I tucked my blouse into my pants and began putting on my boots. “You’re very … driven, aren’t you?”

“You are first discovering this?”

I laughed and shook my head.

“What?” he asked.

“I know I keep harping on this, but”—I laughed again—“you are so like my father—just thinner and darker.”

“Don’t they say that girls are attracted to their fathers, as boys are attracted to their mothers?” He sat down next to me. “Now, my mother died when I was young. She is not so clear in my mind. So I can create whatever fiction I want.”

“What’s your stepmother like?”

He thought a moment. “Tall … strong … brown eyes … pale skin.”

“Sounds familiar,” I said. “Red hair?”

He shook his head no. “Brown. Then after ten of us, it turned gray. Batya was tough as a mother, but fair-minded. No sense of humor, but I could make her laugh.” He eyed me intently. “I like when you laugh. It’s good music.”

I looked down and patted his knee.

He raised my face and kissed me gently. Did it a second time, but with more passion. His hands stroked my arms, lust in those incredible jeweled eyes. “Still tired?”

“We’re dressed.”

“An easy thing to change if the spirit is willing.”

I bit my lower lip. “If you’re convincing, I could be persuaded.”

He raised his eyebrows. “I like challenges. Especially this kind.”

“Go for it, Yaakov.”

He grinned and started by unbuttoning my blouse and unhooking my bra from the front. Then he unzipped my pants but kept them on. He laid me down on the mattress; then beginning at my forehead, he gently kissed a path downward, his lips traveling onto the tip of my nose, onto my mouth, between my breasts, and over my stomach and navel until he reached the top of my pubis. He lowered the waistband of my panties, his tongue dipping into my thatch of red hair. Softly, he bit the skin. “How do I do?”

My fingers dived into his kinky black hair as I moved his mouth lower. “Very convincing.” I sucked in my breath when he hit the right spot. “Oh Lord, yes, I am definitely persuaded.”

19

We eventually made it to dinner, then hit a ten o’clock movie. The cinema was followed by drinks at a small jazz club, talking and talking until the wee hours of the morning. We had been together for over twelve hours, and though I was zapped, I politely declined Koby’s offer to bunk down at his place. I didn’t have to work until the afternoon, but I wanted to wake up in my own bed, on my own time. He didn’t look insulted. On the contrary, I felt he needed breathing room as well.

We were quiet on the way home, tapped out on ideas, and happy to let the stereo provide the background noise. We were sailing on Sunset back into Silver Lake, his car finally missing a light and gliding to a stop. There were no other vehicles about us, no cross-traffic in sight.