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He reached the top floor before he knew it. The lift doors opened to a cacophony of noise as glaziers, construction workers and plasterers chatted, banged, drilled, swore and gave the place the kind of raw energy that usually invigorated him.
It meant progress. Honest work, honestly executed by honest men. Sweat of the brow stuff. He was proud of the healed blisters on his own hands for that exact reason.
But as he hit the spot on the roofless penthouse floor, where the night before Rosalind had sat upon a crate, looking out over his city, and with her mix of ruthless candour and subtle beauty had managed to smooth over his perpetual dissatisfaction, the noise faded away.
He leant a foot against the edge of the roof and looked out over the horizon where streaks of cloud were just beginning to herald the rising of the sun.
He held out his hand at arm’s length and a span above the horizon; just where she’d said it would be, there it was: Venus. A glowing crescent in the pale-grey sky.
His hand dropped. Somewhere out there, beyond the borders of the noisy, thriving city he loved, she would be sitting somewhere quiet looking at the exact same point in the sky.
And while she was thinking trajectories, gas clouds and expanding universes, he was thinking about her. About seeing her again tonight. It would be their third date in as many nights, which was more time than he’d spent with one woman in as long as he could remember. More time than he ever let himself see Meg or Dylan.
A thread of guilt snuck beneath his unusually unguarded defences. He’d kept those he loved most at the greatest distance so as to save them from being tainted with the hurtful knowledge about his father’s weak character he always carried with him. But something Rosalind had said made him wonder: was keeping them at bay hurting them as much?
If he really wanted to see them he knew where they’d be that weekend, all in the one place at the one time, which was usually an impossible feat.
He ran a hand over his mouth. If he went to his father’s birthday party, he pretty much knew what would happen. Brendan would swagger, Dylan would win money on a bet he had made somewhere about the date of his return home and Meg would squeal, leap into his arms, then try to set him up with a girlfriend. And his mother would probably cry.
His stomach clenched on his mother’s behalf. The clench turned to acid as he thought of how shabbily she’d been treated by the one person who was meant to care for her. The idea of putting on a show at a celebration of that man’s years on earth turned to dust in his throat.
He needed to put it out of his mind for good. He checked his watch. Twelve hours to go before he was due to pick Rosalind up at the planetarium. Not soon enough.
‘Cam?’
He turned to find Hamish standing in the lift, holding the door open.
‘Anything else you want to go over before I do head off?’
Cameron had to think, the usually crisp, clear list in his head squished at the edges, having been pushed aside by other pressing thoughts. ‘If there is, I’ll call you.’
Hamish nodded and stepped back into the lift, where he held the door open. ‘Unless, of course, you need a different kind of advice. I have some moves the likes of which you could not even imagine.’
‘I’ve got it covered,’ Cameron said, his voice gruff.
Hamish nodded. ‘Good to know.’
Cameron stretched his arms over his head and shook out the looseness that invaded his limbs, and the wooliness that infiltrated his head whenever Rosalind Harper was on his mind.
He did have it covered. He just needed to find some perspective. His business was his life. His family his cross to bear. Rosalind Harper was a delightful but temporary distraction. Tonight he would make sure those boundaries were clearly redefined.
By the time he joined Hamish in the lift, he was clearheaded and ready to act like the head of a multi-million-dollar business.
When after several seconds the lift had yet to move, he realised he’d forgotten to press the button. He reached out and jabbed it so hard his finger hurt.
As the lift doors closed, Hamish said, ‘If you’re this scrambled, I’m thinking redhead.’
Rosalind’s face swam before Cameron’s eyes—her wide eyes unguarded, her smile heartfelt, her kiss like heaven on earth.
‘Hair like caramel,’ he said. ‘Skin like cream, legs that go on for ever.’
Hamish swore softly and Cameron grinned.
On the other side of the city, Rosie peeled her eye away from the planetarium’s telescope then stared unseeingly at her open laptop.
The cursor blinked hopefully on a blank screen. Her daily notes about Venus’s position, colour, opacity, flares, shadows, and any other nuances her dedicated study was meant to bring forth, were lost within the muddy mire of her mind.
