Just One Rose

Pope, on the other hand, was trying quickly not to rise. The air smelled of tantalizing perfume and of well prepared food, and her dress, to say the least, was painted on by a professional. It was all so unexpected; first a plainly colored slightly chipping wooden door, then something out of a dream of placement and sophistication.

"Wow..." was all he could muster under the assault from the entrance before him, at least that's what he thought he said. Her snowsuit did her no justice, and he might have been wrong about her age.

"What?" Nadia was looking everywhere, left, up, she spun around, then back, then left again. Before he could explain she had taken a step out of the door and looked behind him as if something was hidden, then off to the right of the front of her cottage.

Nadia moved like a cartoon character, Pope was sure of it. He always did enjoy cartoons, and her personality was infectious.

"No, I mean, You look great, and.. wow." He tried to lay out the scene before him with his hands, or at least to illustrate it. Nadia looked up to her side, from hanging out of the door, to stare at him and gleam, feeling silly and thinking: "Calm down, you're getting too excited, and solitude is no excuse."

"Oh, thank you. Come in, come in, let me take your coat. Is this for me?"

"Yeah, I um, I don't know anything about wine, but this is good stuff." He held the bottle of scotch while she hung his coat.

"Well, welcome to my abode," waving her hand behind her head as if it were an unimportant detail, "as humble as it may be, make yourself comfy." She snagged the bottle from his hands and sashayed to a tune towards the kitchen, humming and grinning devilishly to herself.

Pope was in the same clean sneakers, miscolored to the plain white button shirt and black slacks - with which he rocked a cuff and a crease. When Nadia nearly made it to the kitchen, he noticed the tattoo between her shoulders just above the low back of the dress and too high to be a stamp. It was a small black number eight.

"That really is a killer dress." Her hair, up in a pony tail with her bangs tucked behind her ears, bounced and floated, her earrings and necklace were diamonds - he could see them from across the room - and the furniture, as sparse as it was, was designer.

"Think so?"

"Absolutely."

"Thanks," Nadia twirled a show, near a pirouette, "I've been looking for an excuse to wear it for quite some time."

"Glad I could help." Ecstatic would have been a better description, he strained to keep his eyes off her caramel skin from a lifetime of sun.

The rug that could have been a knock-off was probably real and she walked on it as if it were nothing. The room was very warm, fire in it's place surrounded by brass accents, and Nadia wore no shoes. "Dinner will be a bit, I started late, I-think."

Pope stopped on the bar side of the open kitchen counter that served as a wall. Nadia had pulled out two clean delicate glasses to pour him and herself a drink, throwing her head back and laughing at his bare feet.

"When in Rome, I guess?" He felt kind of silly but decided to roll with it since the carpet felt like walking on kitten stuffed angels. This was a woman of wealth and taste, her car and tattoo made little sense in his simple mind. Neither did the ring on her toe.

"Hardly," she spoke in a kindly cynical way, handing him a shortly poured glass of amber goodness. "I took a glance at your house, on the water is an understatement. It's so cute, so cute. How long have you lived there?"

"Almost six years now."

"Really? Plus a business? You're not that old-"

"-I'm old enough," Pope was glancing sideways at her from the corner of his eye, attention pulled away from her decor, slight smile touching his lips. "It was my grandparents fishing cabin, and a hobby I had that paid off as a career. I finally got everything to where I want it, calm and steady and comfortable... Easy."

"Well done," She was leaning on her elbows on the counter, enough to make her ass stick above her lower back and her cleavage strain against the material of the dress, all of it daring Pope to look down at the exposed skin past the openings in search debauchery.

The arch and angles of her form were mathematically correct, so to call her lithe would have been accurate if it weren't for her thick and ample assets slightly bigger than they should be for the equation. Nadia was built to hold attention; Pope had to look around the room just to think.

He would have thought she shouldn't be here, less than a few acres from his own front door, had she not been here for months already. In point of fact, he was thinking that he got here late.

"Thank you, this was kind of my goal point, I really don't know what I'm going to do from here, or what else I might want, but the possibilities, as I see them, are limitless."

"Amen." The word escaped from her compulsively, his mindset infatuated her, simple and visionary.

"Think so?" He asked. Nadia nodded in reply to which Pope shrugged his shoulders. "I'm young yet, and I like the quiet out here." He was holding something back again, but she had figured him out. He was a sly tease, and he was listening to every word she said while trying not to laugh at his own jokes.

"Well there's always the ladies to waste your time on..." Nadia had a smirk: it was obvious, practiced, tactless. She rose to rest one hand on the edge of the counter, laying all of her weight on it, dropping a shoulder and holding the glass to her lips, pausing and testing the distance to it with her tongue, but only for a moment before sipping. Her posture could have been drawn by a modernist.

"Yes, yes there is." He stared her straight in the eyes, so hazel that they almost seemed green, not taking her bait, mentally daring her to say something. "So what about you? This," he pointed around the room, "is..." He didn't finish, looking at her and formulating a thought proved to be too much.

Nadia sighed, she was just getting interested in his late evening stubble and wondering how he kept his hair that way without products as well as how he was able to master cutting his own hair.

"Might as well," she huffed herself up to the proper feeling. "My ex-husband bought this place in some kind of time-share thingy and then bought the whole of it as some kind of a tax write off thingy and then I got it in the divorce and it just so happens to be closer to my daughter's college than LA was." She then took a breath. "He's never actually been here, I don't think anyone has been here in a long time considering the state of the place when I arrived, I didn't even know he had it."

"Oh, is that all... You did a nice job, at least."

"Thanks," her mood relaxed back, mentioning the ex alone did it, Pope took a mental note. "Still, painting and cleaning isn't so hard to do, come spring it'll be more, I've never had to garden. I've never used a lawnmower either."

Pope couldn't help but watch mystified, Nadia seemed to him to be excited by the idea of self reliance and chores.

"This is all a first for me, living alone. I've been a bit pampered, but, you have to grow up sometime, right? I sure did not realize how much paperwork is involved with living alone."

"Gets worse every year."

"Can't wait." They smiled in tandem, he almost thought she said something else, but decided to look around the open rooms, from his vantage, some more. The painting were intriguing, soft, horrifically simple, and strangely fitting. The art matched the furniture, the furniture matched the walls, the walls matched the fire, and the fire matched the carpet.

"So... LA, huh? Nice name drop." The room did have the look of a Television or magazine depiction of the perfect getaway cottage, but it felt different, like home, not just a visual.

"Thanks, compared to the city this is the Boondocks as they say, but it's nice to have my life turned down." Pope smiled at that, he may even have gotten the reference.

"So... Divorced? Elephant in the room..." Pope didn't want to ask the question, but he had to for his own posterity, to get it over with.

"Aren't we all these days?"

Pope sat quiet for a moment studying her lowered eyes. "I have no response to that."

"Oh-it's-fine," and she batted a hand at him, "I don't think a man in your position would. I was married twenty years, then two years ago he traded me in. He was younger than our daughter."

"He?"

"Yeah... Long time coming."

"You're not that old-" He regretted the words before they were finished their utterance, but it all seemed to confuse him.

She rescued him, though, before he could properly regret the phrasing: "-I'm old enough." She winked, she was letting him off the hook and not at all being a woman about it, "Besides, I'm young yet, and the possibilities are limitless, right?"

Pope held his glass up for a toast, Nadia obliged.

"Your daughter, how old is she?"

"Why? Are-you interested?" Nadia was overcome, she was getting hot, and she hadn't expected the flirts to happen with so much flow.

"I'd say curious." He had already found the picture on the fridge that she was pointing to, he assumed it was Nadia's slightly younger sister, friend, or cousin. It would be a crime to choose one over the other.

"Her name is Felicia. She's twenty-one, three years into her degree. She's a good girl." After a quiet thought she went on: "Are these winters here always this bad? I went skiing a few times but this..."

"Truth?"

"Sure, why not," Nadia shrugged her shoulders, playing along.

"This isn't that bad. Gets worse."

"Ugh," was her response, and she acted out the sound in accompaniment.

"But..." He raised a finger, "...the summers make it worth it. I've lived here a long time, born and bred. I grew up on the other side of the township, by the shopping plaza and outlets. You just need a hobby to keep you busy when you're stuck inside."

"Like what?" She was baiting him again, but didn't let him answer in the friskiest possible way: Nadia changed the subject and swapped hands on the counter at the same time, gender equally alone dictated that he should be as excited by her as she was by him. "So you know the area well?"

Pope went temporarily agape, she was too fast, his mind went right to the naughty bits with the words and skin reveal of her new arrangement, some kind of miracle allowed him conversationally recover: "Sure sure. I'm no cartographer, but this is my kind of place. Rolling expanses versus houses and developments on the other side. The view of the river valley, here, off the hill," Pope pointed at the hill, in the direction of his house, past the road, through the small section of trees that hid her driveway and the view, and through the wall of the cottage, then brought his gaze back, "is the best."

Pope's eye caught a desk in the corner soon after, folders stacked to one side of a monitor. "So you work at home too, eh?" He pointed to the desk with his glassed hand, somehow not sloshing the liquid in deft travel.

"Yup, I am a draft editor, I used to be senior editor at my publisher, but after the divorce, I wanted out of town. I took all of his money so I don't need to do it, but it's nice to stay busy even if it can't keep me sane."

"So then that hubbub this morning?"

"...was just because I was stuck in the house. First deadline I almost missed in ten years. I didn't even know they made so many kinds of shovels, let alone ones for snow."

As engaging as the turn in the conversation had become, the 'ding' from behind pulled her away, "Work work work work," she said sarcastically, bobbing her head in quirky tune. Pope did always like vivacious, it made him feel alive.

"Want some help?"

"Sure, why not? Chopping or mashing?"

"Mashing."

"Good answer, going for the knife first would have told me too much." Nadia had almost forgotten how to flirt, Pope was easy.

"That's what I figured, but I can just grab it later when you aren't looking."

Nadia, with all of her intuition, couldn't tell if he was joking, at least not right away, not until the shifty eyes and smirk as he came around the counter.

"Well that's ok, I'm not taking my eyes off of you... plus your fingerprints are everywhere." Her chest lifted with her humor, and with her movement through the space, offering to help might have been a bad idea.

The no pressure air and increasing proximity in the cramped kitchen were making the weeks of solace, at least to Nadia, worth it. He was making her happy and he felt good, which only served to amplify the situations at hand. She had to know.

"Really, how old are you." Nadia went all serious.

"Thirty-six." He continued mashing tubers with ease, and he had rolled up his sleeves. His forearms were natural, solid, and his muscles danced with the tedious job. There would be no lumps here; he said nothing else.

"Don't you want to know how old I am?" She watched in silence, paused in her chopping as he tossed her words around his mind.

"Do you want me to ask? Does it matter?" He caught her off guard this round, Nadia temporarily speechless. She was going to say something, what exactly she did not know, but he beat her to it.

"How old are you?" He was serious, furrowed brow and all.

"None of your business young man, and that's a rude question to ask a lady." She was pointing the knife at him and twisting it in the air. Pope laughed so hard he snorted.

"...and a lady you surely are," he almost whispered the words. "By the way, beautiful, we don't have a CSI out here in the Boonies, and I can always wipe the place clean before I leave." Nadia blushed at the comments, murder jokes aside, the emotion of the flattery came faster than she could brace for.

It wasn't until her skin went patchy rouge that Pope noticed the soft and catchy blues music in the background. It sounded like Taj, and he'd been there for a half of a hour.

***

As small as the cottage was, they ate side by side at the split counter top. The layout was simple enough, cathedral ceiling living room, balcony bedroom and bath, kitchen and office below: not a book let alone a bookcase in sight.

When he asked about that, the simple reply was: "I don't read."

They had eaten their fill, done the dishes side by side, and chattered in conversation endlessly; more and more often Nadia moved to touch Pope here or there with comments and reactions.

Pope, out of character, even followed her lead for a quick spontaneous dance with soapy hands, breaking free with an expert ability just before he was about to uncontrollably kiss her, leaving Nadia slightly disappointed. Back at the sink he repeated "You just met this woman" in his head, but never missed a beat on the outward.

The progression of conversation brought them across from each other in the small living room, opposing love seats with a table in-between. A matching chair was to Pope's left, the fireplace to Nadia's.

She had just turned up the music ever so slightly with a slim remote, the only thing on the table, bringing along a third glass of scotch for each before sitting down. The first two glasses were short poured, sip-able.

It was only when he noticed how the art on the walls had changed in light of the fire that Pope realized the lights had been dimmed.

The glasses she brought this time around were refilled for drinking, not neat. Pope at least knew it wasn't the booze that made her flirt and that turned her on, though after this glass it would be questionable.

Throughout dinner, while doing the dishes, and as the evening progressed, Nadia had begun to break free from her dress, the zipper had fallen slightly down, exposing the dimples on her back; a shoulder strap had also fallen to the crease in her elbow, the other strap, fighting the weight of her mammary, and not to be left out, was on it's way down as well. At no point did she attempt to fix the dress, and the bottom of it, once mid-thigh, already short, had risen close to the danger zone with her seating.

The casual nature of the way it disheveled, combined with her apparent indifference of it, oozed sexuality. Pope, obviously out of his league, decided playing for the minors was for chumps. Women like this were in movies or in print, and she wanted him to be here. It appeared to be time to move up ranks in an all-star debut.

Pope summoned the willpower he wished he had more of to keep his view on hers, and he desperately wanted to leer and ogle this woman. The dress was satin black, her panties were cotton, white, thong cut, and pointed right at him. She sat on her legs on her opposing couch, both arms stretched across the back of it; one holding the edge, the other dangling the glass from a hand.

The room had gotten unusually warm though the fire simmered evenly where it had been all along. Nadia couldn't help but be impressed. He had managed to keep his composure despite her years of trophy wife training. Enough years around a man that didn't want her let her see just how much this one did.

Pope was on the verge of squirming, yet still sipping scotch slowly and studying her gaze to a palpable tension. He, even as a rookie, could play, too.

"Wanna go cards out?"

"You want to play cards?" Nadia made a frumpy face, as if disappointed.

Pope smiled at that, "Cards, out, go cards out."

"No I heard you, I just don't understand."

"Oh, I'm sorry,"

Nadia rolled her eyes to the word. "Don't be."

"Well, yes or no first. I'm going to do it anyway, I just want to see what you think."

"About what?" Nadia was giddy, confused, and squirming. Her bottom was peeking from her dress, her legs were all out now, and Pope still wasn't looking at anything but her pupils.

"Cards out."

"Which is what?!"

"I think you are the finest looking woman I have seen in my life, and I find you fascinating." He slowly sipped scotch after the words, her eyes caught on the movement of his closed lips, his tongue obviously rolling the liquid for a moment, her jaw hanging down in stupefaction.

Not that it had, and not that it would, but this could go badly. Nadia thought it quickly through. He lived far enough away, that if this went all wrong, it could be fixed.

They sat eyes locked for a minute or two of musical silence, his words hanging. She studied him, he looked calm, he was smiling, and appeared comfortable and, like her, was halfway into the scotch glass, but he could obviously pop at any moment.

He had left it to her; her call: They were both adults despite an age gap.

"Yes. Cards out. Sounds fun."

Pope sort of puckered his lips and nodded his head, as if impressed by her.

"Well then, your turn."

"Are there rules?or-something-like-that, I mean, just say something flattering?" Nadia was beyond anxious, somehow he was making her squirm more, and she was already wet from anticipation alone. She was going to sleep with this man, tonight, because she had zero reason not to, and suddenly she couldn't remember foreplay or sexy talk.

"If only. Has to be the truth, no limits. Be bold. Might as well do it now? This is the only date like this I've ever had."

"This is a date?" Nadia licked her lips.

"Absolutely, I feel like I've done something right."

"Explain."

"I know what I want. Every other date I've ever had has built up to this one."

"Which is...?" She knew. He knew she knew. He took a last sip of the scotch, setting the halfway full glass onto the table., then sat up straight and square and cross legged on his opposing couch.

"My turn?" Nadia pointed to her chest using her empty hand, the second shoulder strap falling down to join the other.

Pope nodded.

"Well, it's been a long time since I was around a man, selfless and gentle and sweet like you are. I know we just met, but do you want to see more?" She was offering her body to him with a wave of a hand, posing on the couch.