Now Is Our Time by Jo Kessel Page A

face her and they stilled, their foreheads touching as the tips of their noses performed a languorous Eskimo kiss.
     
    “Do you know what?” he said, his forehead still glued to hers. 
     
    “What?”
     
    “If it’s possible, I think you’re more beautiful now than you were when I last knew you.”
     
    “Rubbish.”
     
    “It’s not ‘rubbish’,” he mocked her accent, wearing a playful smirk on his face. “It’s the truth. I think thirty-seven must be the perfect age for a woman. You’re coming into your sexual and physical peak.”
     
    He trailed his hands to the hem of her black vest t-shirt and wormed his way underneath, stroking her bare back before teasingly slipping his hands towards her front, tickling the sides of her waist as his fingers continued on a northbound trajectory, lightly grazing her breasts. Claire’s breath hitched.
     
    “Do you have any idea what you do to me? What you’ve always done to me?” Jonah asked.
     
    Claire shook her head, but really she did have a very good idea. And if she could have taken her mind off his travelling fingers she might have found the courage to admit that he made her feel as nobody else had done and how her body ached for him. She floated her hands from his biceps to the back of his neck and pulled his mouth urgently to hers, whimpering as he parted her lips with his tongue, her whole body tingling with desire.
     
    “If we wait a bit longer,” Jonah whispered with their mouths still meshed, “it will be even more sensational.”
     
    Claire was pretty sure he wasn’t talking about the chicken. She nodded in agreement, pulling away with a smile.
     
    “I think we should eat then,” she suggested.
                                      -------------------
     
    Claire had prepared everything that they’d need and placed it on the counter in the kitchen which was adjacent to the conservatory. Two plates, two sets of cutlery (each wrapped in a serviette) a curried pasta salad, a green salad and a jug of home-made vinaigrette. It was still warm enough to eat outside so Jonah helped her carry everything to the wrought-iron table in the garden, to join the bottle of Chardonnay and wine glasses which were already laid there. Claire lit a scented candle to ward off the bugs and then went in to fetch one final platter which she loaded with the crispy chicken and burgers waiting on the barbecue. She’d way over-catered.
     
    “Voila,” she said, once they were both seated at the table. As she said the word ‘voila’ she caught herself doing the same weird jazz-hand gesticulation which so embarrassed her in the viral video. It was obviously a mannerism she didn’t even know she had, like a nervous tick. She must stop doing it!    
     
    Jonah refilled Claire’s glass before topping up his own and holding it aloft to make a toast.
     
    “To you,” he said.
     
    “To happiness,” said Claire.
     
    Happiness: that elusive state of mind which right here, right now, as she moistened her lips with wine, she felt she’d achieved. She felt lighter than she had done for years. She didn’t want the moment or the feeling to end, ever.  Watching Jonah pile his plate and tuck in made her feel that they belonged together. His very presence beside her felt so right and sent a wave of warmth coursing through her bones. 
     
    “You’ve got a lovely home,” he said.
     
    Her previous marital home, a penthouse apartment overlooking Regents Canal, had been much more impressive. Splitting their assets post-divorce, however, had led to the inevitable downsizing. This had been a compromise house. She’d compromised on the size of the garden and the size of every single box room for that matter, but what she had got was a house full of period character, with original wooden floorboards, fireplaces and Edwardian picture rails. Not to mention the conservatory, which she adored. She’d kept the décor simple, offsetting ivory