Right Place, Wrong Time

by Judith Arnold

  But he’d gotten through the eighteen holes somehow. He’d soldiered on, keeping his mouth shut, letting Ross vent about the ineptitude of unskilled workers, the intricacies of the sprinkler systems required to maintain golf courses—“It’s amazing how much water they need! This course alone probably consumes more water in one week than the island’s population uses in a month”—and the prospects for a Kim-Ethan union. “Kim is a remarkable young woman,” Ross had pointed out. “You’re not the first man who ever wanted to marry her. But if you win her hand, you will be the luckiest man who ever wanted to marry her.”

  I will never marry your daughter, Ethan had wanted to announce, but he’d seen no reason to spoil Ross’s vacation. Kim was indeed a remarkable woman, and he had no doubt some other guy would win the title “Luckiest Man”—and would cherish that title in a way Ethan never would.

  Actually, the longer the game had dragged on, the more Kim had risen in Ethan’s esteem. For her to have evolved into a smart, strong and generally good-natured woman after growing up in the overbearing presence of Ross Hamilton was nothing short of miraculous.

  Once he’d turned in their rented equipment, he’d been forced to endure a “nineteenth hole” drink—iced tea for him, bourbon and water for Ross. Then he’d dropped Ross off at his hotel and enjoyed a blessed hour of solitude, during which he’d showered, donned fresh clothing and lounged on the terrace, remembering how relaxed he’d felt last night while he’d been shooting the breeze with Gina.

  So perhaps it was no surprise that he was thrilled to have her and Alicia joining them for dinner. The two of them looked weary but not too bedraggled after their long day in town, and Gina carried only one plastic shopping bag. Kim and her mother juggled numerous bulging bags and bubbled with energy, as if shopping fueled rather than drained them. No one was sulking, no one sniping. He could only assume their ladies’ day had been more successful than his gentlemen’s day.

  “We had such a wonderful time today I insisted that Gina and Alicia have dinner with us,” Delia said as the group gathered outside the restaurant’s entry. “I hope you don’t mind.”

  “I got three nail polishes that change color,” Alicia boasted. “And we saw happy diamonds, too.”

  “Alicia is a fine little shopper,” Delia praised Alicia, giving her a pat on the head. Alicia beamed.

  Gina discreetly rolled her eyes. “It’s okay if you want it just to be family, though,” she said, addressing him directly. “We can get a taxi. I don’t want to barge in on your dinner.”

  “No, no, by all means, have dinner with us,” Ross said gruffly, before Ethan could tell Gina how welcome she and the kid were. He hoped his expression conveyed that message. She continued to study him, skepticism twisting her mouth and something that might have been worry or amusement lighting her eyes. He nodded and touched her elbow, urging her ahead of him into the restaurant.

  It occupied a historic building and had a broad dining porch that overlooked Charlotte Amalie’s harbor. Kim had read about the restaurant in a guidebook and made a reservation for four, but the host quickly moved their party to a larger table on the porch, from which they could see rooftops and narrow alleys and at least five cruise ships, illuminated by strings of sloping lights, retreating from the port to the open sea.

  Ethan wound up seated between Kim and her mother; Gina sat directly across from him. Her blunt-cut hair looked almost bluish in the twilit evening, and her face glowed like polished bronze in the light from the candle at the center of the table. When she opened the menu the waiter presented to her, Ethan noticed her shoulders twitch.

  He shouldn’t be so attuned to her, but he couldn’t help it. He’d seen her reaction and understood it at once: the prices had shocked her. “I’m treating,” he said abruptly.

  “Oh, that’s not necessary,” Ross argued.

  It was necessary. The restaurant was obviously more expensive than Gina had expected. She’d been coerced into this dinner party, and Ethan couldn’t allow her to blow her budget just because Delia considered Alicia a “fine little shopper.” “Please. I insist.” He shot a quick look at the pile of parcels behind Delia’s chair and added, “Given the power shopping these ladies did today, I may be the only solvent person at this table.”

  He meant it as a joke, but it took Ross a full minute of harrumphing before he managed a smile. “Very well, then. Be a sport,” he grumbled.

  Gina apparently wasn’t as easily persuaded. Her lips pursed, she paged through the menu, emitting waves of tension. “I don’t know, Ethan—”

  “I insist,” he said firmly, his tone leaving no room for debate.

  Her eyes met his above the menus, and he was again unable to define the emotions he saw churning in them. Pride, perhaps—she didn’t want his charity, and he couldn’t blame her. Discomfort at being included in an event that was beyond her means. A mixture of anxiety and defiance. “All right,” she finally said, but it sounded more like a dare than a concession.

  Ross, who had appropriated the wine list, waved over the waiter and ordered a bottle. “I hope you don’t mind,” he belatedly said to Ethan.

  Ethan was the host; he should choose the wine. He glanced at the list to see what Ross had ordered. A seventy-dollar bottle—not the most expensive on the list, but definitely not one of the cheaper ones. “Sure,” he said not wanting to get into a pissing contest with Ross over the wine. “Alicia, what would you like to drink?”

  “Can I have milk and soda?” she asked Gina in a stage whisper.

  “Just milk,” Gina told her. “It’ll give you strong teeth.”

  “I want strong teeth,” Alicia said in a louder voice, including the others. “Stronger than an iguana. Did you see any iguanas today, Ethan?”

  “Not a one.”

  “Me, neither.” She seemed amazingly poised, seated among so many adults, a lone milk drinker surrounded by wine sippers. Her shirt had a dark spot on it—something must have dripped onto it earlier in the day—and her hair was frizzy and disheveled except for the tight bead-adorned braids tucked behind her ear. But her spirits were high and she wasn’t even squirming.

  He wondered what bad news Gina had gotten from her sister that morning, news from which she’d wanted to shield Alicia. Obviously she’d succeeded in keeping the kid ignorant. Ali the Alley Cat didn’t seem to have a care in the world.

  A sommelier approached their table with the wine and poured some for Ross to taste. He studied, sniffed, chewed a mouthful and, after several ponderous moments, nodded his approval. Glasses were filled, orders placed. Alicia asked if she could have a hamburger, and the waiter told her she could have ground sirloin grilled over an open fire and served on a wheat roll with a garnish of mesclun and tomato. “That’s essentially the same thing as a hamburger,” Gina explained, and Alicia smiled and ordered it. Everyone else selected from the elaborate list of entrees. Ethan visualized the bill and let out a slow breath. He could handle the cost, and he considered the expenditure worth sparing Gina’s feelings.

  Why did he care so much about sparing her feelings? Why was he so keenly aware of the deep darkness of her eyes? Why did she have to be seated directly across from him, so that every time he lifted his gaze it collided with hers?

  “I’ve been wondering,” Ross said, turning to her. “What kind of accent is that?”

  “What kind of accent is what?”

  “Your accent.”

  “I don’t have an accent,” she said, smiling sweetly.

  “She’s from New York,” Alicia offered.

  “I’ve known New Yorkers who don’t have quite so pronounced an accent,” Ross pressed Gina.

  “I guess you know the wrong New Yorkers, then,” she said with obviously fake sympathy. When Ethan caught her eye, she flashed him a wicked grin. He couldn’t help but smile back.

  She must have sensed his approval, because he saw her relax, her posture losing its rigidity and her grin lingering, teasing her mouth. God help them all, she was go
ing to have fun with Ross. She was going to puncture his pomposity. This dinner could turn out to be a disaster—the most entertaining disaster Ethan had ever witnessed.

  She more than lived up to his expectations. When the waiter delivered baskets of bread to the table, she launched into a description of her uncle Rodolfo—“Like that guy in the opera, you know which one I mean? The opera where she dies of TB.”

  “TV?” Alicia asked, her eyes round. “You can die from TV?”

  “Only if you watch the wrong shows,” Gina had joked. “You know Uncle Rodolfo, right? Gramma’s brother?”

  “He makes pizza.”

  “That’s right,” Gina confirmed. “Anyway, he makes rolls out of leftover pizza dough and sells them to gourmet restaurants. People think his rolls are fantastic, and all they are is pizza dough. What do you think, Ali? Are these rolls pizza dough?” she asked as she passed Alicia a flaky, buttery biscuit.

  And later, when the salads were brought out, she poked her fork through the mixed greens and said, “You know what this looks like? Those weeds that grow through cracks in the sidewalk in the city. I hope it doesn’t taste like weeds. Then again, I have no idea what weeds taste like. Mr. Hamilton, you’re a man of the world. Have you ever tasted weeds?”

  “No,” he said, his voice dissolving into a cough. Kim sighed heavily and her mother’s lips pinched as she prodded her weedy salad with the tines of her fork.

  Over their entrees, Gina described some of her favorite eateries in the Bronx neighborhood of her youth. Alicia chimed in, mentioning some of her favorite restaurants in White Plains, where she lived. They concurred that Happy House had the best waffles, although Alicia complained that the syrup bottles were too sticky. “That’s because they don’t wipe them off,” Gina explained, before detouring to the subject of her boss. “He designs shoes,” she said. “More accurately, we design shoes, since I’m on the design staff. I’m learning so much from Bruno. The man’s a genius. He knows everything you’d ever want to know about leather.”

  “I can imagine,” Ross grunted.

  “He’s got the face of a pre-Raphaelite angel,” Gina said. “I majored in art—I know pre-Raphaelite, and Bruno fits the bill. Isn’t that the way it always is?” she asked Kim conspiratorially. “The best-looking ones are always gay. Present company excluded, of course,” she added, indicating Ethan and Ross with a sweep of her hand. “Bruno’s last boyfriend could have passed for Pierce Brosnan’s twin. I’m telling you, he was gorgeous. Why couldn’t the guy have fallen in love with me?” She shrugged, then shot Ethan another mischievous grin.

  He wasn’t sure why she was treating him as her accomplice. Possibly because he was the only one at the table who realized she was teasing. Like her, he took pleasure in watching Ross Hamilton shift uncomfortably in his chair, jaw clenched even as he tried to chew, throat laboring to swallow. Ross was a snob. He deserved to have his feathers ruffled, and Gina was a wonderful feather ruffler.

  She saved her best ruffling for last. With coffee—and cognac for Ross, which Ethan was sure he’d ordered only because it was so damn expensive, and a dish of vanilla ice cream for Alicia, because she’d been so well behaved—Gina said, “I just don’t get golf, Mr. Hamilton. Maybe you can explain it to me. Why would any sane person want to play it?”

  He glowered. Ethan could practically hear him rumbling like threatening thunder. “I’m sure it’s probably too refined for you to understand, my dear,” he muttered.

  “It tones up the cardiovascular system,” Ethan said helpfully.

  Ross aimed his menacing frown at Ethan. “The pleasures of golf extend far beyond its health benefits.”

  “Isn’t jogging better, cardiovascular-wise?” Gina asked. “Plus, all you need to jog is a pair of running shoes—which is an area I think Bruno should extend into. Sports shoes in general. I don’t understand why jogging shoes have to look so dorky. Gotta admit, though, they’re a hell of a lot more attractive than golf shoes. You ever see those golf shoes that look like old-fashioned saddle shoes, with the fringed flap over the laces? I mean, yuck.” Even Delia chuckled at that.

  Ross seethed. Ethan could guess the style of the old guy’s golf shoes at home. He was still struggling to suppress his smile when he handed the waiter his credit card.

  Over Gina’s protests, he managed to fit everyone into the huge rental car. Gina was slim enough, and Alicia small enough, that they could sit side by side with the seat belt stretched around both of them. Kim looked squeezed, stuck in the middle seat in back, and her lush mouth settled into a halfhearted pout. If she weren’t so ticked off at him, he suspected she would have been amused by Gina’s performance over dinner. True, she loved her father and felt a loyalty to him, but she did have a sense of humor. Or at least she’d had one in Connecticut. If her mother could laugh over Ross’s golf shoes, surely Kim could.

  Maybe she couldn’t laugh at anything because she and Ethan weren’t having sex. Maybe she couldn’t laugh because their relationship was unraveling. Maybe she couldn’t laugh because he’d failed to accompany her to a jewelry store in town to pick out an engagement ring.

  He felt bad about that—but not bad enough to buy her a ring. He’d feel a lot worse if he pretended they were on track for marriage, if he closed his eyes to the obvious lack of love between them. Over the past few months they must have been in some kind of love—the wild-infatuation kind, the hot-sex kind—but this trip had been their chance to discover if they were also in the kind of love that carried a couple happily into old age together. And they weren’t.

  He was relieved to have recognized that essential fact before it was too late. He wished Kim could accept the truth and share his relief. But she’d really, really wanted him to buy her a ring, duty-free.

  She’d just have to come to terms with the reality that marriage, commitment, the whole till-death-do-us-part thing was never duty-free.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  WHEN THEY ARRIVED back at Palm Point, Alicia wanted to watch TV. So, unfortunately, did Kim. “I am not going to shut myself up in the bedroom,” she said imperiously, once she’d returned to the living room after dumping all her purchases in her and Ethan’s bedroom. “We’re paying just as much as they’re paying for this apartment.”

  Everyone was paying zero for the apartment, but Gina didn’t mention that. The fact was, her watch read nine-fifteen, and no show appropriate to a seven-year-old would be on at that hour anyway. Tugging Alicia away from the television set, she said, “How about let’s let Kim watch TV and I’ll polish your nails for you?”

  “With my new nail polish?”

  “With whichever of your three new nail polishes you want.”

  The promise of a manicure was enough to entice Alicia. She raced eagerly down the hall ahead of Gina, ceding the television to Kim.

  Gina and Alicia ended up in the bathroom, which wasn’t huge to begin with but seemed even smaller with the two of them in it. It contained what Gina needed, though: bright lighting, water and hard surfaces to lean on. Since she hadn’t brought any bubble bath to St. Thomas, she improvised, fetching a large bowl and some liquid dishwashing soap from the kitchen and creating a warm pool of suds for Alicia to soak her hands in.

  “I want the polish that turns from purple to blue,” Alicia requested. “On my toes, too, okay?”

  “Claws and paws,” Gina confirmed. “You’re getting the works. You were such a good girl today! I was getting cranky by the end, but you were a champ. Didn’t you feel tired?”

  “No,” Alicia said, settling herself on the floor and removing her sandals. “Shopping’s fun.” She looked much more comfortable than Gina felt on the unyielding tiles. The bathroom was humid, the air tinged with a vaguely familiar scent.

  Ethan’s shampoo, she identified it. She hadn’t been aware of sniffing his hair—but damn it, she couldn’t help noticing things about him. Like the way his eyes had constantly sought hers during dinner, and the way his mouth had twitched as though he was strug
gling not to smile while she ran old man Hamilton through the wringer. Like the way he’d stabbed his food with his fork, and the way he’d held his wineglass. Like the way he’d helped her fit the seat belt around both Ali and her, his hands smoothing the band over her hip…and the scent of his hair.

  Alicia appeared as fixated on shopping as Gina was fixated on Ethan—and neither was a healthy fixation. “I liked the way the stores smelled,” her niece babbled. “Except that store with the straw hats in it. But the other stores—some of them smelled like perfume. Remember the store that had all that crystal in it, and there were rainbows in all the glasses? It smelled like perfume. Maybe I should’ve gotten perfume for Mommy.”

  Perfume was the last thing Ramona needed right now—or maybe it was the second-to-last thing, the last thing being a shirt that changed color in the sunlight. “Perfume can be hard to buy for other people,” Gina told her as she pulled the cuticle stick from her manicure travel kit and nudged Alicia’s cuticles. “Sometimes a perfume smells good in the bottle, but then it doesn’t smell good on the person.”

  “That’s silly!” Alicia giggled.

  “No, it’s true. A perfume that smells just fine on one person will smell bad on another. It has to do with body chemistry.”

  Through the closed door, she heard muffled voices. Kim and Ethan, arguing. “I bet Ethan would know about chemistry,” Alicia said. “He’s so smart.”

  “I’m smart, too,” Gina boasted, although her knowledge of chemistry was pretty much limited to paints, dyes and solvents. She dried Alicia’s hands off, then smoothed her short nails with a file, more for show than because they needed to be shaped.