AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Koro fires up the barbecue, and Aroha chops some of the mussels and mixes them with a batter to make fritters. I don’t eat seafood, but the wonderful smell of cooked food still makes my stomach rumble. I offer to help, but Kuia and her daughters wave me away, so I sit and chat with Mack, Jamie, Emma, and some of their cousins until dinner’s ready. It’s not long before the table is loaded with heaps of steaming fish, mussel fritters, orange kumara or sweet potato that’s been baked in foil, vegetable kebabs, barbecued corn on the cob, and several large salads.
When she discovers that I’m also vegetarian, Kuia cuts open the baked kumara and mashes the inside with butter and cheese, then takes the grilled vegetables off the skewers and piles them on top, adds a barbecued corn on the cob, a couple of large mushrooms that have been stuffed with a breadcrumb and Parmesan mixture and then grilled, and two slices of homemade cheesy bread smothered in butter.
I eat until I can’t eat any more, feeling a lot better once I have some food in my stomach. Emma plies me with wine, and by the time the sky begins to darken, I feel content and chilled.
Someone lights citronella candles all around the deck, and one of Mack’s cousins produces a guitar and proceeds to strum some carols and Christmas songs that everyone sings to.
There’s a swing seat just in front of the house, and Mack and I end up on that, with Jamie and Emma sitting opposite us, Gus at our feet, and a few others of our own age scattered around. I curl up next to Mack, and look up at him to see him staring off into the distance, lost in thought.
“Are you calculating Pi to a thousand decimal places or something?” I ask, and Emma chuckles.
He brings his gaze back to me and lowers his mouth to my ear. “No. Just thinking about a plan of action.”
“Oh?”
“For tonight.”
Ooh, he means when we get to the hotel. A shiver runs down my spine. How exciting.
I’m just about to ask for more details when his younger cousins bound up and try to persuade him to get up and boogie with them. He insists, “You know I don’t dance.”
“You danced with me,” I point out, and the girls’ eyes widen.
“If you danced with your girlfriend, you can dance with us,” one of them insists.
But Kuia shoos them away, saying, “Stop bothering him. He’s having a well-earned rest,” and they sigh and go off to play on the sand with Gus.
It leaves me with a little buzz in my stomach, though. Am I his girlfriend? He didn’t argue.
The sky darkens, and everyone grows merry as wine and beer and whiskey flows. Someone lights up a joint, which doesn’t surprise me as marijuana grows in abundance all over the Northland. When it gets to Mack, he takes it but passes it to me.
“You’re not smoking?” I ask, shaking my head, not wanting to if he isn’t.
“Nah.” He passes it to someone else. “It makes me fuzzy.”
“Alcohol doesn’t?” After having a few beers, he brought out a bottle of whiskey that must have been rare and expensive, judging by the oohs and aahs from the guys. One of the cousins is pouring it out now.
“Alcohol speeds me up.” Sure enough, his foot is tapping, and his knee is bouncing rapidly. He’s radiating energy. I’m surprised he’s not glowing. He meets my gaze, and it’s like I’ve stuck a fork in an electric socket, sending a delicious shock all the way through me. He’s thinking about having sex again. With me. Ooh.
“Here you go,” the guy says, coming up and handing Mack a tumbler of the amber liquid, and me another glass of wine. It’s my third, or is it my fourth? I feel very merry and relaxed and excited too about going back to the hotel with him.
“Are you watching the All Blacks at the weekend?” Jamie asks Mack.
“The Lions match in London? Yeah, probably.” Mack’s pulled on a T-shirt to combat the evening chill, and he’s sitting now with his legs stretched out, rocking us a little with his bare feet. He has a swig of his whiskey.
“They were talking about that rear tackle the Aussie prop made,” Jamie continues. “They said it was a… um…” He clicks his fingers, trying to remember the word.
“Reach around?” I suggest.
Mack coughs into his whiskey, Emma giggles, and the others burst out laughing.
“Sorry.” I press my fingers to my lips. “Did I say that out loud?”
Mack wipes his mouth on the back of his hand and gives me a wry look. “Don’t do that.”
“I said sorry,” I say cheekily.
His eyelids drop to half-mast, and then he slides a hand into my hair to hold my head and kisses me. I blush as everyone cheers.
