Free Paradise for a Sinner by Lynn Shurr

T-shirt that exposed an inch of flab between its hem and his belt buckle. A woman with a small child on her hip stood in line clad in a tank top, pajama bottoms, and slippers. Maybe the fat man and the slovenly mother wondered how a scrawny woman like her held the attention of a handsome hunk like Adam Malala.
    “Nearly done?” Adam asked as she picked a cherry tomato from her salad with her fingers and bit into it. “We have an umu to build.”
    A few pulpy seeds from the tomato squirted out and landed on her emerald top. Great, try to be ladylike and a little sexy and a girl ended up with stains on her chest that drew the eye to her small breasts. But not Adam’s eyes. Strange, he’d seemed interested in her only yesterday. He polished off the fries, and she pushed the rest of her salad aside. “I’m ready to make an oven.”
    With Adam behind the wheel, they returned to Lorena Ranch in record time terrorizing only a few moms in minivans along the way. He drove the truck across the sparse grass under the oaks straight to the side of Joe’s barbecue pavilion. A quick trip to the barn and back yielded a shovel. Winnie sat on the open tailgate of the truck and dangled her long legs as Adam attacked the dirt packed down by lots of traffic for crawfish boils and weenie roasts in the screened building. She felt very much like a teenager watching her boyfriend show off in a feat of strength as the big Samoan cut through the hard earth and a tangled net of roots to carve out a shallow pit. His arm muscles bunched beneath bronze skin as he strained in the effort.
    She liked the feeling. Her parents had frowned on high school dating except for one awkward night at the prom. Study hard. Be a credit to your race. Don’t even think about getting pregnant before you turn eighteen. No wonder she fell prey to a user like Doug Hopper when she had no experience at all to sift the phonies from the genuine men.
    Whether genuine or not, Adam Malala was all man. The first week in February, albeit in Louisiana, and he’d worked up a sweat. He stripped off the knit shirt clinging to his pecs and tossed it into the truck bed. Winnie restrained herself from picking up the shirt and burying her face to inhale the pheromones.
    “I thought a South Sea Islander would have tattoos,” she said almost to herself as she eyed his smooth, hairless chest.
    Adam glanced up as he leveled the pit. “I have tattoos. If I wore my lava-lava, you would notice, but I think Mrs. Joe might not like it if I took off my jeans. Someday I will show you. Someday soon.” The broad smile, the twinkle in the depths of his dark brown eyes returned.
    He had to be interested in her. He just had to be. Her eyes strayed to a dark band inked into his brown skin just above his belt buckle. “I’d like that.” Saliva gathered in her mouth, and she swallowed hard.
    “We both would. Hand me the stones.”
    Winnie got into the truck bed and tossed the lava rocks to him one by one. He placed each carefully until satisfied with the results. Dusting off his hands, Adam said, “All we need now is a bunch of firewood, a couple of pigs, and lots of banana leaves.”
    “Good thing we had a mild winter, and the banana plants didn’t die back.” Winnie took his hand and hopped down from the back of the truck.
    “There are many good things about this winter, especially meeting a beautiful woman. I could use a second lunch. You?”
    Adam held her hand longer than necessary and seemed reluctant to let it go. She wouldn’t have minded if they’d remained united all the way back to the house, but with a final squeeze, he released her fingers. “Corazon probably has something for us.”
    That assumption proved wrong. They entered into kitchen chaos. Nothing simmered except Corazon’s temper as she berated her employers. Not saying a word, Brinsley stood at martial attention near the hallway door.
    “What, you no like my cooking anymore? My cousins don’t clean good enough?