Love in the Vineyard (Tavonesi #7)(13)

She hugged her elbows close to her chest. “I love plants, everything about them. Their beauty. Tenacity. Fragility. They speak my language.”

He raised a brow, barely visible above his black mask. “Then we have more in common than loving to dance.”

“I didn’t say I loved to dance,” she said, glad that it was dark and he couldn’t see the heat creep into her cheeks.

“You didn’t have to.”

If she’d known how intimate dancing with him would feel, would she have agreed to dance? Already she felt that she’d stepped into a world with signs and signals she couldn’t read. With sensations that tumbled her thoughts and teased at her carefully held boundaries. But perhaps she was like a prisoner kept too long in a dark cell. She longed for color. For song and dance and laughter. To surrender, if only for a moment.

If only there wouldn’t be consequences.

But there were. There always would be.

“Tasha, I’d like to take you somewhere. Somewhere special to me. I think you’d love this place I have in mind.”

She froze in place. Her breath caught, and she must’ve stiffened, for he stepped away from her as if to give her breathing room. As if to make her feel safe.

“Not now. I mean on a date. To the Asian Botanical Gardens.” He tilted his head and his eyes glittered in the glow shed by hundreds of white lights strung in the nearby trees. “But perhaps you’ve already visited?”

She’d love to visit a botanical garden, Asian, American or any kind. She hadn’t known there was such a place nearby. But she wasn’t ready to open herself to all that an outing with him would likely entail. Not yet. Maybe never would be if the trauma counselor she’d met with before Tyler’s birth was right. And it wasn’t just that she wasn’t ready. She would never be in the league that this man played in. She shouldn’t even be here with him now. He was in his element. She certainly wasn’t.

“I’m not dating right now,” she said, marshaling her voice and willing it not to hitch with the tension building in her chest. “I’m taking a break.”

Right. A six-year break. Ten, if she were to be honest. The guy she’d dated three times six years ago didn’t really count.

Behind the mask, Dumas’s eyes narrowed.

“Shall we wager? Red, you agree to go on a date with me. Black, no date. I prefer roulette unless you prefer dice?”

He couldn’t know the terror his easy offer of a bet unleashed in her.

“No.” She said the word louder than she’d intended, and several of the people around them looked up. “I mean, thank you, but no,” she said softly. “I don’t gamble.”

Not anymore. She’d never wager on anything, not ever again.

A series of chimes rang out from inside the tent.

“It’s almost time for the unmasking,” he said. “Let’s go in. I’ve a keen interest in the auction that will follow.”

“I have to go.”

“But it’s ten minutes to midnight. At least stay for the unmasking.”

“I prefer my anonymity,” she said honestly.

“Oddly, I’m enjoying mine as well. We could go on an anonymous date. To the botanical gardens—they’re close by in Kenwood. We can let the plants do the talking.”

Another set of chimes rang out from the tent.

“At least give me your number so I can call you.”

“I don’t have a pen.”

“I do.” He pulled an expensive pen from his pocket.

“No paper,” she said, as if that would protect her. Oddly enough, she wanted to give him her number. But the thought of trying to write down the numbers chilled her blood.

“Who needs paper?” He rolled up the lace cuff of his costume and flattened his palm. Then he grinned. “Better yet…” He pulled out his phone, swiped at it and then tapped in a code. Then he held it out to her.

She waved her hand, signaling for him to type in the number.

Slowly she repeated the carefully memorized numbers. She was never certain if it was forty-seven or seventy-four, but she took a guess. She’d bought the disposable cellphone at the drugstore and intended to use it only in case of an emergency involving Tyler. Just repeating her own phone number was a sort of roulette, a daily game that was neither welcome nor pleasant.

The chimes sounded again.

“Five minutes. You sure you can’t stay?”

She was already surveying the shortest route to her car.

“No, but thank you. For the dance. The dances. For everything.”

At that, she turned and fled down the lighted path to the parking area. Glancing over her shoulder, she was relieved he didn’t follow. Maybe he was a gentleman, maybe he wasn’t. One thing was certain, he swam in waters she’d never belong in and through currents she’d never master.

If he called, she wouldn’t see him.

But she’d have her memories of the evening and that would be enough. It had to be.





Natasha braced her hands against the little counter that served as breakfast bar, dining table and desk in the room she and Tyler shared at Inspire. And she stared at the health insurance forms one more time. The words began to spin into the lacy web that within seconds would congeal into a black mass and slide down the page.