She lifted the lid as Damien shoved his chair back and stood up. He peered over her shoulder. "Food hamper?"
"Yes." She grinned at him and pulled out some strawberry jam and Darjeeling tea. "Hungry?" There were biscuit tins and a variety of cheeses, crackers, marmalade, and lemon curd. Her stomach rumbled in anticipation. "Mother is worried I’ll starve or eat bad fruit in this heathen tropical country."
"She sent this from London? I can only imagine what that must have cost." Damien shook a tin. "Chocolate cookies. Good stuff."
"Cost is no object when Mother thinks she’s right." But for the first time, Mandy saw beyond her mother’s desire to maintain strict control over every aspect of her life. "But you know, I think I finally understand. A mother’s fears aren’t always rational, but they’re born of love. I don’t think I’ve ever appreciated just how my mother feels about me until right now."
Damn it, she was going to get weepy. Just when she was trying to prove to Damien that her pregnancy was irrelevant to their relationship, she went and turned into a hormonal watering pot.
Damien didn’t stop to think about what he was doing. He just wrapped his arms around Mandy and pulled her into his chest. She gave a little sniffle and sank against him with a sigh.
His heart raced as he held her there, patting her back. He hadn’t held a woman like this in so long, hadn’t felt he had any comfort to give. And Mandy was so, so different from Jess. His wife had used tears to manipulate, to wrench guilty apologies from him, to gloss over her own transgressions.
Those very thoughts now – unkind, scrutinizing thoughts of Jessica’s flaws – made him feel guilty all over again. He hadn’t loved her well enough in life, and he couldn’t get it right in death either.
Mandy was looking up at him. He could feel the weight of her brown eyes studying him. But he looked over her shoulder as she spoke, unable to bear the openness she was wearing on her face.
"Love, no matter how it’s expressed, is still love. We all have flaws, and so our love will be flawed. But that doesn’t diminish it."
Damien squeezed her tighter to him, swallowing hard, unable to speak. How did she do that? How did she manage to get inside his head and find his thoughts, anticipate them, refute them, offer him a comfort that he wasn’t sure he deserved.
One of the walls of defense towering around his emotions and heart had a good hole in it. About the size of Mandy’s foot, where she inadvertently was kicking down the fortress that had protected him for three years.
"I’m not sure I agree with you, Mandy. Just because we’re flawed doesn’t mean it’s okay to let those flaws bleed into our feelings."
"Do you think there is a perfect love, then?"
"No." That he was sure of. And he wasn’t even sure there was love.
"I think perfect love is any time you love unconditionally, without selfish intent, without concern for personal gain."
He wanted to scoff. Call her hopelessly naive and begging to be taken advantage of. But he couldn’t. Maybe because he wanted so desperately to believe that she could be right. "And do you think people really do that?"
"I do, Damien. I really do."
Her hands wrapped around his waist, her hair tickling his chin, and he knew that she meant what she said. That she would love her child that way. That she had bits and pieces of her that alone were greater than the sum whole of his soul.
He knew that he didn’t deserve whatever she had to offer him.
That he couldn’t resist her.
That he wanted to believe.
That he didn’t want to be alone anymore.
That while the court had dismissed the charges of murder against him, he had effectively been living in a prison of his own making for the past three years.
And that Mandy was helping him turn the key.
Damien wasn’t taking the hint that she wanted to make love to him. Mandy lounged on the bed, the contents of the hamper spread out all around her, stomach happily full, while every trick she tried was ignored.
He was either exceptionally dull witted, or he was choosing to ignore her. Knowing him like she did, she was forced to conclude the latter. Damien was no dummy.
But Mandy had done everything short of a striptease to get his attention. Instead of jumping her bones, he just looked pained. As though he had indigestion.
He hadn’t done a thing when she had brushed her chest against him. Hadn’t made a move when she’d tossed her hair and given him a smoldering look. Hadn’t even blinked when she had spread out lunch on the bed, claiming the balcony was too sunny this time of day.
No, he had pulled up a chair instead of climbing on the bed with her and was sitting there devouring biscuits. If he did have indigestion, it wouldn’t surprise her. He’d worked his way through a whole tin, after eating a cheese wedge and an entire cracker sleeve.
"Do you want to go sailing this afternoon?" he asked.
"Sure." Right after they had sex. "I’ve never been."
She purposely let marmalade dribble from her cracker down onto her chest. Her barely contained in a bikini, newly burgeoning chest. The sticky orange jelly slid down into her ample cleavage. Damien’s fist closed, crumbling the cracker he was holding to bits.
But he didn’t do a damn thing, not even when she leaned over for a napkin and started delicately blotting herself inches from his nose.
"Oops." She gave him ample opportunity to come to her assistance with his hand or tongue, whichever method he preferred, but he just shoved another hunk of cheese in his mouth.
Exasperated, she dropped the napkin, marmalade still clinging to her breasts. "Damien, I think in your case, too much knowledge is a bad thing."
"What’s that supposed to mean?" he asked around a mouthful of Brie.
"You read that pregnancy book and now you see me as some kind of vessel for creation. You’ve lost all sexual interest in me."
It was gratifying to see his mouth drop completely open, Brie clinging to his tongue, though not as gratifying as him reaching over and untying her top would be.
"You’re kidding, right?" He swallowed the cheese.
A cracker crumb clung to the corner of his mouth, and she wanted to lick it away. "Well, maybe I sounded a little overdramatic, but no, I’m not kidding. I dropped marmalade on my breasts and you didn’t even blink!"
"You did that on purpose?" He looked shocked.
Hello. Of course she did. "Yes. I was trying to entice you, for all the good it did me."