“Sure,” he says.
“I need a shower,” I say. “I’m covered in nettles, thyme, and boar juice and oil and tomato seeds. I smell like onions.”
“Hot,” he says, smelling the backs of his own hands. “And I’m not actually kidding.”
I feel the tension melt slightly as I laugh.
“Come on,” he says, as he nods toward the back of the house. We make our way back up the long field to the bicycles. As we near them, Leo stops and turns to me, shielding his face from the sun with his hand.
“Look. I know this is presumptuous and I don’t want to pressure you, but I worked on some ideas for Nicky’s,” he says. “A new direction for it. A new menu. I tried to show your dad, but...”
“He wasn’t interested?”
Leo shakes his head. “Would you like to see it?”
I nod, feeling the prickle of the sun on my skin, as I consider my answer carefully.All I can do is be honest, and I want to see his ideas. I want to open myself up to keeping Nicky’s.
“Yes,” I say. “I’d like that.”
THE RIDE BACKis grueling, although I’m pleased to see that I’m fitter than Leo and beat him by some minutes. I am already gulping down water in the kitchen when he arrives.
I watch as he uses the bottom of his T-shirt to wipe the sweat off his brow. I sigh, averting my eyes from his body.
“I’ve got a Zoom call,” he says, glancing at his watch.
“I’m going to go call my mum,” I say.
But when she doesn’t answer, I decide to make use of the bath in my en suite.
I stand up and pull my dress off and wander, yawning, into the bathroom. Then I hear a yelp.
I spin around,naked, and there is Leo, inmybathroom. Standing on the bath mat dripping wet, just out of the shower.
Also completely naked.
There is a moment where our eyes meet, then his flicker down my body and mine down his, tracing the lines of his chest and the curving muscles on his stomach, beads of water trailing down to pool on the floor. I feel an instant reaction inside, a coiling of a spring that pulls tight from my chest to my thighs.
I stare at him and the whole universe narrows tothismoment. His stomach flexes, and his hands clench, his eyes on the curve where my neck meets my shoulder, and then they drop to my breasts and I feel all my blood rush to where his gaze rests, my breath shallowing to tiny gasps for air.
I am drawn toward him. I lift my hand just a fraction, my fingers reaching forward,and he spots the signal, his eyes once again locking with mine. But now they are dark, his pupils dilated, his face tense with desire.
I don’t move a muscle.
Don’t do it, Olive. The warning that sits somewhere in the back of my mind right now is so slight, but it catches me. I feel it pierce the bubble around us.
I drop my eyes.
“You were on a Zoom,” I say.
“I wanted to shower first,” he explains.
“Shit.”
Then everything moves quickly. I grab a fluffy white towel to cover myself. But Leo hasn’t anything within reach and so he pulls on the shower curtain, so hard that it comes off its metal pole, one ring popping off at a time.Pop! Pop! Pop!
My eyes dart back across his body to the huge erection that the flimsy plastic sheet cannot hide.
“Fuck,” he says, trying to cover up. The pole that held up the shower curtain falls, hitting him on the back of his head before landing in the bath with an almighty clatter. “Shit.”
