Inconsolable

By Ainslie Paton

Sometimes the only way to forgiveness is through love

Foley has a new boss she doesn't like, a flatmate who's been known to wear odd shoes, and a car that's ready to pack it in.  She hasn't met a guy worth lipstick in forever, and though she planned a life less ordinary, the only thing unique about her is a badly thought through tattoo.

Until Drum.

Drum wasn't always the cliff guy, a homeless man sheltering in a cave tucked above a popular tourist beach. He wanted to get as far away from his previous life as possible.  Now he wakes with the sun, runs on the beach, does odd jobs for cash to buy food, and is at peace.

Until Foley.

It's Foley's job to find Drum a safer place to live, but the only home Drum wants is the one place he can never stay: Foley's heart.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Australia
• Release date: Aug 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9780857992451

Ainslie Paton

Ainslie Paton always wanted to write stories to make people smile, but the need to eat, accumulate books, and have bedclthes to read under was ever present. She sold out, and worked as a flack, a suit, and a creative, ghosting for business leaders, rebel rousers, and politicians, and making words happen for companies, governments, causes, conditions, high-profile CEOs, low-profile celebs, and the occasional misguided royal. She still does that. She also writes for love.

Book preview

1: House Hunting

Nowhere in Foley’s job description did it say lean over a railing on top of a scary cliff to talk a homeless hermit squatter into living somewhere else.

Community relations managers didn’t do spelunking as a rule, nor did they force evictions in the face of pending public outrage.

Foley’s job description said sensible, definitive, measurable things that you could put a key performance indicator against and bank a salary on. It said present the public face of council with integrity and professionalism. It was about recreation, community engagement and the environment. It was parks and beaches, family, historical and cultural events.

It wasn’t sweating and squinting in the February heat haze with her stomach whirling and her palms so slippery the railing might as well have been made of butter while she yodelled off into space.

Hello, are you there?

The midday sun burned her forehead as she tried again. Hello, I’m Foley Barnes. I’m from council. I’d like to talk to you if you’ve got the time.

Got the time. Idiot. He was an unemployed squatter, what could he possibly be doing but deliberately avoiding her. This would be funny if it wasn’t something Gabriella wanted her to fail at.

Foley wiped her hands on her pants, put them back on the railing and leaned a little further over. She couldn’t see the man’s camp site. That’s how he’d managed to live on the cliff face undetected for so long. He was tucked away in a cave that must extend back under the rock ledge, perhaps even beneath the walkway and Marks Park, where she stood.

Of course, now she’d said she was from council he’d probably think he was in trouble and he’d stay hidden away down there, so that was another dumb move.

Hello, you’re not in trouble or anything. I want to introduce myself.

Oh yeah, sure. That was going to work. He’d be sitting down there laughing his homeless head off.

She sighed. Even in this she was Frustrated Foley. Nat was going to love it.

Okay, I’ll come down to you.

There were two ways she could go and they both involved the railing: under or over. That’s why the pants suit and the sensible shoes, instead of a lightweight dress and heels. If she had to be a billy goat on work time, she’d be a practically dressed one.

She clamped her back teeth together and ducked under the metal rail, stepping out on the rock ledge. One of the world’s most famous beaches was spread out in front of her, along with a good deal of the coastline. It was blue on blue where the sky met the sea and it sparkled; blindingly awe-inspiring, spectacular, and though she saw it often, the beauty of it never got old. Now it was especially breathtaking, but for all the worst reasons. From the wrong side of the safety railing it was simply bigger, more ferociously beautiful and potentially deadly.

She took a steadying lungful. She’d wanted a life less ordinary. She could’ve been in her comfortable air-conditioned office, at her ergonomically sound desk, working on the Beach Film Festival or the Winter Wonderland, or she could walk along the coast, a very safe distance from the edge, and check Sereno, the heritage-listed house she was trying to save from greedy agents and developers, but no, here she was, back to the wall, thrill-seeking on a rock ledge.

Nat was going to piss herself laughing.

From here Foley could see the ledge had two tiers. The one she was standing on and another that jutted out beneath. The cave must be between them. The edge and the drop off into the ocean was a good car length away, but it was still the edge to a sheer cliff and no next birthday. Sensible shoes or not, her knees locked.

Hello, are you there?

She bent forward and tried to peer along the ledge and was rewarded with the sight of a blue tarp. But no hermit squatter man. He couldn’t keep avoiding her, and surely he’d be able to hear her, unless he was sleeping. If he was sleeping she should let him be. It wasn’t smart to sneak up on a sleeping hermit on a cliff face. Who knows what he might do? They knew so little about him anyway. But you had to surmise what they knew didn’t suggest model citizen. He was an unemployed, bearded street person, who’d made a permanent camp site on a cliff face.

Hello, Mr Drum. Are you there? My name is Foley and I’d like to visit you.

Was that his surname, Drum? The lifesavers and the park rangers called him that. It was probably a nickname. They all spoke favourably about the man. A good bloke. Maybe some mental health problems, but he didn’t appear to be dangerous and was always ready to help out. There was probably truth in that, given he’d been living in the cave for about a year now and there’d been no reports of trouble.

Mr Drum. If you’re there, I need to talk to you.

And he needed to talk to her like he needed … Hell, he must need a lot of things. A hot shower and a home-cooked meal. A shave, haircut and a job. A proper bed to sleep on and some form of counselling. And walls. The man must need walls, at night, when there was only the moon and the stars to see by and it was windy or cold, or just plain frightening to be living on the edge of the world with nothing to stop you falling off.

A shudder started in her thighs and rippled through her body, leaving a trail of goosebumps. Imagine being here during a storm. It could rip you out of this life and hurl you into the forgotten. No one would even know it had happened, unless a body washed up. Oh God. What if he sleepwalked? What if he was hurt or sick or already dead in his camp site?

Or he really was dangerous and they didn’t know it yet.

Gabriella had suggested she take a ranger or a lifesaver from the beach with her, but no, Foley argued that might scare the man, and they didn’t want that. They wanted this to be a peaceful eviction. Not something the local press would write up. Which was true, but it was also Foley being stubborn about doing it her own way, because two months on she wasn’t over losing the department director job to Gabriella, and was thoroughly infected with an overwhelming desire to stick one up her by being the singularly most competent person on the entire planet.

And for all that bravado, the man, the whole idea of him—which in air-conditioned comfort, within solid walls, was entirely benign, in a we’re more scary than he is, and it’ll be no trouble for me to manage way—was freaking her the fuck out.

The singularly most competent person on the entire planet probably didn’t have rubber knees.

That, and the knowledge she’d have to go down to the lower ledge to find Drum, or go back to the office and admit defeat. Not an option. But neither was moving her legs. Her feet stuck like sea snails to the rock, slimy suckers growing from the soles of her sensible, before you considered rock climbing in them, shoes and sticking like wet on water.

She looked around for anything resembling steps naturally carved in the rock face. It wasn’t that she was scared of heights. She wasn’t besties with them, but she wasn’t normally frightened rigid of them, or spiders, or snakes, or the Doberman in the house next door to her unit block that tried to leap the fence to eat her every time she walked past. Those were decent, solid, ordinary fears, but not her fears.

Mr Drum, are you there?

She should’ve thought to bring a bribe. A sandwich, a coffee, a cash donation. With her bag strapped over her body, she could still do the latter, but was it smart to yell out come and get it, when the getting it meant opening her wallet in front of a quantity unknown, unemployed, homeless man?

On a cliff face.

Oh shit. This was a really dumb idea.

Please, Mr Drum, if you’re there. I’m a little scared about coming down to see you. I know I said I would, and I’ve come under the railing, but, um, I’m not sure how to get down to where you are from here.

Oh bloody excellent. Tell the homeless vagrant you’re on his turf, but spinning out. This is how smart people end up murder victims. They miss out on a promotion, take an unreasonable dislike to the person who gets their dream job and make idiot ego-based decisions about their own safety—because they’re a flaming numbskull.

Okay, I can see a way. I’m coming down to you.

Bad karma to even think the word down, proof of insanity to shout it. Her sensible leather-soled shoes really weren’t at all, in hindsight. No grip. Marvellous. If she sat, she could wiggle her way forward, drop her feet over the edge and push off to jump the rest of the way to the lower ledge. She bent forward, put one hand onto the rough rock and went to her knees. From here it was a matter of flipping over to her bum and butt-walking the rest of the way.

That was a workable plan, except now she was in a crawling position, crawling felt safer than flipping anywhere so she crawled forward and yes, that ripping sound was the left knee of her suit pants. Fantastic. The toes of her shoes would be scuffed as well and she’d be pink with sunburn. All this and she’d achieved zip.

She looked up towards the walkway and safety. The rational, professional thing to do would be to call this little adventure off, and come again another day with better shoes and backup. So what if Gabriella was patronisingly pleasant about it. The woman would probably offer up aloe vera for the sunburn, a sewing kit for Foley’s pants, and a smiley face in her follow-up email, asking passively aggressively if Foley wanted to pass this responsibility on to someone better qualified after her horrible ordeal.

She was not passing this responsibility on. Disliking Gabriella wasn’t irrational, it was healthy. The woman swooped in from nowhere and took Foley’s promotion out from under her because she was a friend of the mayor’s, and now Gabriella very clearly wanted Foley gone.

And Foley wasn’t going anywhere. Which was the metaphysical, and the actual physical, truth. She was in a battle to the death at work, and on her hands and knees on a rock ledge, suicide distance from plummeting to the sea.

Freaking superb.

But pitting herself against Gabriella and not being able to follow through was definitely a career-limiting move. She crawled forward, took hold of the rough stone edge of the ledge and brought her legs around to drop them over and sit. She made a hmmm noise, as though she’d actually achieved something and looked at her watch. It’d taken fifteen minutes to travel sideways maybe two car lengths and sweat was running down her face.

Now she could see the rest of the tarp, a rusty, wrought-iron table, and two chairs, and an old barbeque cooktop. She peered over the ledge and a drop of sweat rolled down her jaw and off her chin to splash on the rock below. The distance between her dangling feet and the second ledge was about the same as stepping up onto a kitchen stool. The ledge she was sitting on would be about chest height.

Mr Drum. I’m almost there. Sorry it’s taken so long. I was checking out the view. I can see why you’d want to live here. Magnificent, isn’t it?

She smacked herself in the head. Lame, so lame. That’d sounded all right in the car on the way here. She pushed off the ledge and there was another tearing sound. She was safely on the lower rock platform but now frozen with a different fear. Her unsexy underwear would be on display. She felt her backside, screwing her head around to look and yes, she’d torn a hole in the bum of her pants. Could be worse. She could be wearing a g-string and there’d be bare white, fleshy, backside flashing. As it was, black undies under black wasn’t so bad and her jacket covered the damage. If she remembered to stand straight and not lean forward she’d be fine. Except she’d have to walk back across the ledge or he’d get an eyeful of Bonds Cottontails.

She patted her face with a tissue. She wasn’t going to think about the trip back to the path. She was going to go flap Mr Drum’s tarp and hopefully take a seat at his table and they’d talk about how it was dangerous for him to continue to live here. She’d tell him council was concerned for his welfare and ready to help him move to more appropriate accommodation, especially before Sculptures on the Coast kicked off, when there’d be thousands of people, including the visiting Danish Royal Family, trouping all over the park and the coastal walkway.

Hello, I’m here.

She walked forward and put her hand to the tarp. The ledge was much wider and deeper than she’d expected. He had to be asleep, or there was one big cave behind the tarp and he still couldn’t hear her.

Hello.

She stepped around the tarp, which was more of a windbreak than anything else, and the cave came into view. Shallower than she’d thought, less sheltered. There was a camp bed and a sleeping bag, a zipped suitcase, an esky, a torch, some kind of lamp, and a pile of books. No rubbish, no discarded crap, no hoarded junk. Not a single empty alcohol bottle or can. It was surprisingly neat, functional and heartbreakingly sad that someone would want this hunk of exposed rock for their home. It was also annoying free of life forms.

Why couldn’t an unemployed hermit squatter be home when you needed him?

2: Sting

The beach was officially closed. The lifeguards had packed it in for the day. Now it belonged to joggers, sweethearts strolling, surfers and locals who’d swum here for years and knew how to read the sea. This was his favourite time of day in summer. The worst of the heat fading, the humidity easing with the setting sun, the sky gone shades of pink or orange, the beach returning to itself after hours of strutting the charm and acting the showplace for visitors from all around the world.

He was one of the many joggers who now pounded the impressive curve of shoreline when he saw them. He knew they’d all been stung. The way they shook their limbs, contorted, folding in on themselves. The child, the worst, screaming in panic. He kicked his jog into a flat run as the father grabbed for a handful of sand.

Hey, he called. Don’t use sand. You need to wash it off.

He got blank looks from the adults and the kid continued to scream. Tourists. Beside them now, he tried again in his halting Japanese. Telling them it was a bluebottle and they needed to wash the tentacles off, not scrub at them, not touch them or they’d be stung again. He squatted down so he was face to face with the kid. She’d been stung across her head and neck, one of her eyes was swelling and the blister of the bluebottle was trapped under the strap of her swimmers.

It hurts, yes. Let me help you.

He looked up, met the mother’s eyes and got a nod that was more a surprised tearful whole body shake than assent, but it would do. He picked the kid up and turned to carry her into the sea.

Everything okay? Oh, bluebottle. Can I help?

Another jogger, a woman. He moved passed her, beckoning the parents. I’ve got it.

After this hot water, not vinegar.

He knew that. Vinegar was for deadly box and Irukandji jellyfish, stopping their tentacles releasing venom. He gave the woman a nod and copped a sting across his arm as the kid squirmed. He carried her back into the sea, the two adults holding on to each other, following.

He showed them how to wash the tentacles off, but got stung himself a couple of times. The little girl never stopped screaming and he didn’t blame her. Bastard bluebottles bit like a whip and stayed with you like an electric current made of shimmering knifepoints.

When the family was tentacle-free, but still reeling from the pain, he led them to the public changing rooms where there was hot water, lucky that the council rangers hadn’t yet locked the facility for the night.

He washed his own stings while the family stood in hot water showers. Then he took his t-shirt off and soaked it in hot water and told the mum to hold it over the child’s face to bring the stinging down.

Twenty minutes of hot water treatment later, they were still scarred in red stripes, but the panic of the pain had passed. Back on the beach they exchanged names more formally and he waved off any hint of obligation. Anyone would’ve helped them, another person almost had. It was nothing. And just random luck he knew enough of their language to be useful.

He left them and continued on his run. The tide was coming in. By morning the beach would be fringed by bluebottle blisters and plenty more people would get stung. The lifesavers would be here to manage it, but he’d come and lend a hand too. Only fair. There was so much to make up for and this was nothing.

If he could, he’d take the tentacles of every bluebottle that washed up, wrap them around his body, and revel in the pain to stop anyone else getting hurt, especially kids.

It would be the right thing. But it was also impossible. He could be stung a million times and not fix all the hurt he’d caused. He could be stung to within an inch of a heart attack from shock and it wouldn’t be enough to make up for what he’d done.

Nothing ever would.

He looked at the angry red welts on his arm and chest. They’d fade to nothing. You’d never know he’d been stung. And that was the problem. Guilt should leave a mark so decent people would know to stay away from you. Instead it soaked through your skin and only stained where you could hide it.

He finished his jog, his stretches and a meditation, and on the way home ran into Scully. A swarm of Irukandji jellyfish would be more welcoming.

Playing the hero, Joker.

He bent to pat Mulder. The best thing about Scully was his fox terrier.

Scully grunted, but that was his default, along with his incongruously cheerful, underfed, dirty Santa Claus look. No one is going to give you a medal.

Don’t need that.

Go back to where you belong, you fuckin’ idiot. Scully walked on, but Mulder gave him a look that said I’d take more pats if you’d care to give them until Scully’s gruff, Mully, sent him off after his master.

At home, he prepared and barbequed a fish he’d caught earlier that day. He had two juicy peaches for dessert and only one was bruised.

It was a fine warm night after a scorcher of a day and he knew he’d find it hard to sleep. He knew he’d dream. The kid’s screaming was still in his ears; the sound of injustice, an undeserved anguish, a bitter tutorial for innocence in the ways of the world.

He’d dream about hopeless shouting, about heads turned and silences that were more upsetting than all the noise. About protocols and practices that were evil, criminal but entirely legal. About letters that came in the mail with nooses and bullets and blades.

It was better to stay awake than go to that place again. He’d worked so hard to leave it behind. Shed everything he’d loved to pay the price. So instead of sleep he read; through the night and into sweltering heat of the apricot dawn. A favourite. A classic. A well-worn friend. Through the injustice and into the clarity of a clean new day.

It was more than he deserved.

And then she came, and she was too.

He was standing in the sun trying to understand how the night could so easily become a host for his terror, smothering him to a crouch, when the day was so fresh and perfect and he could stand tall again. He sipped coffee. He’d need more than the one cup he was allowed today. It was still early but the beach was already waking. The regulars, the locals, taking ownership. He’d go down when the tourists, the daytrippers, arrived and earn his keep.

Sometimes they came under the railing; occasionally his camp was raided, not that there was anything of value to take except his books and his torch. He was on his third torch. The books, old, grubby and torn, they never touched. One time someone wanted to interview him for a film. Women never came. They had more sense. But she came.

He heard her first. Talking to herself, or maybe to God. It was a shock to realise she was talking to him, calling him.

She wore Skins and a t-shirt, runners on her feet. She had a shiny brown ponytail and she was smiling at him. She was the woman from the beach last night—hot water, not vinegar—and she was looking at him as if he knew the secret to an eternally happy life.

3: Unlikely

Foley wasn’t making the same mistake as yesterday. She’d ruined a suit, given herself a case of sunburn that still glowed through makeup, and had to slink back to the office, gaffer tape her pants back together and admit to Gabriella that she’d failed.

Today was going to be different. She staged a pre-work raid. Early enough to catch a hermit squatter at his camp site before he went wherever a hermit squatter went during the day. She also wore clothing and footwear more suitable for scrambling over rocks. Plus she had an offering. Today she wasn’t going to be Frustrated Foley; she was going to be a winner.

She saw him the moment she ducked under the railing and stepped out on the first ledge. He stood one level down, right on the edge of the cliff face, looking out towards the beach. He was sipping from a mug, casual as Sunday morning, with death at his toes. She gasped aloud, then slapped her hand over her mouth because what if she startled him and he fell. But he turned her way anyhow and surprise made her shout through her hand again.

It was the bluebottle man. The man from last night who’d helped out those tourists.

She held her hand up in greeting. Good morning. How are you?

Was he visiting Mr Drum too? Foley had heard him speaking what sounded like Japanese. Hermit squatter men didn’t speak difficult foreign languages, did they? Maybe she needed a third bacon and egg roll.

Can I come down? Is there a special way to do it? I brought breakfast. Hell, she was prattling, but she’d only caught a glimpse of him last night and he was covered in screaming kid. He wasn’t covered in much at all now. A faded pair of board shorts and an expression of disbelief. He was tall, built, deeply tanned, bearded and heavily muscled.

Are you Mr Drum, uh, is he here? I’m Foley. I feel like a dope. I brought bacon and egg rolls.

He stared at her as if she was cloud that might burn off in the sunlight and he was waiting for her to disappear. And she stared back. If he was Mr Drum, he was one sexy homeless guy. Neither the rangers, nor the lifeguards who knew of him, had bothered to mention that.

She raised her hand with the cardboard tray. I brought coffee too.

He moved quickly then, as if coffee was abracadabra, disappearing under the top ledge. Before she could think about taking another step away from the railing he was standing on the level with her.

He was barefoot, his hair was long, grown out of a once decent cut, curling about his ears and neck and sun-bleached in a paint chart of variable caramels, sands and honeys. His beard and mo were neat, clipped, not hipster, 1800s, Ned Kelly.

He had the palest eyes, grey as if the sun had stolen their depth and faded them to half-strength. She took a step towards him and he lowered them, embarrassed maybe. She didn’t want to make him feel that way. He was down on his luck. She wanted to help him.

Hi, I’m Foley. She should’ve said where she was from, but those lowered eyes cut. She didn’t know who this man was, but he was big and beautiful and reticent, and she’d done nothing to threaten him except arrive.

His chin came up. He held out a hand to shake. Hello Foley. I’m Drum. You don’t need to come down, but if you want to I’ll help you. There’s an easy way when you know it.

He spoke softly, politely. Correctly, like a man who’d had a good education, a man who didn’t need to live in a squat on a cliff top. She would feed him first, talk to him, and then help him.

She put out her hand and they shook, as though they were both wearing suits, in a meeting room with walls and air conditioning, bad filter coffee and uncomfortable chairs. She watched their joined hands. His was big and calloused, dry, it swallowed hers up, but there was no power there. No I’m the boss of you inappropriate squeezing, no hand on top rolling to demonstrate dominance. It was handshake of equals.

Except she had electricity in her life and he was incapable of meeting her eyes.

You got stung. His chest and one arm were traced with thick red lines. Badly.

He released her hand and shrugged one shoulder.

They could talk here, on the top ledge, but he looked so uncomfortable, his neck bent so his whole face was tilted down and his hair falling across his forehead. If they stayed where they were, anyone using the path could see and hear them. She’d come dressed for the climb.

I’d like to see where you live.

His head shot up and he frowned. He thought she was making fun of him.

I’d like to see your camp. He didn’t need to know she’d seen it yesterday. Here. she held the cardboard tray out. This is for you.

He looked at the tray but made no move to take it.

There’s a bacon and egg roll and a cappuccino, though the froth has probably melted by now.

He shook his head. Thank you, but I’ve already eaten.

Oh. He was an unemployed homeless guy who knew Japanese, shook hands, spoke like a gentleman, and had already had breakfast. Or he was lying? She knew he’d been drinking something. Please take the coffee at least.

His hand flexed, but he didn’t otherwise move.

I brought two of everything and I’ve not eaten.

He pointed. See that darker rock with the indentation.

She followed his hand. He was going to show her the easy way to his camp. He stepped across to where he pointed and she followed.

From here it’s up and across to go down.

He reached for the tray and she gave it to him, then followed him up two giant rocky steps and down a curving slope, before three small graduated ledges that worked like steps cut in the rock appeared, an easy way to conquer the varying heights of the rock shelves.

This approach was less intuitive and less obtrusive than the full frontal assault she’d tried yesterday. If he’d been home then, he’d have heard her coming, and given most people would take the straightforward approach, she’d bet he’d never been surprised by an unwanted visitor. It meant something that he’d shown her the right path to his front door.

His camp was as neat this morning as it had been yesterday. The suitcase zipped, the sleeping bag rolled. There was a pile of books by the bed, beaten-up classics. A Hemmingway, a Kerouac. She could see the spines of To Kill a Mocking Bird and The Count of Monte Cristo. If he’d made breakfast, there was no evidence of it, other than the mug, left on the iron table.

He gestured to one of the chairs. Please take a seat. He put the tray on the table and walked to the bed, his broad, tanned back, slim hips and athlete’s calves accessible for her viewing pleasure. He picked up a t-shirt and put it on and she sat before he caught her staring, reached for a coffee cup and lifted the lid. The froth had disappeared but that distinctive coffee aroma was joyous. She watched him, standing a little away from the table, looking out to the horizon.

I can’t drink two of these. Her second lie of the morning, but this one was spoken aloud. I brought it for you.

He stepped up to the table and picked up the cup. Thank you.

She plucked up one of the white sandwich bags. I can’t eat two rolls either.

He sipped the coffee and looked away.

The handshake, the t-shirt, the please take a seat. She took a gamble on his good manners. It feels rude to eat in front of you.

He pulled out the other chair and sat.

She smiled and held out a sandwich bag. Eat my dust, Gabriella. He’d willingly brought her into his camp; if he accepted her food, she was one step closer to having him accept her help.

He took the bag, but put it down on the table and made no attempt to open it. Her own mouth was watering from the smell of the bacon.

Why are you here, Foley?

She’d made it this far on false pretences and while he looked perfectly calm and sane, he could still throw her over the cliff; looking at him, he could easily do that, and unlike yesterday, no one other than Nat knew she was here now. The Gabriella in her head stepped sideways, avoiding the dust plume and smiling prettily.

He didn’t smell of alcohol. He wasn’t twitchy. Would a dangerous man stop to help people when he might get hurt himself? Nothing about Drum alerted her to peril. I’m from council. She watched him carefully, expecting his hospitality to be withdrawn, if not some outright hostility to surface.

His eyes were on the table. He was very still. You were on the beach last night. He looked up briefly and turned his head away. Hot water, not vinegar.

She gagged on a bit of bread roll, coughing, and his head lifted. How had he managed to notice her? He had a screaming kid in his arms.

Are you all right?

She coughed again and took a sip of coffee. I’m fine. Yes, that was me on the beach.

You tried to help.

You didn’t need any. You had it under control.

He gave a tight nod then hovered a flattened hand over the sandwich bag. So this is on an expense claim?

She blinked at him in surprise. Good manners, language skills, neat homemaker, saver of stung tourists, he knew about claiming work expenses, and he looked liked he could model for a surfing magazine. He was not your