Lagoon of Dreams

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

We went to a coffeehouse off campus, and I secured a table and kept watch over our briefcases while Dr. Avila procured two coffees. He came to our table, offering me the coffee that was light with four sugars. I wondered how he knew my preference.

He placed his hat on the chair between us, and I admired the white felt fedora with its pinch-front teardrop-shaped crown and the multi-colored feather in its band. I had no desire to wear hats just yet, but Father had one similar, although in a dark brown and without the feather.

Dr. Avila raised his cup to his lips. His dark eyes gleamed as he sampled the brew, but then he grimaced. “Ah, my young friend, someday you must come to Rio as my guest, and you will experience real café.”

I hid my smile behind the rim of my cup and sipped my coffee. I had no problem with its taste. As long as it had caffeine—a good deal of caffeine—any brand of coffee was fine with me. I studied the fragrant liquid in my cup, hesitant to let him see the desire that swept through me in spite of how not my type he was. It had been a long five weeks, after all.

“I’d like that very much, señor.”

“Senhor,” he corrected. “Brazil is a Portuguese-speaking nation.”

“Of course. I beg your pardon. Senhor.” That was a gauche error. I began to trace random patterns on the tabletop. “About what did you wish to speak with me, Dr. Avila?”

“Please, call me Carlos. Your father, he disapproves of this trail of broken hearts you leave behind wherever you go.”

“What?” My head shot up, and I felt ice cold. What was he talking about?

The doctor gazed at me with warm, sultry eyes but continued as if I hadn’t interrupted him. “He wishes me to persuade you to change your ways.”

“But I was told…” I narrowed my eyes at him. “How do you know my father?”

“His foundation affords funding for my expeditions from time to time.”

The foundation was the division of Knight, Inc. that provided donations to charities for the most part, but on occasion did sponsor scientific research. I knew because I’d be heading out on one such expedition shortly.

“Let me make sure I have this clear. Knight, Inc. has supplied the funding. You didn’t come requesting it.”

“There’s never any need. My reputation is well-known, as are my discoveries, and many companies are gratified to have it known they back my expeditions.”

I blinked in confusion. Why had Father told me one thing while Dr. Avila was telling me another?

“David?”

I blinked again. “So my father is paying you to lecture me?”

“Hardly that.”

“Indeed?” The smile I tossed him was slightly bitter. “At any rate, that’s an old conversation between my father and me. He wishes me to give him grandchildren at some point, you see.”

“This is the hope of all parents.”

“All?”

He gave a wry smile. “Most,” he conceded.

“It will never happen. Did my father by chance tell you those broken hearts I’ve left behind all belong to the male of the species? That I have no desire to bed a woman?” I kept my voice low. I could be arrested for my preferences, or at the worst, killed.

“To get a child, it is not necessary to love its mother,” he remarked meditatively.

“This is true, but it is necessary to want its mother, at least enough to achieve an erection.” I shrugged. “For me, that is impossible.”

“Ah.”

“And why did he choose you for this task, senhor?” Father would never permit such intimate family skeletons to be revealed to an outsider.

“I have a little experience in these matters myself. Although I prefer to take men to my bed, I have a number of children in Rio and elsewhere.”

“Are you saying you’re married?” I frowned at him. I had the reputation of loving and leaving them, of never sleeping with anyone more than once, but I drew the line at taking a married man to my bed.

“No longer. I’m a widower, you see. But one does not have to be the one in order to have the other.”

“It would for me.”

He shook his head. “I’m simply saying it can be done.” He spoke as if I were a child.

“No.” I stood abruptly, almost tipping over my chair, and took a couple of dollar bills from my wallet to toss on the table. Of course coffee didn’t cost that much, but I always tipped well. “I told you, that is not an option for me. Never.”

Perhaps he saw how the knowledge of never fathering a child ate at my secret soul. Perhaps he was aware of how the weight of my father’s disapproval was like acid on my emotions. Perhaps…

Perhaps, nothing. It was unimportant. I turned to leave, but he seized my wrist, pulling me to an equally sudden halt. I tugged fruitlessly, then stilled as he tucked the money into my pocket, running his fingertips over the material covering my groin. It was a tantalizing sensation.

“I have completed the commission your father set out for me.”

Perhaps, but it didn’t explain why my father had thrown me in the doctor’s orbit. I waited to hear what else Dr. Avila had to say.

“You will do as you will, being true to yourself.” He turned over my hand and caressed the thin skin of my wrist with his fingertips, and for a second I couldn’t catch my breath as my pulse rocketed out of control. “Now I may speak for myself. Am I being presumptuous in thinking I might persuade you to consider taking an old man such as myself to your bed?”

In the normal course of events, I’d date the man for a few weeks or a month before I’d permit something like that, but there was no time. “Oh.” The sound was whisper-soft, so that only he could hear it, and I dropped back into my seat. “You are not an old man, senhor. And truthfully, I’d like nothing better.” I smiled, lowered my lashes, then raised them slowly. “But then you’d fall in love with me, and when I couldn’t love you back you would fail me.”

“Quite the c**k of the walk, aren’t you, young David?”

“That does sound conceited. Pardon me, senhor.” I rose once more to take my leave of the suave Brazilian, but his next words shocked me to immobility.

“I promise you, if I am so foolish as to fall in love with you, I will not hold you responsible.”

Of course he would; they all did. He continued before I could say as much.

“You overlook one simple fact, my dear young man. I am merely a guest speaker—my lecture is not graded. Hmm. Two facts. You are not auditing that class and won’t be graded on it.”

How was he aware I wasn’t auditing the class? I tilted my head and observed him thoughtfully. “This is true. It’s also true you could mention this to my professors who aren’t visiting lecturers, and that would affect my grades.”

“Ah, David. I give you my word I wouldn’t do something so ungentlemanly.”

In spite of how different he was from my “usual” type, I found I was curious enough to want Carlos Avila, if only for an hour or so, so perhaps I would take him at his word. After all, I never denied myself a body I wanted.

“Very well, senhor. Your place or mine?”

His teeth flashed in a blinding grin. “Perhaps you know of a place, caro. It would not be wise for me to be seen with such a winsome young man in my rooms on campus.”

I knew of a little guest house a couple of towns over, and I inclined my head. It was imperative for both of us to be discreet.

I rose and picked up my briefcase. “If you’ll come with me?”

“Oh, yes, David. And you will come with me.”

I’d taken a step toward the door, and I almost stumbled at his words. I looked back at him over my shoulder, and he grinned.

He was quite the c**k of the walk himself. It would be refreshing to while away the afternoon with a partner who knew what he was about. And judging by his self-confidence and swaggering stride, Dr. Avila could be that partner.

We left the coffeehouse and walked toward the campus parking lot.

“Do you have transportation?” I asked as I unlocked my Corvette, opened the driver’s side door, and slid my briefcase behind the front seat.

“I do.”

“In that case…” I gave him concise directions to Terry’s Guest House and the most languorous smile in my repertoire. “I’ll meet you there.”