All About Sage (A City of Sails Romance Book 2)

by Hill, Joanne

  Mrs Parker crossed her arms defensively and Ethan raised his eyebrows at Sage.

  She shrugged. She had no idea what this Mr Parker was like, but as with Ethan, she was becoming more and more curious by the hour.

  Suddenly, Harry moaned, “Mum, I feel sick.”

  Sage fumbled around in her bag but there was nothing there. She turned around to look into the back at Harry. “Do you want us to pull over as soon as we get off the motorway?”

  Harry’s face had paled. “I think I can make it. How far?”

  “Two and a half miles to the house,” Mrs Parker said. She produced a plastic bag and reached her arm across the back. “Take this. Puke in it if you need to, but watch for holes.”

  Ethan’s foot suddenly pressed harder on the gas, and Sage gripped the door handle.

  “Hang in there, Harry,” he said as he changed lanes, and sped up the off ramp towards Takapuna. “Puke if you’ve got to, but if you can possibly hold on, we’re almost there.”

  The windows suddenly went down as air blasted in the back.

  “I’m cold,” James complained.

  “Then as soon as we get back,” Ethan said, “I’ll make you hot chocolate.” He slowed down, checking the rear-view mirror frequently, Sage noticed.

  “With marshmallows?” Eric said.

  Ethan looked panicked.

  “I doubt Robyn’s got any,” Sage said. “We could stop—”

  “Covered,” Mrs Parker said. “Clearly we North Shore people are more organized than you Aucklanders.”

  Harry made it home, and made it to the closest toilet where she threw up. Then, leaning on Ethan, she staggered up the stairs to the guest room, where she collapsed into bed. Sage sat beside her.

  “That’s some funky virus.” Ethan stood looking out the window over the harbour. His hands were in the pockets of his jeans, pulled tight around his hips.

  Sage looked away, focused on Harry. “She’s been working hard lately. She puts a lot of pressure on herself.”

  “Sounds like her mother.”

  From the bottom floor came the muted sounds of the children in the kitchen. Mrs Parker had offered to help them bake cookies. Sage checked her wristwatch again and gave up tapping it. This was the longest day of her life.

  She glanced up as Ethan came to stand beside her and looked down at Harriet.

  “It’s been an eventful day,” he remarked.

  Sage’s gaze slipped to his hips. He was lean, but he was big. Barry was tall and scrawny, but Ethan was what she thought of as ‘all male’. All powerful, all masculine, all completely male.

  She cleared her throat and looked back at her daughter. Harry had said she felt better after throwing up, and Sage was pretty sure it was just some twenty-four-hour thing that would be over by this time tomorrow.

  She said, “I’ll just let her sleep. I think she’ll be out of it for a while.”

  Ethan moved back as Sage got to her feet. She went over to the window to tweak the blinds so there were only shafts of light streaming through.

  She hesitated a while before looking behind.

  Ethan was watching her.

  For a moment, the breath hitched in her throat.

  Finally, he said, “So what now?”

  She gave the blinds an unnecessary tweak, adjusted the drapes to the sides.

  “I guess we go back and be child-minders,” she said.

  He scratched his chin, and then took one more look at Harriet, before he looked slowly back at Sage.

  He gave a sigh of something that may have been defeat. “I guess,” he said, a pained look on his face, “that we do.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  The kitchen, Ethan thought, was reasonably decent considering Ruby was sifting flour, James was banging up peanuts with a blunt knife, and Eric was chopping up dates into meticulous bits.

  “What’s all this going to be?” Ethan asked as Mrs Parker stood alongside them with military-like attention.

  “A number of things,” she informed him. “Peanut brownies, chocolate chip cookies, and I rather fancy some lemon date slice.” She shooshed him away. “We’re all good here. You go and do a push-up or something.”

  He eyed her with gratitude. “I do feel the need to get out and go for a run.”

  Mrs Parker beckoned to Sage. “You could take her with you. Looks like she needs to get out and about a bit more.”

  Ethan said, “Really?” He couldn’t resist the urge to look Sage up and down and not feel any guilt doing so.

  Sage glared at Mrs Parker. “I do not need to get ‘out and about’. I’m here to look after these children, and you may have forgotten I have a sick daughter upstairs who might need me anytime, and that this morning, you weren’t too well either, Mrs P, hence Ethan and me being here.”

  “I’m fine now,” Mrs Parker said defensively. “Don’t use me as an excuse.”

  As Ethan watched Sage, he wondered. Did she need to be needed? She came across as incredibly independent, which she was, but maybe she had some inner need to be depended on. It was an uncomfortable thought. When people depended on you, it meant there was something going on in their lives that they couldn’t control, and they looked to you for the answer. He shuddered. Either being needed or wanting to be needed – it was all too much.

  Or maybe it was just that she was being a good mother. Heaven knew the only example he had of that was Robyn and Jack, and now Emily with baby Bella.

  He looked out the window. It was fine outside, but there’d be a cooling breeze. It would be good to go for a run along the beach.

  “I don’t know about Sage, but I’m up for a run.” He grabbed a bottle from the cupboard and filled it with water.

  “You know your way around well,” Sage remarked.

  “As do you. So, are you leaving Harry in the extremely capable hands of Mrs P or not?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with capable,” she protested. “And I don’t like running so I don’t see the point of me going out there with you.”

  “I’ll make you a flask of coffee,” Mrs Parker said, “and you can sit. There are good spots under the trees. You can just watch him run.”

  “I don’t want to watch him run.” But there was a book in her bag, and the proposal she had on her tablet. She glanced outside, bit her lip. Peered at the clock on the wall.

  “I’ll make a start on that coffee,” Mrs Parker said.

  Ten minutes later Sage had a bag with a flask of coffee, some pieces of fruit, her tablet, pens and notebooks, and her phone. The bag was heavy. It was the tablet and the flask, but she needed them both. Ethan walked with a small towel around his neck and a water bottle. He’d put a cap on his head, and wore shorts that were mid-thigh, and a T-shirt that sat nicely around his shoulders and chest. Sage would have figured he’d go for something big and loose to deal to the sweat. She liked loose clothing and the idea of restriction was not a pleasant one.

  She navigated the path down the back of Jack’s landscaped section and Ethan unlocked the gate that led down to the public beach.

  Sage breathed in the air, and noted no whiffs of pollution. There’d been problems here over the summer but it seemed good now. Rangitoto Island sat picture perfect in front of them and along the beach people walked dogs, navigated pushchairs on the solid sand, or talked on phones on a break from work.

  Ethan gestured up to a spot under a tree. “Look alright to you?”

  “That looks fine.” They walked over. Sage had a cotton shawl she spread out, and as she sat crossed legged on it, she pulled her bag closer. She took out the flask, and the tablet, then noticed Ethan was still watching her.

  “There’s a beach waiting for you,” she said.

  “Just making sure you’re all set here.” He pulled his cap down, then took a swig of water. He glanced up the beach. “You bring out my paternal instincts.” Then without looking at her he broke into a slow jog.

  Paternal instincts?

  Sage watched as he jogged slowly down
the beach, making his way on to the solid sand nearer the water, his arms loose at his side.

  She waited to see if he turned around, but he kept on heading up the beach. Paternal instincts? What did that mean?

  She switched on her tablet, and stared again at him. He was blurry now. She needed to get her eyes tested, but hadn’t got around to it. Not that she needed glasses to see him, when his image had burnt into her eyes.

  Who was she kidding? Burnt into her skull.

  She looked ahead of her.

  Serenity. Peace. It was a beautiful place.

  She glanced up the beach one more time, but people were walking a dog her way, a few couples were strolling along, and Ethan had vanished from her sight. For all she knew he was running on to the road now. She didn’t think you could jog along the beach without heading up on to the road now and then.

  Paternal instincts my arse.

  She opened her proposal and began to read.

  It took an iron will not to look behind and see what Sage was doing. By the time he’d broken into a run, he patted himself on the back for that iron will and mentally thanked Mrs P for suggesting he get out.

  Clearly he needed to because—he checked his watch—seven hours with Sage was affecting him. And why on earth he’d said that thing about paternal instinct he had no idea, but he had no regrets. Let her stew on it. She could analyze what he’d said if she wanted. She was a woman; they over-thought all the time. And she was smart. Doctor of freaking physics smart.

  He focused on keeping his pace steady; he wasn’t a fast runner. He didn’t do marathons or ten-k runs, and he had no competitive streak in him, at least in that capacity. He just ran, and enjoyed doing it. It made him feel good. Physically, emotionally, spiritually. There was nothing to prove.

  A fellow jogger ran past, but Ethan kept his pace the same.

  His mind slipped to Harry as he headed up onto the road, and joined the beach again further down. Yeah, he had a real soft spot for Harry. That was his paternal soft spot, if you could call it that. She’d looked like death in the truck on the way over but she was okay—surely she was. Like Sage had said, it was probably just a sleep-it-off kind of virus. One of those twenty-four-hour things that would go in a flash, and she’d be back to normal.

  Yeah. She’d be fine.

  He slowed down the pace a fraction, went wide around an elderly couple examining flotsam left by the high tide. Of course Harry would be fine.

  He slowed down a fraction more.

  But what if? What if she wasn’t fine?

  But she had Mrs Parker. Mrs Parker was there.

  Nothing got by Mrs P.

  Yet… Mrs Parker, he remembered, wasn’t all that great either. At least, she hadn’t been a few hours ago when he’d got that panicked phone call from Robyn and Jack.

  Mrs Parker was looking after the children and she hadn’t been well.

  Ethan slowed to a stop. He’d been running fifteen minutes. He’d planned to keep going another fifteen, turn and run back, make detours down a few streets just to check out the place...

  He stared up at the sky, his breathing still heavy. Around him it was calm. It was serene.

  Inside, he felt something like panic begin to claw away at him.

  What if Mrs Parker wasn’t okay? What if she’d collapsed? What if she was lying comatose on the kitchen floor right now? Did Jack’s kids know how to call 111? Would they come looking for him, looking for Sage, and take the wrong way, and end up walking down to the main road, which was a shockingly busy road?

  He swung around, and began to run back the way he’d come. His mind spun into overdrive, an overdrive combined with a growing sense of panic, a panic that wouldn’t let up as every conceivable thing that could go wrong began to cement in his mind.

  What had he been thinking, leaving them with Mrs Parker?

  He increased the pace, felt in his pocket for his phone, and groaned in disbelief. He’d left the damned thing back at Jack’s.

  He ran harder. He hadn’t figured he was going to need the phone. He was only going down to the beach for a run.

  A sensation of dread trickled through him, gaining momentum with rapid intensity. What if the kids came down to the beach to find them, and didn’t see Sage under that tree and she didn’t see them, and they went the wrong way? What if they went into the ocean for a swim and they couldn’t swim? Could they swim? He didn’t know.

  Let them be okay, he prayed, as he ran harder, navigated driftwood, dogs, rubbish and goodness knows what else. Let them all be safe and sound and okay.

  He ran faster, his arms working, ran as hard and fast as he could, and when he was back on the stretch of beach leading to where Sage sat some place in the distance, he scanned the water for any sight of them. Casual walkers strolled by, a few power-walkers out for exercise, all those people with dogs, and sheesh, there were a lot of them, and yes, they had every right to stare at him because he was sprinting down a beach in the middle of the day like a freaking moron. Who ran down a beach at this speed? He sure as hell didn’t. And there better not be any smart arse filming this for a potential YouTube hit.

  Man runs away from imaginary threat.

  He didn’t sprint. He never sprinted. Running was for exercise, but this? This was a nightmare. This was a speed that was no doubt going to kill him, and he deserved it.

  He was a crazy person. A mad man. Mad for taking off the way he had and leaving the children alone with an unfit babysitter. Jack, his best mate, had asked him to look after his family, not leave them, and not desert them as if they were pets that could look after themselves. Sure, nothing had happened when Mrs P had sent him and Sage out for breakfast but that was hours ago.

  Time seemed to stop, even as his heart raced and his legs began to ache, but the sensation of dread was now deep within him, and it was building, along with the extreme beating of his heart. He had to get back to the house, had to get there now. He ignored the insane pounding, and the almost intolerable feeling of blood pulsing through him, and he ran even faster, using the adrenaline that had kicked in.

  In the distance were the trees, and he could see the top floor of Jack’s house, up above the beach.

  His eyes cleared and he saw Sage beneath the tree, and he drew closer, saw she was still focused on her tablet, the plastic cup from the flask in one hand.

  “Sage?” he yelled as he approached.

  She looked up. Startled, she did a double take.

  He stopped in front of her, barely able to breathe.

  “You weren’t gone long.” She looked him up and down, and went pale. “Are you having a heart attack?” Panic crossed her face as she scrambled to her feet. “I’ve never had to do actual CPR. Only on a dummy in the first aid course, and I didn’t get the rate of compressions to breaths right.” Her voice rose in despair. “And they keep changing the ratio. I can’t remember how many breaths to chest pumps it is. I can’t remember how to do it!”

  “No heart attack,” he gasped, barely able to speak as he fought to get his breath. Nausea rose up inside him, and along with it the feeling that she was right. He was having a heart attack. He had never felt this bad, this sick, this close to dying, in his life.

  “Your face is purple. You look a hundred. What’s wrong with you? It looks like a heart attack. Or a stroke.” Panic intensified in her eyes. “I can’t remember what to do with a stroke. I’ve only ever done first aid on children.” Her voice ended on a strangled gasp.

  He jabbed his fist in the direction of Jack’s house. His lungs burnt. He was in the throes of cardiac arrest. His chest hurt and he could barely breathe. “The kids,” he managed to gasp out. “The kids.”

  “The kids?” she repeated. “Are you okay?”

  He shook his head but the movement made him worse, made him light-headed. He was going to pass out. “The kids,” he ground out. “Worried.”

  She followed his gaze, up to the house, confused. “But Mrs Parker’s there. She’s taking care of them.
”

  “Not well,” he wheezed. “Not well. Mrs P.” This is what he was going to sound like when he hit a hundred—if he even made it. “Sick this morning. Remember?” Unsteady, he bent over, trying to get rid of this insane sense of disorientation flooding over him. “Harry sick and—” What was wrong with him?

  “Oh, no.” Sage swore. “We’re idiots.” She squatted down to stuff everything in her bag with one hand, still clutching the coffee cup for dear life, and stood up to haul the bag on to her shoulder. “We should never have left them, and I know Mrs Parker says she’s okay, but Robyn thinks she’s well over seventy, and you know, anything can happen.”

  Ethan managed to fumble his way through unscrewing the cap of the water bottle, his vision blurred, his throat more parched than it had ever been.

  Sage’s bag tilted and everything fell back out onto the ground.

  “Unbelievable,” she yelled, as she bent back down.

  Automatically, he followed to help her, and as he did the movement sent the blood rushing from his head. Dizzy, he reached out to steady himself and his hand rested on her back.

  “What are you—Ethan!” She fell forward on to her knees, putting her hands out to steady herself. Ethan, relying on that back for support, fell forward, and Sage collapsed with a muted screech. He lay on top of her.

  He shifted with an effort, so he didn’t crush her completely.

  She lay on the ground, and he lay next to her, with his leg over hers.

  “Disgusting,” an elderly voice called out. “That is disgusting behaviour on a public beach. There are children around. I’m reporting you.”

  “It’s not what you think,” Sage called out, her voice muffled. With an effort, Ethan pushed himself over so he was lying on the ground, and off her. He was dying. He was sure of it now. He couldn’t move, he spluttered at the sand in his mouth—interestingly flavoured with coffee. Was he wet as well? Had the tide rushed in and they were going to drown? With any luck, he’d lapse into unconsciousness before—