Читать книгу Life Is A Beach: Life Is A Beach / A Real-Thing Fling - Pamela Browning, Pamela Browning - Страница 13

THE NEXT DAY WHEN KARMA met her uncle Nate at the neighborhood ice-cream parlor, she informed him about the fried chicken barrel now reposing on top of her refrigerator.

“Okay,” he said, “so I should have ordered an urn. But what difference does it make? Sophie wanted her ashes scattered in the ocean. She loved the ocean.”

Karma took time out from licking her raspberry frozen yogurt on a stick. “And you’re going to scatter them, right?”

Nate looked uncomfortable. “No, not me. You, Karma.”

Karma stopped stock-still in the middle of Ocean Boulevard. “Why me?”

“I pretend like she’s buried. I go to the cemetery every day to see her grave, God rest her.” He pulled her out of the path of a speeding dune buggy. “You should watch where you’re going, Karma. I don’t want to be going to any more funerals for a while.”

They resumed their stroll. “With me out of the way, you could give Rent-a-Yenta to Paulette,” Karma said while thinking that scattering Aunt Sophie’s ashes was something Nate should do.

“I don’t want you out of the way, Karma. Your cousin Paulette was second choice. Anyway, she already has a job counting money for a big Wall Street firm.”

Lucky Paulette, Karma thought glumly. She probably had a boyfriend, too. But not someone as handsome and charming as Slade Braddock, she’d wager. Not that Slade was her boyfriend, but he had kissed her. He was a good kisser, too.

“Anyway, Karma, I like to go to the cemetery and look at Sophie’s grave. I sit there for a while and I talk to her.”

“Aunt Sophie doesn’t have a grave. She’s in that fried chicken barrel.”

“Barrel? Don’t call it a barrel. It’s a fried chicken bucket. Sophie wouldn’t need a barrel. She was as slim on the day she died as she was on the day I married her. And anyway, I picked out a grave that looks like it could be Sophie’s. Sometimes I drive Mrs. Rothstein to the cemetery, too, so she can visit her husband’s grave nearby. There’s a pretty bottle-brush tree, and we like to sit under it on a nice wrought-iron bench. Let me have my fantasy that Sophie is there, bubbeleh. Don’t spoil it for me.”

“But Uncle Nate—”

“Your aunt Sophie was my life. I miss her.” Nate wiped a tear from his eye.

Karma slid an arm around his shoulders. “She’d want you to make a new life, Uncle Nate.”

He sighed. “I know, I know. That’s true.” He cheered up slightly. “So when can you scatter the ashes?”

Karma finished the rest of her frozen yogurt and tossed the stick in a trash can painted with a purple palm tree. “I don’t know. I’ll have to figure out a way. I think I’ll need a boat, since you can’t really toss ashes from shore without the prevailing winds throwing them back at you.”

“You let me know what you’re going to do.”

“I will, Uncle Nate. Thanks for the frozen yogurt.” She bent and kissed him on his wrinkled cheek.

“You’ve got your yogurt class tonight, don’t you?”

“Yoga. I practice yoga. I eat yogurt.” Her uncle had never been able to tell the difference between yoga and yogurt, which had been endearing at first, but now it was beginning to wear on her.

“Okay, yoga. Didn’t I hear that the big cowboy was coming to class?”

“Where did you hear that?” Karma uttered in surprise.

“Goldy mentioned it. Is it true?”

“I invited him. Not sure if he’ll be there tonight,” she hedged.

Nate’s eyes twinkled. “He will be. I saw the way he looked at you the other morning.”

“From your mouth to God’s ears,” Karma said, but Nate only laughed.

“That’s my line,” he said, and it was true. Her uncle was always saying that.

After she and Nate parted company at the corner, Karma walked slowly back to her office, wondering where would be the best place to hire a boat. She was still mulling this over as she climbed the stairs. The door swung open before she inserted her key.

“Hi, Karma.” Jennifer, the same Jennifer who was eager to find a date who was husband material, had parked her sexy self in front of the TV in the alcove where clients were welcome to browse through videos of possible matches. “Aunt Goldy sent me over to take delivery of the couch and chairs for you, and I figured it’s a chance to check out new prospects. I’ve just met one, in fact.”

“Oh?”

“He said his name was Slade Braddock. He was looking for a psychological profile form and took one off your desk. I hope that’s okay.”

Karma’s spirits fell. She wished she hadn’t missed him. “I guess it’s all right. Um, Jennifer, why aren’t you at work?”

“I switched to the night shift.”

“They have night shifts for ear piercers?”

“Uh-huh. That’s when all the teenagers come in, and we’re having a special—two for the price of one.”

“Two ears? You charge per ear?”

Jennifer rolled her eyes. “No, silly. Two people for the price of one. You should come get your ears pierced while the sale’s on. Your belly button too. I’m not supposed to do belly buttons, but I’d make an exception for you.”

Ouch! But, “I’ll think about it,” Karma said. To her dismay, the very video cassette that Jennifer now cradled in her eager little hands was labeled Slade Braddock, Client 1811.

“This guy was soooo cool. I think I’ll pop this cassette in the VCR and see what he has to say.”

“I haven’t edited it yet.”

“I don’t care. Want to watch it with me?”

Karma shook her head. “I’ve got things to do,” she said.

Jennifer leaned forward, her breasts surging out of her vee neckline. They were conical in shape and tanned all over, at least from what Karma could see, which was considerable. Furthermore, it looked as if Jennifer had succeeded in her quest for artificial nipples. They were standing up straight and proud. Did guys really like that look? It seemed that as a matchmaker she ought to know such things.

Jennifer noticed her scrutiny. “Yes, Karma, I did get them. Do you want to know where? I could—”

“No, thanks,” Karma said hastily.

Jennifer treated her to a knowing smile. “They’d help you in the guy department, believe me. By the way, I took a message for you.” She bounced over to the desk and ripped a pink message sheet off a pad. “The caller said she was your cousin Paulette. She said she was recently fired from her job in New York and wants you to call her back.”

“Paulette? Call her back?” Despite Karma’s immediate sympathy for anyone who’d lost a job, this wasn’t anything she wanted to do. Paulette had been the butt of jokes from Karma and her sisters during their childhood. Karma knew she had never been completely forgiven for dipping the sleeping Paulette’s hand in a pail of warm water on the first night of sleep-away camp when they were both eight; Paulette had wet her bed, which was what Karma had been assured would happen. After that, Paulette’s nickname around camp had been P. P., which ostensibly stood for her initials, since her full name was Paulette Parham. But all the campers had known what the nickname really stood for, and the counselors probably did, too.

“Come on, Karma, sit down and watch with me.” Jennifer tugged Karma into the alcove and pushed on her shoulders until she sat on the chair.

“Roll tape,” Jennifer sang out as she pushed the play button, and Slade’s face popped up on the screen. A good-humored face, an animated face—until Karma asked him the first question and he froze up.

As Slade hemmed and hawed his way down into the conversational skids, Karma slid a glance in Jennifer’s direction to gauge her reaction. “Not much of a talker,” was all she said.

“Mmm,” Karma said noncommittally.

“Still,” Jennifer mused as Slade started running on about birds, “he’s a hottie. I can’t see what’s the big whoop about roseate spoonbills and great blue herons, they sound boring to me, but I think I’ll give Mr. Slade Braddock a whirl.”

Karma’s heart sank.

Jennifer switched off the tape. “Set it up for Friday night, won’t you, Karma?”

“Well, I—”

“I mean, why not?” Jennifer skewered her with a look.

“I’ll have to check to see if he’s busy,” Karma hedged, getting up and shuffling through a pile of papers on her desk.

“Aunt Goldy says she’s met him. She says he’s nice. What do you think? Are we well suited, he and I?”

“Why don’t I study your personality profiles in relation to each other and get back to you on that? Of course, I won’t see his until he brings it back.”

Jennifer shrugged, which went a long way to show off her breast assets. “Oh, don’t bother with that psychology stuff. I want to go out with him. Friday night is good because my mother is trying to set me up with her best friend’s son, Sheldon. If I already have a date, Mom won’t insist.” She flipped her hair back off her shoulders, and Karma was nearly blinded by the shimmer of it in the slant of sunshine coming in the window. Slade, she thought sourly, would go crazy at the sight of Jennifer.

“So do you promise to set it up?”

“All right,” Karma said reluctantly. “I’ll do it.”

“Tell Slade to pick me up at seven,” Jennifer said airily on her way out the door.

When she had gone, Karma collapsed onto her desk chair and pillowed her head on her arms in dismay at the thought of setting Slade up with Jennifer.

“Well, he may be a client, but Jennifer won’t like him,” counseled the Aunt Sophie side of her. In fact, the voice in her head sounded so much like her aunt’s that Karma’s head jerked up in surprise.

Whereupon the Karma side of her cautioned, “Why wouldn’t Slade like Jennifer? She’s blond, sexy and eager.”

Unfortunately it was the Karma side of her that made the most sense.

Still and all, Friday was still four days away. Karma could only hope that Jennifer, who could usually be counted on to show her fickle side, would decide before then that Slade wasn’t a real possibility.

SLADE BRADDOCK SHOWED UP at the rooftop sundeck yoga class right on time that night. He strode in wearing those cowboy boots, jeans and a white T-shirt that made his tan look darker than ever. He nodded to Karma, balancing his hands on his hips and looking the group over.

“Who is that?” Mandi asked as she unfurled her purple yoga mat.

“Oh, just someone I invited to join us,” Karma answered.

“Mmm-mmm. I sure would like to hear him say, ‘You know you want it, baby. You know you do.”’ Mandi lowered her voice in imitation of a male consumed by lust, which might have been funny if Karma were in the mood for it.

“Don’t they all say that to you?” Karma asked innocently. Mandi let out a sort of halfhearted giggle as Karma unfolded herself from her mat, where she had been sitting in Half-Lotus position. She strolled over to where Slade stood.

He grinned at her, the light in his eyes rivaling the moonlight spilling down from a clear night sky, his grin revealing teeth that gleamed whiter than the promise of any toothpaste commercial on TV. “Didn’t think I’d show up, did you?” he asked.

What to reply? She had and she hadn’t, both at the same time. One thing for sure, she had developed a dry mouth from merely being in his line of sight, and at that moment, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to open it to speak.

“Uh, glad to see you,” she managed to say after what seemed like a couple of eons. Slade looked out of place, she thought, in those jeans. “Be better if you’d worn fewer clothes,” she said, not realizing until the words were out of her mouth how they sounded.

His delighted laughter boomed out over the assembled regulars, most of whom were gawking at him with their jaws hanging down to their knees. Which was not an approved yoga pose as far as Karma knew.

“Most things,” Slade said wickedly but in such a low tone that the others couldn’t hear, “are better without so many clothes. You mind telling me which items you’d like me to discard first?”

She blushed. She couldn’t help it. “Your boots for a start,” she said crisply.

The instructor, a powerful bare-chested yogi from The Om Place whose previous address was listed as an ashram in India, sauntered over. “A new student?” he asked in precise tones as he inspected Slade from head to toe.

“Prashant, this is Slade. Slade, Prashant.” Karma made her introductions as quickly as she could and scurried back to her mat.

“How do you happen to know that big hunky guy?” Mandi wanted to know. Her favorable assessment of Slade and his muscles and his tan and his white, white teeth was undisguised and avid.

“Oh,” Karma said with a vague wave of her hand, “we met on the street.”

Jennifer arrived, running late as usual. She stopped to talk to Karma. “Isn’t that Slade Braddock talking with Prashant?” she asked, aiming a come-hither look and up-standing nipples in his direction.

“Yes,” muttered Karma. “I’m afraid so.”

“Should I introduce myself? Or do you want to do it?”

“After class,” Karma told her.

“Mmm,” said Jennifer, her gaze still on Slade. “Boxers for sure.”

“Briefs,” Mandi corrected. “He’s a briefs kind of guy.” Having made that pronouncement, Mandi leaped up, her melon-sized breasts jostling each other for room under her Om Is Where The Heart Is T-shirt. She undulated over to the corner where Slade was approaching the stack of spare mats.

“Need some help?” Mandi asked.

Karma wondered, Help? Help with what? Deciding whether he wanted a blue mat or a purple one? Putting one foot in front of the other until he reached the rest of the group? Oh, pu-leeze!

Karma shut her ears to the byplay between Slade and Mandi and forced herself to breathe deeply, trying to find her center. The trouble was that by the time Slade, looking like every dream man in every one of her fantasies since she was twelve years old, began to spread his mat out beside hers, her center seemed to have moved downward considerably to that warm place between her—

“Karma,” Slade whispered under his breath while fielding admiring glances from virtually every woman present without so much as acting as if he noticed. “Karma, what am I supposed to do?”

She opened her eyes. “What Prashant says.”

“Oh,” Slade said in a puzzled tone. He glanced from her to Prashant. “He likes you, I think.”

“Prashant? That’s doubtful.”

“He certainly came running when he saw us talking. Defending his territory, maybe?”

The observation was too ridiculous to be worthy of reply, and Karma was saved by Prashant’s settling down on his own mat at the front of the group and welcoming them all to the lesson.

Prashant began the class by chanting an Om. “Allow yourself to go with the flow, and then you will find what you’ve been looking for,” he said afterward with reverence.

“I’ll be damned if I think that’s going to get me a wife, which is what I’m looking for lately,” Slade muttered under his breath. Karma threw him a reproachful look.

“Well, don’t I have you to find me what I’m looking for?” he whispered.

“Go with the flow anyway,” she whispered back.

Prashant coached them through a few simple warm-ups. With Slade beside her, Karma, for the first time ever in yoga class, found it difficult to concentrate. As they progressed through various poses, he doffed his shirt, revealing a torso that was leaner, harder, and more muscular than she could have imagined. And she had been imagining it plenty, starting from the first moment she saw him.

It was an intense class, and the members of the group, most of whom were intermediate students, flowed from pose to pose with little recovery time in between. Sun Salutation, Warrior, Downward-Facing Dog…and Slade, who seemed to be struggling valiantly to keep up, looked slightly more musclebound with each pose. Musclebound was not good with yoga. Flexible was good. Agile was good. Slade seemed to be neither.

“Are you doing all right back there, Slade?” Prashant asked once, and Slade replied with what looked like a grin superimposed on a grimace. “Fine,” he gritted through clenched teeth, but the next pose, a backbend, drew an incredulous intake of breath from him as he lay on his back and attempted to lift himself up.

“Karma, you are the best at backbends. Will you please demonstrate?” suggested Prashant.

“Well, I—” she began, but Mandi said, “Yes, Karma, do!” and was rapidly echoed by Jennifer.

All eyes were upon Karma, but the only ones that mattered in that moment were Slade’s. He lay on his mat looking up at her with a challenging grin, and all she could think at the moment is that if they were in bed, this is what he would look like—well-muscled and fit, his grin fading into passion as he reached for her and pulled her down across his body, the better to kiss you, my dear.

“Backbends are important,” intoned Prashant, breaking into her reverie. “They help our bodies release emotion in a positive way.”

“Wouldn’t backbends be good for me?” Slade urged. “Since my chakra is blocked, I mean?”

He might have something there, but the thing that finally decided Karma was that if she were in a backbend pose, she wouldn’t have to look down at him and thus wouldn’t be tempted to reach over and unbutton his jeans, a behavior that surely would be frowned upon.

Karma forced herself to lie down on her mat; she closed her eyes and inhaled a deep breath, then exhaled as she firmly planted her hands behind her ears and her feet flat on the floor. While inhaling the next breath, she hoisted herself up into a backbend, keeping her eyes closed and wishing she’d never invited Slade to class. Slowly she walked her feet in a bit closer and arched her back even more, thrusting her breasts up. She knew that the quickly inhaled breath next to her came from Slade, and too late she realized that she was exhibiting more of the very thing that he probably wanted to see if Jennifer were correct in her thinking. Karma was wearing a thin exercise bra along with tight shiny leggings. Neither did anything to disguise her womanly attributes. This could be good. This could be bad. But all she could think about at the moment was that she wanted to get out of this pose.

As she began lowering herself to her mat, she was horrified to hear the separation of stitches somewhere along her front. Then she felt a quick rush of air in a private place and realized with horror that her leggings had split somewhere south of her belly button.

Thump! She hit the floor abruptly and sat up, yanking her mat up to cover herself.

“Excellent,” Prashant was saying. “Only next time do not come down so quickly. You could get dizzy that way.”

“Oooh, Karma, did you rip your new leggings?” Mandi said in a loud voice.

“Oooh, Karma, that’s too bad,” echoed Jennifer.

“I—I think I’d better go change clothes,” Karma said, running the words all together and hoping she wasn’t wearing the panties with the lace panel in front. They would reveal too, too much.

She scrambled to her feet, clutching her mat in front of her as she sidled sideways toward the door. Slade was staring at her, his eyes wide, a devilish grin on his face. Without a single word to him, she turned and darted inside the building.

“Unfortunate,” she heard Prashant murmuring. “Shall we try the backbend one more time and then rest for a few moments in Child’s Pose before our final relaxation?”

Karma slammed the door behind her and looked down. Sure enough, more of her was exposed than Slade Braddock needed to see. She owned one pair of lace panties, only one pair, and guess what?

She was wearing them tonight.

Unexpectedly she burst into tears. Prashant was right—backbends promoted the release of emotion. Too bad that in her case, backbends made her blubber.

SLADE DRAGGED HIS ACHING carcass along to the Blue Moon’s lobby after the class. He was still reeling from his meeting with someone who had claimed that she was his Friday night date, a woman who had introduced herself as Jennifer Something and looked so artificial that she terrified him. He couldn’t believe that Karma would set him up with someone completely wrong for him, someone that he would never in a million years take home to introduce to his parents. He’d fled as fast as it was possible to flee without being downright rude.

Goldy hunched in her chair behind the desk, knitting. She blinked at him over the top of her half-glasses when he entered the lobby.

“How was the yoga class?” she asked brightly.

“I think,” he said slowly, “that I’m feeling freer all the time.” This was not necessarily untrue, though what he was feeling freer about was pursuing Karma. She might not be the sort of woman he had hoped to find in Miami Beach, but she had certain—attributes, all of which had been more in evidence tonight than at any previous time.

“I received a lot of energy in the class,” he offered helpfully. And a novel view of Karma, he thought to himself.

“That’s good,” Goldy said, and she beamed.

“There are a few things I’d like to discuss about it. About the expression of this energy, I mean. But Karma won’t answer my knock.”

“Maybe she’s not in her apartment.”

“She left class early. Did you see her go out?”

“No, I didn’t see Karma leave. Not that I would, necessarily. Not if she went out the back. She often slips out that way to walk on the beach, especially when she’s feeling all mellow from yoga class. The door’s down that hall.” Goldy inclined her head toward her left.

“Thanks, Goldy,” Slade said. He grinned at her, and she grinned back.

“You know, Slade, I seem to recall that you live on a boat.”

“At the moment, that’s so,” he said.

“Karma has need of a boat. She wants to scatter her aunt Sophie’s ashes at sea.”

Goldy’s intent was not lost on Slade. She was giving him another boost, a clue as to what he could do to capture Karma’s attention, possibly even her undying gratitude.

“Like I said, Goldy, thanks. I owe you.”

“Remember, you can’t escape your Karma.” She winked.

He winked back before loping off down the hall.

The door at the Blue Moon led to a narrow alleyway that culminated at a boardwalk leading down to the sand. The beach at this hour was deserted except for a lone figure walking along the high tide line about a hundred yards south. Karma.

He jogged to catch up with her. As he approached, she wheeled around, startled. Her eyes were wide, her lips parted. Her hair stood out around her face and seemed to snap and crackle with energy. He thought he had never seen anyone more beautiful in his life.

The breakers were rolling in at a fast pace, giving rhythm to the night. This part of Miami Beach seemed far away from the hoopla of South Beach night life.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded, stopping dead in her tracks.

He thought he saw the tracks of tears dried on her face, but perhaps he was mistaken. “I came to offer my services,” he said.

Karma started to shake her head, but on the off chance that she wouldn’t object, he captured her face between his hands. “Or rather,” he added, captivated by the confusion this brought to her eyes, “the services of my boat.”

“I don’t need—” but she stopped talking in midsentence, all the better for him to explain.

“So you can scatter your aunt Sophie’s ashes,” he said gently, moving his head closer and tilting it into kissing position.

“How did you know about that?” she breathed, and her breath was sweet and soft upon his lips. Her eyes were deep and unfathomable, and she didn’t pull away.

“When a person opens himself up and begins to receive energy, all sorts of things happen,” he murmured, and then he kissed her.

As soon as his mouth touched hers, he wanted her. He wanted her with all the passion and depth of a man in full pursuit even though he warned himself again that she wasn’t his type. Yet the image of her nipples straining against the fabric of that brief top she’d worn to yoga class was burned into the part of his brain that governed reason and good sense; he wanted her. Perhaps this lustful feeling was the ultimate expression of the energy he was experiencing?

Slowly his lips explored hers, and before he knew it his tongue was seeking new territory and his hands were tangled in her hair. She was a full participant, her tongue meeting his, her teeth nibbling at his lower lip, her hands pressing against his back to draw him closer.

When she pushed him away it was with less conviction than he had expected.

“You’re a client,” she said, the words approximating a gasp of passion. “I shouldn’t be doing this.”

“If you’d like, I’ll resign as a client,” he said. “I could be just plain Slade Braddock, man on the loose.”

She braced her hands against his chest and shoved, forcing him to take a step backward.

“More like Slade Braddock, man on the make,” she said.

“Anything wrong with that?” he asked amiably.

“You’re supposed to go out with Jennifer on Friday night.”

“She told me. What if I don’t want to go?”

“That will get me in trouble with Jennifer, not to mention Goldy, who is her aunt. Don’t do that to me, Slade.”

“Goldy is the one who told me you might be on the beach.”

“She may not know that Jennifer has dibs on you.”

“I have free will. I can see—or not see—any woman I please. So do you want to go out in the boat with me or not?”

“A houseboat isn’t something you’d take out to sea,” she said, casting a look in his direction. He didn’t know the meaning of that look, but it was definitely not one that said go away, so he kept walking along beside her.

“Toy Boat has a dinghy,” he told her.

“So you’re planning on rowing out to sea? That’s not advisable, you know. The waves can get pretty big offshore.”

“Maybe it isn’t called a dinghy. I don’t know because I’m not that experienced a boater. It has a motor.”

“And what strings are attached to this offer?”

“Absolutely none. Maybe while we’re in the boat we could talk about freeing me up. Maybe we could talk about freeing you up.”

He saw her rolling her eyes. “I’m as free as I want to be,” she said. She swiped at her nose with a tissue that he hadn’t realized she carried in her hand, increasing his suspicion that she’d been crying.

“Maybe that’s the problem. You need to feel attached to someone,” he said hopefully. She could be lonely, he supposed. She could be shedding a few tears because she had no one to walk with on the beach on a beautiful and romantic night such as this one, which could play into his purpose really well.

“I don’t think I want to be attached in the way you’re thinking about.”

“Perhaps you need to free up your chakras, all seven of them. Have you ever thought about giving yourself permission to feel, Karma?”

She shot him a skeptical glance.

Realizing that this line of discussion wasn’t going any further, he changed the subject. “How far do we walk? When do we turn around and go back?”

She seemed on the verge of smiling when she looked up at him. “Why? Too much exercise for you, cowboy?”

“Not at all,” he said firmly, wishing suddenly that she could observe when he and Lightning, his prize quarter horse, were cutting cattle. She’d see that he was a superior athlete, an experienced horseman. He was out of his element in sea-sand-sky territory, that’s for sure.

“I usually stroll to the next lifeguard station, then head back. You’re welcome to go back now, if you like. These walks of mine are usually solitary.”

“Too bad,” Slade said.

“Not really. Solitude is good sometimes.”

“Karma, when a woman looks like you, acts like you and kisses like you, there’s no reason to be alone.”

She emitted an exasperated sigh. “Maybe I want to be alone. Maybe I like it that way.”

“And maybe I’m the king of Siam, but I don’t think so.”

“I don’t think there is a king of Siam anymore. For that matter, there’s not a Siam anymore. It’s called Thailand these days.”

“You get my point,” he said.

They had almost reached the lifeguard station, and Karma slowed down. She drew a deep breath before speaking. “I know what you were looking at in yoga class tonight when I was doing that backbend, and I might as well tell you that unless you concentrate on being centered, you’re not doing your blocked chakra any good.”

He turned back toward the Blue Moon when she did and wondered what she would do if he kissed her again. He decided not to chance it. “I believe I feel my chakra becoming unblocked,” he said, not believing that he was actually speaking these words that flowed so easily from his lips. “I feel a certain—a certain—” He struggled to think of something that would convince her that he was making progress.

“A certain letting go?” Karma supplied.

He grinned and punched a fist into his opposite hand. “That’s it! A ‘letting go’!”

“Maybe it is working. Maybe you are getting better. Backbends are good for releasing emotion.”

She walked on, a frown marring her features. “You’ll have to keep doing yoga. It will help you dramatically.”

Maybe his muscles would stop screaming out in agony by next Tuesday night, maybe he’d be able to twist himself into a damned backbend—a real one this time, not a weak imitation.

“I should practice,” he said. “Other than backbends, I’m not sure what poses would be best, though, so perhaps you could help me.”

“No funny business if I do,” she said firmly.

“What do you mean, funny business?” he replied, all innocence.

“Kissing me,” she said. “Becoming unduly familiar.”

“Now wait a minute. I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep.”

“If I’m going to find you the wife you want, you can’t sully the process,” Karma said in a reasoning tone.

He didn’t know what to say to that. The kind of wife he wanted had slipped his mind. The sweet, delicate little Southern-belle type didn’t seem so desirable anymore. He knew he should ask when he could view some videos of female Rent-a-Yenta clients. He knew he should be more eager to make contact with other women. He ought to be encouraged by the thought of having a date with Jennifer. And yet when he stole a glance over at Karma walking along beside him, when he took in that curly blond mass of hair and those breasts straining against the cotton of her blouse, when he thought about what had been revealed through those lace panties when her leggings split—well, she was the one he wanted to know more about. She was the one for him.

At least for the short term.

When they reached the boardwalk, he stopped to pull on his boots. As if against her better judgment, she waited for him.

“How about if I pick you up Thursday afternoon at three to scatter your aunt’s ashes?” he asked, taking the bold approach.

She looked down at her bare feet. “I don’t know if I can be ready by three. I have work to do in the office.”

“Three-thirty, then.”

“Well, only if you learn how to motor that boat.”

“I’ll learn.” Slade finished pulling on the boots and stood up. At the moment that he was ready to slide his arms around her, she stepped up on the boardwalk. It was an evasion, but he wasn’t going to let her get away with it.

“Not so fast,” he said, the words coming out more gruffly than he had intended. He grabbed her wrist, the handiest thing to grab, and twisted her around. His heart was thumping against his ribs as he pulled her close. He’d bet his last dollar that her heart was hammering, too.

“Slade,” she said, the word more of an assent than a denial. And then he kissed her thoroughly, liking the way her head was on a parallel with his because of the increased height standing on the boardwalk gave her. If she were tiny, like the woman he’d come here to find, kissing her wouldn’t be nearly as satisfying. As it was, when he opened his eyes they were gazing directly into hers. He liked what he saw there because it wasn’t anger or defiance or anything but a kind of hushed acceptance of what was and maybe could be.

He released her reluctantly and dug a paper out of his back pocket. “I brought you my psychological profile,” he said. “It, um, may give you clues to my emotional identity.” He wasn’t sure what an emotional identity was, exactly, but it was the kind of term Karma would use.

She merely stared at him, then took the sheet of paper from his hand. It quivered a bit, and not entirely from the ocean breeze.

“See you tomorrow,” he said, and then she was off, scampering up the boardwalk like a runaway heifer.

All in all, he thought jubilantly as he headed for the parking lot, the evening had gone tolerably well. Except for yoga class, and even that had had its redeeming features.

Like lace panties that left little to the imagination.

HE KNOCKED ON KARMA’S DOOR at three-thirty on Thursday afternoon. She opened it, clutching a flyswatter in one hand.

“I’m chasing a palmetto bug,” she said, leaving the door open and taking off into the tiny kitchen, which he could see courtesy of a pass-through to the living room.

He closed the door. “I learned how to run the boat,” he called after her. His words were followed by a loud Splat!

“Good,” she said distractedly. “Damn! I missed it.”

“Didn’t I hear something about an exterminator service around here?”

“Yes, which is personified by a guy named Geofredo. He’s tried his best, and now the exterminating is up to me. The thing about palmetto bugs is that you can’t treat them nicely. One becomes two, which become four, and pretty soon you’ve got a bunch. It used to be against my core beliefs to kill anything, but I’ve had a change of heart.” She flicked the flyswatter back and forth.

“Why?”

“Because this particular roach and his kinfolk were waving their feelers at Aunt Sophie’s bucket,” Karma said, angling her head toward it. The bucket sat on top of the refrigerator amid a tangle of dish towels, a blender base, a potato ricer and a tape deck.

“Fear not. Bwana will hunt down palmetto bug. Bwana will kill.”

Karma shook her head. “Thanks, but this is my fight. If he’d only show his face, I’d nail him.”

“I think I see him poking out from under the baseboard.” The palmetto bug—an enormous one—scurried across the kitchen floor, straight toward Karma.

“Eek!” she squealed, backing fast and furiously until the back of her knees hit the couch. She rallied, feinted, and swung the flyswatter down hard.

“Dead,” she pronounced solemnly. She scooted the carcass out the sliding glass door with one foot. “How about some lunch?”

He rocked back on his heels. “It’s not the most appetizing idea at the moment. Anyway, it’s a little late for lunch.”

“Call it an early supper if you like. I haven’t eaten because I’ve been busy trying to balance my checkbook all day.” She went into the kitchen and began shoving pots around on the stove. “I’ve made linguine,” she called over her shoulder. “With shrimp sauce.”

He noticed with bemusement that she had set the table with turquoise-blue place mats and yellow plastic plates. There were napkin rings that looked like carved fish painted red and pink, and she’d stuck a branch laden with white oleander blooms into an old wine jug. The effect was, well, interesting.

He sat down at the table, and she bore a huge platter of pasta into the little dining area. While he was waiting for her to pour iced tea, he had a chance to look around the apartment. Furniture consisted of what appeared to be flea-market finds, but it was a creative mix. An old couch had a fringed silk shawl thrown artistically across the back, and a shelf on one wall held bottles and jars in jeweled colors, which were lit from within by tiny Christmas tree lights. A coir rug was underfoot, and his sharp eyes didn’t miss the fact that the binding was ripped in the corner behind the rocking chair that almost, but not quite, hid the imperfection from view.

“Nice place,” Slade said. He meant it. It looked comfortable and reflected Karma’s personality.

“Thanks. I hit a dozen yard and garage sales when I arrived here. I didn’t move much down from Connecticut with me since I wasn’t sure I’d stay.”

“Why not?”

She shrugged and sat down across from him. “I didn’t know if I could make a go of the business. I still don’t. There’s so much to do that I hardly have time for anything but work.”

She passed him the linguine, and he helped himself. “As busy as you are, you wouldn’t have had to provide food,” he said.

“It’s the least I can do when you’re going to so much trouble for me.”

As she tucked into the food, he studied her. She was wearing a knit short-sleeved polo shirt, yellow, and navy-blue shorts, and her hair was pulled into a ponytail. She looked wholesome, like a camp counselor, but her expression was decidedly businesslike. Taking his cue from her, he concentrated on eating and making small talk, which turned out to be enjoyable enough. He told her that her bike had been retrieved from the bottom of the bay, and she seemed relieved. She was even grateful when he told her that he’d asked the marina manager’s son to make sure it was rideable and to fix it if it was not. They talked about her uncle, who seemed special to her. It occurred to him as he helped her clear the table that he was really enjoying her company.

By the time Karma climbed into the Suburban beside him clutching the bucket of her aunt’s ashes firmly between her breasts, Slade had already planned what they would do when they returned from their task. They’d have a late dinner on the houseboat, then a walk in the moonlight alongside the bay and perhaps a nightcap before he took her home. And maybe, if he got megalucky, he wouldn’t have to take her home. There was plenty of room in the master stateroom’s bed for two people.

The runabout, fourteen feet long, was painted in the houseboat’s colors and had been given the cutesy name of Toy Boat’s Toy, which was no doubt the idea of Mack’s wife Renee. Karma smiled when she saw the name lettered on the stern, though, and then she spotted her bike, which he had propped against one of the pilings near the houseboat’s mooring.

“The bike looks fine,” she said, giving it a quick once-over before climbing down the ladder to the runabout. “Maybe I’ll ride it home.”

Maybe not, Slade thought involuntarily as he steadied the runabout. After the romantic evening he’d planned, she might want to rethink things.

Phifer had shown him how to start a cold outboard, for which Slade was grateful since his knowledge of boats was sadly limited. Phifer had also loaned him charts and had given him instructions about where to go. As Slade, feeling optimistic about the afternoon and evening to follow, aimed the runabout’s bow toward Key Biscayne, Karma settled herself and her aunt’s ashes in the middle of the boat facing him.

There were a number of boats on the bay, as usual. Karma angled her head so that the sun’s rays fell more evenly on her features, and Slade made himself concentrate on working the throttle as they chugged past Key Biscayne and out into open water.