the heat less hellish than the daytime hours when we slept, the perfect time for amore.
Ethan was inside on the phone and I on the terrace cutting roses, laying them in a large wicker basket, singing a canzone di Napoli, when a pebble hit the terrace. Ethan had schooled me to call him at the slightest disturbance in the night. I tried to ascertain where the pebble-tossing intruder was, when a boy’s voice called out from the shadows, “Mee-ya?”
One of the rats from the beach, I figured. Backing slowly toward the house, I assumed a fighting stance as Ethan had taught, brandishing my shears as a weapon. “Ethan is inside. I’ll scream. He’ll be on you like a bat out of hell.”
A slight figure vaulted lightly onto the balustrade. Moonlight fell on a face as delicately white as the Dresden statue Selena kept on the mantelpiece when I was a girl. Huge star sapphire eyes caught the light. I froze, thrilled and shaken by this serendipitous pleasure.
It wasn’t an arrow that did it. That sort of rude assault was never his way. Eros, that diminutive god of love, roused this drowsy Psyche abruptly from her slumber with a small, sad smile.
His feet touched the pavement noiselessly as he leapt down beside me. This was no rat. His honey-colored curls were well tended and he was dressed in a fine, blue shirt, open at the neck with spotless buff trousers. He was also somewhat older in mortal years, small, but fully-grown. No, this celestial apparition wasn’t cast-off, but someone’s beloved possession.
“I had to see you just once,” he whispered. “I’ll go round front— no trouble.”
He was everything Philip had said, and then some. I gasped, “Kurt?”
He nodded solemnly. “A message for Ethan. Brovik doesn’t trust the telephone.”
Questions flooded my brain faster than this silent creature could have possibly answered them. “Where is he? Is he coming?”
He shook his head, slipping a small beautifully bound book out from his pocket and into my hand. Our fingers brushed and lingered. “Goethe, a decent translation, but you should really read it in German someday. Faust. You know it?” I shook my head. The bittersweet smile lit up his eyes. “Write me what you think.”
“I will.” I don’t know what I’d imagined but somehow he was everything I could, perfection in miniature, his ethereal elegance worlds different than Ethan’s animal sensuality, making my master seem somehow overdone.
He started, withdrawing his hand. “He’s coming.”
I hid the book in my basket as Ethan came out onto the terrace. He took one look at Kurt and scowled. “What in hell’s name are you doing here? Mia, you should have called!”
Kurt spoke up to defend me, “I just arrived.”
“Hand it over and clear out.”
Kurt reached into his pocket, pulling out a folded envelope. Ethan snatched it away, flashing him a look of utter contempt. “Now get out Peter Pan, fly, fly away— ”
Kurt scowled back. “I’m not finished. You’re to bring Mia and join us on the yacht.”
“I work for him. I don’t have to socialize with him.”
“He’s willing to overlook your past insults if Mia is presented properly,” Kurt replied, calmly.
“You may both go to the devil. He won’t get his hands on her. Tell him, he needn’t send his toy to keep tabs on us. Let him come if he has something to convey to me.” Ethan shoved the envelope into his breast pocket and gave Kurt a once over. “Disgusting— he should’ve done you a favor and left you to rot in that pit.”
Kurt was still young enough for this kind of remark to visibly wound him. I couldn’t stand it. “Ethan that’s cruel!”
“Don’t waste womanly sympathy on this thing, my dear.”
Kurt winced, but he couldn’t say anything in retaliation. He nodded to me. “I’m sorry we won’t get to know one another, Mia.”
“You’ll never get within an inch of her.”
Kurt wasn’t all that cowed by Ethan. He looked him dead in the eye. “I’ll be sure to tell Brovik how cordially I was received here.”
Ethan put his arm around my waist. “Must be hell to look around and know none of this can ever be yours.”
Kurt’s eyes furtively met mine.
Ethan laughed. “Is that what he’s promised? He promised me the world. It’s a sham little man, a dirty, lowdown trick.” I pulled away from Ethan, disgusted by this behavior. “Ah, but you’ve realized that already. Go on now, shoo! Crawl back to your master— on your knees— the way he likes it.”