forcing her to do the same as he pulled her around to face him. ‘I’m so sorry.’
She waved a hand between them, but it took her longer to speak.
‘He had cancer. The big C.’ She said it dramatically, in a feigned I’m OK action. ‘Such is life, hey?’
He cupped her cheek just as he had before, and again her skin heated beneath his touch, coaxing back the warmth, the comfort, the desire for more.
‘I can’t imagine what that must have been like for you, for your family…’
Meet Me in Hawaii Page 5
