She shut her eyes, not wanting to be caught staring. No more sparring on an empty stomach, she told herself. This weird, light-headed sensation had to be low blood sugar. That, and feeling a mite off-balance from being right up in intimate space with the man, after four years of being walled off from that sort of human contact.
She couldn’t resist a third glance, to find him looking at her again, unspoken question in his gaze as Godiva finished telling him about how Bird (who had been cut free by Mikhail) had become the world’s expert on croaking in various ways.
Then Jen made herself step forward to do the polite thing and introduce herself.
Only, what came out was . . . “Hi. Thanks for sparring with me—not that I asked you, that is, it happened so suddenly, which I’m not complaining about, it’s just that it’s been a while—the sparring, I mean, and working on cement is not optimal, at least for martial arts training—which is funny when you think about it because you train to defend yourself, but if some bad guy comes at you, you can’t hold up your hand and say, ooops, wrong type of ground, bad for the feet, we’ll have to take this to wood, or better, durable vinyl, ha, ha . . .”
Jen listened in growing horror as the cascade of blather fell out of her mouth, when she had only meant to say I’m Jen Carlsen. She felt like someone had frozen her into a statue except for the crazy she was now spouting in a way she hadn’t since high school.
Making a superhuman effort, she mustered every iota of inner strength to stem the tide—and to her horror, out came her old mental catchphrase, “ . . . so what I was getting to was, rubber chicken!”
Everybody stilled.
The world stilled.
Somewhere in Western India, a fly buzzed on a wall, and she was sure that everybody on five continents at least could hear it in the sudden silence.
Then Nikos cleared his throat.
“I beg your pardon, but did you . . .” he began carefully.
Before the horrible words could come out again, Jen stiffened her spine, stared at her shoes, and made a desperate effort. “Soooo, what I meant to say was, I’m Jen Carlsen.”
She couldn’t prevent a quick glance, fully expecting to see him jetting out of there at Mach 3.
But he smiled. That was all. Smiled, a real smile that shot another jolt of sunlight through her veins.
Oh yes, it was definitely way too long since she had sparred. With a man, she thought hazily. Though finishing a good workout with any of her old partners had never left her with quite this much sheer . . . euphoria.
“I am honored to meet you, Jen Carlsen,” he said.
She took in his long, well-made hands, which were bare except for an old-fashioned ring with a glittering red stone that he wore on one pinky. She tried to recover the shreds of her rusty social skills to prove that she was not actually one step away from the nice people in white coats chasing her with a butterfly net. “So . . . where did you study martial arts?” Yes! That was normal! Right? Right? See, she could do normal!
“It was part of my education at home,” he said.
She gulped in air again—who had stolen all the air here at the edge of the Pacific Ocean? He really was tall, taller even than Mikhail, with the splendid build you’d expect of a martial artist, and stop staring.
“Ah, that’s Vasilikos Alogo, an island in the Adriatic Sea.” He paused there.
She wasn’t sure if he wanted her to respond, but she didn’t dare lest she geyser inanities again, and anyway, she had to eat something before this dizziness turned into something embarrassing. Rubber chicken rubber chicken rubber chicken.
“Sounds wonderful,” she said, edging away. Rubber chicken. “I’m going to . . .” She shut her teeth with a click before she could start spouting a thousand page bulletin about her daily breakfast routine, and moved firmly away.
She really had forgotten how to be social!
She walked into the bakery and stopped before a display without seeing any of the delicacies freshly put out. Instead she found herself staring at Nikos Demitros’s reflection in the glass of the display case.
Come on, Jen, she told herself, shutting her eyes. This is high school behavior. You’re a widow of fifty-five. And you’ve sparred all your life. A terrific bout with someone at your level—possibly even higher—is nothing new. Even if it came out of nowhere.
“ . . . Jen?”
Jen blinked at the familiar voice, and turned to see Doris next to her, eyes owl-round. Next to her, Bird, eyes even rounder. “Jen, are you okay?”
Jen forced a laugh. “I’m fine. Great.”
“Okay, if you say so,” Bird said sweetly, but Jen almost saw the question marks whirling around her head like some Disney cartoon.
At that moment Godiva ranged up next to them, giving Jen the Hairy Eyeball from Planet X-Ray Vision. “Did you really say . . . rubber chicken?”