Page 55

Not wanting to distract him, I let him do his thing, and it’s not long before I feel the helicopter lift. Seconds later, we’re in the air heading across the Midnight Club, west toward the setting sun.
Orson dons a pair of sunglasses and hands me another pair, and I slide them on to guard against the sun’s bright glare.
“How’s your head?” I ask.
He just shrugs.
I watch him as he observes the dials and screens in front of him, secretly impressed by his competence and confidence. He has nice forearms, well-muscled and tanned with a sprinkling of brown hairs, and his hands are big and strong, with neat nails. I can remember them sliding beneath my skirt onto my bare butt, the heat from them searing into my cool skin.
Swallowing hard, I drag my gaze from him and instead look out at the view.
He was right; it turns out to be a spectacular flight. I’ve crossed to the city many times on the ferry and the helicopter takes a similar path, but it’s very different looking down. We pass Motuihe Island with its beautiful beaches, the end of which looks like a whale’s fluke from above, and then Browns Island with its preserved volcano in the center. The sun is about an hour from setting, and the sky is a fantasticpalette of pinks and oranges, reflected in the Pacific Ocean, which looks like strips of iron, copper, gold, and bronze. I spot yachts and fishing boats, seagulls and albatrosses and gulls, and once even a pod of dolphins swimming alongside the ferry from the mainland, which I point out with excitement, making him smile.
He follows the northern coast of the city, past Hobson Bay, then gradually takes us lower, heading, I presume, for Mechanics Bay. He talks into his microphone, asking for clearance to land, then sets us down on top of a big yellow circle with a cross in the middle, in front of the glass heliport.
He switches everything off and the rotor blades slow to a stop, and then we remove our headphones.
“That was wonderful,” I say breathlessly when he comes around to help me down.
“I’m glad you enjoyed it.” He turns his attention to a guy who comes over.
“Evening, Mr. Cavendish,” the guy says. “Will you be wanting her again tonight?”
“No,” Orson says, but before my brain can process the implications of that, he adds, “We’ll take the ferry back to Waiheke later.”
“Okay, sir, I’ll put her to bed.”
We walk across the tarmac and into the building. Orson sees me looking at him, and says, “What?”
“For a moment I thought you were assuming I’d stay the night with you.”
That earns me a frown. “I’d never assume that. Give me some credit.” He takes me out the other side of the building, then pulls out his phone. “Hold on, I’ll call an Uber.”
I watch him bring up the app and organize a car. When he’s done, he looks at me and lifts an eyebrow. “You still look baffled.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
“Because if you went on Tinder you’d be able to get laid every night of the week.”
“Meaningless sex doesn’t do a lot for me.”
“Really?”
“That surprises you?”
“I thought all men liked meaningless sex.”
“Wow, they really paint a good picture of us at the commune, don’t they?” He tips his head to the side. “I guess working at a Women’s Refuge is going to give you a skewed view of the opposite sex.”
I look away, at the cars shooting past, and the shops and businesses, the buildings painted orange by the late sun. “It’s nothing to do with the retreat.”
“What do you mean?”
I shrug. “My father was never very complimentary about young men.”
“Oh, I see. You got the ‘all guys are only after one thing’ speech?”