Page 47 of Ride the Wave

I’m fine.

‘Anyway,’ I continue brightly, swirling my wine around its glass, ‘in answer to your question, I have a great support network too. The shape of it is… evolving currently, but that’s okay.’

He nods slowly. ‘How do you feel about the house?’

‘Mum moving? I think it’s great! That house is full of old memories. She deserves a new space that she can make her own. Dad does too. In fact, I’m hoping that Mum might take the opportunity to go travelling like she’s always wanted to. She married young and didn’t get much of a chance to see the world. She keeps making excuses, though. Maybe selling the house will give her the push she needs. New adventures for both of them.’

I take a drink and when I turn to look at him again, his expression takes me by surprise. It’s not awash with sympathy or anything as excruciating as that, but it’s thoughtful and considered, as though he knows something I don’t. It’s both disconcerting and comforting at the same time. Almost as if he cares.

‘When my parents broke up, I was young and very upset about it,’ he says calmly, his eyes remaining fixed on me. ‘They should never have been together – I think they thought that opposites attract and everything, but in the end, it was a disaster. But it’s still a big change for a kid and I relied heavily on surfing to help me deal with it. I could forget about everything when I was surfing. But one thing that hit me hard was leaving my childhood house. It was only a house, so it shouldn’t have mattered, but it felt like… it was the final thing, you know? Like it was real. The house was gone. So was the family I’d known.’

I watch him as he lifts his drink to his lips, tips his head back and swallows, before lowering his glass.

‘Change is never easy, even if it’s for the better. Even if you’re in your thirties,’ he continues matter-of-factly, glancing out at the other revellers as we remain amongst the few not dancing now. ‘Sometimes being a “grown-up”’ – he forms quotation marks with his fingers – ‘about it makes it heavier and harder. You expect more from yourself. You put a face on it.’ He sighs heavily. ‘I know how that feels. It’s… lonely.’

I swallow the lump forming in my throat.

He turns to look back at me. I feel nervous under his intense gaze, a swarm of butterflies fluttering about my stomach, heat rising up my neck.

Leo’s eyes are searching mine. I have to break away. Ihaveto. This isn’t… right. I’m not meant to get close to my interviewees like this. I never get personal.

Luckily, my rescue comes in the form of Diogo, the deep-sea-fishing man.

‘Iris!’ he bellows, suddenly next to me, swaying unsteadily and stumbling between me and Leo, thankfully splintering whatever it was between us that was not meant to be forming. ‘You have to come dance!’

I don’t want to dance. I definitely don’t want to dance with Diogo, who is pissed.

But I giggle at his silliness, letting him take my hands in his and drag me away, offering Leo an apologetic smile as I’m pulled into the crowd. When I build up the courage to glance back at him, he’s not there anymore. I can’t see him anywhere. He must have left.

I’m relieved and devastated all at once.

Fuck.

13

Something has shifted between me and Leo.

I’ve had to interview people before who intimidate me or make me work hard to get what I need from them, but there’s something about this guy that means whenever I’m around him, I feel…

…nervous.

Ever since the party, things have been different. It may just be coming from me – maybe he doesn’t feel different at all – but I’ve noticed that in the two interviews I’ve conducted with him since then, I’ve been more fidgety and distracted.

Like a fucking meerkat.

Suddenly it’s harder to focus on what I’m supposed to be asking him next and instead, I’m thinking about how best to get those crinkles round his mouth to form again, the ones that appear when he laughs, or how it might feel to run my fingers through his hair, or how my stomach seems to tie itself in knots when he holds my eye contact too long. I think about how nice it was to talk to him at the party, how he listened and seemed to really care.

Christ. He’s making me lose my head a bit. And I never lose my head.

There’s no reason why this should be happening. Sure, he’s unbelievably hot with those deep-brown eyes, his chiselled jaw and billowy bottom lip… but I’ve been in the presence of good-looking men before – my job is to pretty much constantly be in the presence ofathletes, for goodness sake – and, I admit it, I’ve been attracted to one or two of them before. With that much muscle on display, it’s hard not to be. I may be a professional, but I’m also human. But none of them have made me feel so… self-aware.

I think it’s his eyes. I blame the long, dark eyelashes. They make his eyes too intense. Tooprying. It feels like he’s trying to work me out. And that’s not fair, because this is about me trying to work him out. You know, for the feature.

Not that I’m having that much success there. If I was under any impression that our white-flag-waving conversation at the party might mean he would open up to me more during the interviews, I was very much mistaken. If anything he’s tenser. Warier.

Even more closed off than when we first met.

When he agreed to see me for the next interview the day after the party, I was almostexcited. A barrier had been broken between us; mutual respect had formed. I’d let him have a glimpse of what was going on with me so surely he was going to be completely at ease in my company and tell me all his secrets.

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