Know Your Heart: A New Zealand Enemies to Lovers Romance (Far North Series Book 2)

by Tracey Alvarez

Glen grinned—a somewhat evil grin, he imagined—and tossed the two fat steaks onto the barbecue. A hiss of garlic, Worcestershire sauce, and soy sauce marinade steamed into the air, drifting in the light breeze toward Savannah. The foot tapping got faster, and she squirmed on the thin seat cushion. For a fleeting moment he wished she was wriggling on his lap. A thought guaranteed to drive a man to the edge of insanity.

  Thanks, but I’ll pass.

  Savannah’s under-the-breath-muttering was audible even across the expanse of decking and lawn. She dropped the script and swung her long legs to the side of her chair, pouty mouth twisted into a grimace. Behind the over-sized sunglasses, he imagined her gaze hurled poison-tipped darts in his direction. She stood and stalked into the caravan. Moments later, the rattle of pots and pans drifted into his ears, and he turned his face toward the endless expanse of greenery so she wouldn’t see him smile.

  Looked as if they were having a cook off.

  Glen flipped the steaks then cracked open a beer. Sipping the cold brew, he ignored the noises coming from beyond his deck until the caravan’s squeaky axles alerted him to Savannah on the move. He turned his head in time to glimpse her with a salad bowl in one hand and flatware in the other, the long, floaty top thing she’d changed into swirling around her thighs. She fussed over her little outdoor table, setting the knife and fork and bowl just so.

  Heel clicks on decking with a waft of sunscreen announced a visitor. Prickles of anticipation swept down his spine as he faced her with his best bored-lawyer expression fixed in place. Hard to maintain the bored expression when Savannah pre-empted his snarky opener of No, you can’t have a taste of my sausage by saying, “You, are, offensive.”

  Her slitted gaze skipped away from his face and skimmed down his throat to his bare chest. Yeah, he’d stripped off his shirt before coming outside to grill his steaks—so sue him. It was warm out, and being a guy, shirtless was his prerogative. Savannah’s cheeks turning a pretty shade of pink was an additional perk.

  Glen took his time lowering his beer to the barbecue’s side shelf, because being this close to her threw him off guard.

  He needed to get his head in the game, he really did.

  “For a woman who reportedly licked Trent David’s bare chest in Mad about Mitch, don’t you think you’re over-reacting? Just a little?”

  “What?”

  Her brow crinkled, as did her nose. Cute as a baby bunny—except this baby bunny was a carnivore in disguise. A Tasmanian Devil or one of those ferretty things with wicked teeth.

  “Be thankful I’m not like your pal Jakob Carmichael who likes to pose on hotel balconies in his Y-fronts. Now that’s offensive.”

  Her forehead smoothed, eyebrows lifting and almost disappearing into the mussed strands of her hair.

  “He’s not my pal, and I’m not talking about your pale and fish-like skin being an eyesore on this otherwise perfect evening.” She huffed out a sigh he recognized from dealings with his younger sister as meaning you are such a dumbass. “I’m talking about the disgusting stench of slaughtered animals coming from the barbecue.”

  Glen’s spine straightened as if an invisible cattle prod had zapped him in the tailbone. Pale and fish like? His summer tan may’ve faded a bit from working six fourteen-hour days a week without much time for many weekend runs. He’d let the tan barb slide, but the disgusting stench? No way in hell.

  “That’s premium eye fillet steak, lady. Forty-six bucks a kilo.”

  She fisted her hands on her hips, torso tilting forward belligerently. “You’re cooking dead cow on my barbecue.”

  He clacked the tongs under her nose, and she jerked back.

  “Yup. And some dead pig sausages just to round my dinner out.”

  Savannah’s lip curled, and the flush on her cheeks climbed higher. Would be a shame if she stroked out, but it’d certainly solve the problem of his increasingly frustrating landlady.

  “Think I’ll barbecue up a storm every night while the weather’s good.”

  Likely in preparation to tell him to go to hell, Savannah sucked in a breath, causing her amazing breasts to thrust out in his direction. They were nearly but not quite enough to distract him from the black smoke seeping out of the caravan’s door.

  Glen’s heart plummeted into his grumbling stomach. They were surrounded by thousands of acres of bushfire waiting to happen, with the nearest fire station a forty-minute drive away. If Daisy the caravan went up with gas bottles on board…

  Glen dropped the tongs, dodged around Savannah, and sprinted along the deck.

  “Hey—” came her indignant yell, immediately followed by a higher-pitched, “Oh shit!”

  Glen threw himself over the grass and leaped into the caravan. Squinting to see through the smoke, he spotted the blackened causes in a small frying pan on the cooker. He lunged for an oven mitt and shoved his hand inside. The caravan rocked as Savannah entered.

  “Stay out of the way.” He flicked off the gas flame with one hand, using the mitt-covered one to grab the handle.

  After a quick check over his shoulder to ensure he wouldn’t clock Savannah with a red-hot fry pan, Glen spun around and carried the smoking lumps of charcoaled somethings outside and dumped the whole thing, pan and all, upside down on a patch of bare earth behind the caravan. His heart, still thundering like a drum solo on a heavy metal soundtrack, transitioned up from his knotted stomach into his chest.

  A small, wounded sound came from behind him. Savannah, arms wrapped around her middle, stared dejectedly at the still-smoking pan.

  “That was my dinner,” she said.

  Glen tugged off the oven mitt and held it out. “Sausages?”

  “Gluten-free tofu sausages.”

  “No wonder you chose to incinerate them.”

  She snatched the oven mitt from his hand. “It was an accident.”

  “Uh-huh.” Burn the caravan down and play the poor-little-homeless-actress card? He wouldn’t put it past her. “Starting a bushfire is a hell of a way to remove an unwanted tenant from your property. Your tofu sausages could’ve burned Daisy to ashes.”

  She gave a dismissive snort, but her hunched shoulders and down-turned lips told a different story. The bold Savannah Payne was trembling in her high-heeled sandals.

  Tension crawled across his shoulder blades and spread, banding around his chest. He shook off the first deadly symptoms of sympathy and folded his arms. “Guess my dead cow and pig are looking kinda good right now?”

  Her gaze dropped and veered left. “I’m a vegetarian.”

  “Riiiight. So that’s why you were sniffing the air like a starved bloodhound when I tossed those steaks on.”

  “I’ve been a vegetarian since I was a teenager.”

  “You weren’t at Nate’s twenty-first birthday. You probably ate your weight in barbecued meat.” Shit. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

  Her eyes widened. “You were there?”

  Way to go, sounding like a crazy stalker guy. Glen shifted and remained silent. Seemed the safest course, preferable to taking one size-ten foot out of his mouth and jamming in the other.

  Savannah scrunched up her nose and studied him down its length. “There were a lot of people at that party. I don’t remember you.”

  The punch line of his pathetic crush on Savannah Davis, his mate’s beautiful and unobtainable cousin. In a nutshell.

  “No reason why you would.” His lips curved up in what he hoped appeared on his mouth as a casual smile. “I was just one of many guys there for a free feed and a keg of beer.”

  She cocked her head, tucking the pot mitt under one arm. “But you noticed me?”

  That night, ten years ago when he’d first seen her, he’d been one of a large crowd drifting around Nate’s party, balancing a beer on the edge of his disposable plate loaded up with potato salad and cheap cuts of barbecued meat. Nate had introduced Savannah to him and a group of other students gathered around the grill. With a shy smile she’d said “hello”, but
her gaze had skimmed his face and immediately moved on to the guy next to him. While Glen…he’d stood there with blood pounding in his ears, sucker-punched and breathless.

  “Everyone notices you, Savannah. Haven’t you built your career around that?”

  “Yes.” Her voice a terse squeak, she cleared her throat before continuing. “I have.”

  A mini battle took place inside him—gallant knight against pragmatic cynic. As usual, the knight won. “I have some fish in the fridge I could throw on the barbecue if you want.”

  She stood blinking at him, her lush mouth slightly parted, soft and inviting. Then, like storm clouds passing over the sun, her actress mask slipped into place freezing the soft and inviting into cool rejection. “I still have my salad. But thanks.”

  He straightened his shoulders—conversation over. She’d made her feelings about sharing a meal with him perfectly clear.

  “Bon appétit, then.” He gave her and her blackened frying pan a wide berth, heading back to his deck before his dinner charred to a crisp.

  Chapter 4

  Sun, shake, and shade. What more could a girl want?

  Perhaps a dial-a-handy-hunk who’d show up in his tool belt and not much else—since the caravan awning remained lop-sided even after another thirty-minute attempt to fix it after lunch. But at least the striped canvas provided some shade as Sav relaxed in her lounge chair with her meal-replacing-meant-to-taste-like-chocolate-but-didn’t protein shake in one hand and The Script in the other.

  She wriggled her bare toes, admiring her buttercup-yellow polish. She hadn’t seen Glen since last night’s sacrificial burning of her tofu sausages, and this morning, the man had wised up, keeping the blinds to the office tightly closed. Point to her.

  Sav sighed, glancing down at the printed pages. She assumed she’d won another round at 5:30 a.m. with a ‘70s country music medley, yet somehow, she was the one distracted. She was the one waiting to catch a glimpse of him instead of memorizing her damn lines.

  An approaching engine jerked her gaze to the black hood of Nate’s Range Rover coming up the driveway. Sav swung her legs off the lounge chair and leaped up, smoothing down her shorts and silky top. Through the windshield, Nate raised a hand and Lauren, beside him, waved.

  Lauren jumped out of the car, her face creased in a huge grin. “Oh my goodness, Sav—I love it!” She jogged across the grass and hugged Sav, quick and fierce.

  “Aunty Sav!”

  Nate opened the rear door and unhooked Drew from his booster seat. The boy rocketed from the Range Rover like a miniature cannonball and wrapped his arms around her.

  “Daddy said I could look in your caravan! Can I, can I?”

  Tightness gripped her chest as she ruffled the little boy’s dark curls. Hearing Drew call Nate “Daddy” never got old. And being adopted as his unofficial aunty did mushy things to her insides. The boy didn’t seem to mind her occasional awkwardness. As an only child, she had no nieces and nephews to spoil, and her only experience with kids on set were a wailing baby and a prima-donna nine-year-old who threw a tantrum like a spoilt toddler if her favorite brand of organic juice wasn’t available.

  “I’m sure Daisy would love to visit with you. Go ahead and have a look around.”

  “The caravan’s called Daisy?” Nate came up behind Drew. “You didn’t tell me that the other day.”

  “Privileged information,” she said.

  “That’s so cool!” Drew zipped over to the open door where Lauren caught him by his dungaree straps.

  “Gumboots off,” Lauren said.

  “I know.” A theatrical sigh. “You told me before we came over.”

  Drew and Lauren disappeared inside. Nate draped a companionable arm around Sav’s shoulder.

  “Bit of trouble with the awning, little cousin?”

  “Mongrel of a thing. I’d get one end fixed and then the other would jam.”

  “Could’ve asked me or Glen to give you a hand.”

  She hissed out a breath. “Because a girl can’t cope with a stupid awning? I, don’t, think, so.”

  “Like that, huh?” Nate grinned down.

  “You sure know how to pick your friends. Did you rescue him from the local pound because he made puppy eyes?”

  “Guess I’m the stray you’re talking about.” Glen’s deep voice came from right behind her.

  Her heart stuttered—not just from being startled, but by a growing awareness settling low in her belly. She half turned toward him. “Aren’t you meant to be writing?”

  “We’ve got guests.” He shoved a hand into his jeans pocket, the whisper of a smile moving across his mouth.

  “My guests—my family.”

  “Aw, Aunty Sav, can’t we share?” Glen nodded at the two-foot-high concrete gnome keeping Daisy’s back door pinned open. “Love the lawn ornament. Classy.”

  She fluttered her lashes. “He’s your namesake—with you both having solid concrete heads and all.”

  “Aren’t you cute?”

  Sav’s lip curled, a retort on the tip of her tongue. Then she spotted Lauren in Daisy’s doorway, wriggling her eyebrows at Nate, her lips pressed together in suppressed mirth.

  “Now, now,” Lauren said. “Let’s not squabble. Glen, be a sweetheart and give Nate a hand to fix Daisy’s awning, would you?”

  “Yes, sweetheart, help me get the awning sorted before you two start throwing spit balls at each other.” Nate shoulder-checked Glen, who grinned wryly and shoved him back.

  “I can help—”

  “Take a chill pill, diva,” said Glen. “Nate and I have got this.”

  “Diva?” Her cousin’s gaze turned speculative. “We’ve progressed to nicknames now?”

  Glen’s gaze locked with Savannah’s. Her nipples tightened against her silky bra cup. Just a little but enough that she couldn’t deny the chemistry boiling between them.

  Lauren and Drew hopped down from the caravan. Drew spotted Glen and let out a yelp of excitement. The boy raced across the grass to tug on Glen’s hand.

  “Hi, Glen. Can you teach me some more pirate moves?”

  “Have you been practicing?”

  Drew assumed the same position Glen had two nights ago, thrusting his little fist out and lunging forward. “On guard, you scurvy me-hearty!”

  Glen laughed and staggered back, pretending to take a hit to the stomach. “You have been practicing.”

  “I practiced with a stick until Java took it and ran away. He thought we were playing fetch, silly dog.”

  Nate scooped up Drew and hoisted him onto his shoulders. “Do you remember what you were going to ask Glen and Aunty Sav?”

  Drew thumped his gumboot-covered feet against Nate’s chest and grinned over at first Sav, then Glen. “Yep. We’re going fishing this afternoon, and I want you guys to come.”

  Sav glanced at her script, hastily stuffed into the folder when she’d heard Nate’s Range Rover. “Oh, well, I really…”

  At the same instant, Glen said, “Maybe another time…”

  Drew’s smile drooped in the corners until his little Cupid’s bow mouth went completely straight. Sav glanced from Nate to Lauren, back to Drew’s shiny eyes, and then her gaze zipped across to Glen. Aw, balls. Glen could do what he liked, but she couldn’t say no.

  “I’d love to come. I haven’t been fishing for a long time.”

  The boy’s mouth curved.

  Glen sighed and said, “Count me in too, then.”

  “Yay!” Drew said. “This time, I’m going to catch a fish—a really, really big fish.”

  “Maybe even a shark.” Glen chuckled.

  Sav’s belly tightened around a little kernel of heat. The man had a seriously sexy laugh.

  “That would be awesome!” Drew said.

  “We won’t all fit in the Range Rover with the fishing gear.” Lauren glanced between Sav and Glen. “You two could car pool. No point in taking three vehicles.”

  Glen looked at Sav with a raised eyebrow. “Think
you could handle riding shotgun with me.”

  “Do you know how to drive on the beach, city boy?”

  “Attacking his manliness, Sav—that’s harsh.” Nate hooked his thumbs in his belt loops and grinned.

  “I’m sure Glen’s ego can cope.”

  Glen showed her his teeth. “So long as yours can fit in my SUV.”

  “Bazinga.” Nate pulled Drew over his head, flipping him into a summersault before lowering him to the ground.

  Lauren flicked the three of them warning glances and took her son’s hand. “Let’s get the toolbox from the back of the Range Rover for Daddy to fix Daisy’s awning.”

  Lauren and Drew strolled across the grass, and the open adoration in Nate’s gaze made Sav’s heart clench, both in happiness for her cousin but also with a tiny smidgen of envy. No one had ever looked at her like that.

  Once Lauren and Drew were out of earshot, Nate cocked his finger at Glen and then her. “Since you’ve come to this weird stalemate of being neighbors, you could at least try to be civil.”

  Sav jutted out a hip and tilted her chin. They’d only be neighbors temporarily.

  “Fishing will be a good opportunity to blow off some steam,” Nate said. “You’re both wound waaay too tight.”

  Something inside her was coiled like an overwound watch spring, and it cranked a notch tighter when Glen’s gaze dropped to her mouth and back up again.

  “Unlike you, dear cousin, and also my unwanted tenant, I have deadlines to meet—career-changing deadlines—and I don’t have time to blow off steam.”

  The warmth vanished from Glen’s eyes. “And my deadline isn’t important?”

  Sav snuffed a flicker of unease and shrugged. She had no idea if Glen was on a deadline or if he was just one of many people who thought they had a book in them somewhere. He was a lawyer, living in a fancy townhouse in a nice part of the city. He had job security that didn’t rely on whether crow’s feet appeared in an extreme close up. Sorry, but rainbow-farting unicorns just weren’t as urgent as her audition.

  Glen snorted and walked back toward the house. “We’ll head off after I give Nate a hand with your awning.”

  “The civil thing needs work, huh?” Nate said as Glen disappeared inside.