The Dream Jumper's Promise

Chapter 14

            “I bought a dive shop today. I teach scuba and have a degree in business.” For the first time in her life, she wanted to tell someone that she had an education beyond the knowledge of Maui’s sea life.

            Talk of the ocean led to recipes for cooking. “By any chance, do you have a good recipe for seafood bisque?” he asked.

            She laughed to think how useless she was in the kitchen and told him so.

            “I love to cook.” He rattled off his favorite recipes.

            “You are frighteningly in touch with your feminine side,” she teased.

            “I love to eat.” He said it in a way that made Tina think there was an underlying meaning to that statement.

            He introduced her to his friend Noble, a large Hawaiian man. They’d been friends for 20 years, and when Hank excused himself, Noble moved in, letting it be known that he was available, where Hank was not. Noble was handsome, probably more so than Hank, but there was something about Hank that reached out and grabbed Tina by the throat. Noble’s presence barely made contact. Months later, Hank would tell her that he tried to ignore her that night. “but you were just so damned cute.”

             At an art gallery opening, only days later, Tina sipped a glass of merlot when she saw Hank, his arm around his girlfriend’s sylph-like shoulders. Again Noble tried to engage Tina in conversation. They pondered which paintings were more marketable. But she couldn’t keep her eyes off Hank. Noble was a player, and she had no time for the uncertainty of him when her desperation to have a baby was gnawing at her thirty-two year old body. She wanted a life partner and a family, not a hula dancing playboy.

            Tina found herself invited to the “New Year’s Eve Party of the Year” at a Hollywood producer’s house in Wailea. She’d recently broken up with a boyfriend from Honolulu and needed something to brush away her feelings of inadequacy. This was her social debut, not only after the breakup, but after her recent accident with an exploding tank. The chin scar that was left was healing nicely and could now be covered with makeup.

            Earlier in the day, Pepper had insisted she get out of her wetsuit and make an effort. “Come on Tina. We’re thirty and single. Let’s do the party. We’re on the guest list,” she’d pleaded. Without really trying, Tina looked smashing in a sequined mini dress and stilettos. And from the moment they walked past the bouncer at the door, the two women attracted male attention from every direction.

            Hank stood by an outdoor fountain talking to a group of rock stars and did a double take when he saw her. This time Hank approached her. “I remember you. Tina, right?” His twinkling eyes made her heart flip and she secretly hoped the absence of the girlfriend was significant. After an initial conversation about the paintings in the house, Tina professed she knew nothing about art. “I am a total Crayola girl.”

            Hank took her by the arm. “Let me give you the twenty minute art history crash course,” he said, as they strolled towards the hallway’s collection. At some point she revealed that she owned paintings. “Inherited,” she said. “They were my grandmother’s. I’m not sure if they’re worth anything. It doesn’t matter because I’ll never sell them. Some painter named Hebert. Maybe Jacques or Francois? Francois, I think.”

            “Never heard of him, but perhaps you’d like an appraisal?”

            Tina stared at the sexy man in front of her, sizing up what he’d said and how he said it. “They’re at my house in airtight containers.” She smiled coyly, unsure what direction they were taking and how far they’d go with this.