Just Say Yes (Escape to New Zealand Book 10)

by Rosalind James

  “I poured my cereal,” Zavy said. “But I can’t get the milk out.”

  “That was a big boy.” She got up and pulled on a cardigan and socks against the morning chill, then followed him into the kitchen, biting her lip at the scatter of spilled Cheerios around his bowl and on the floor, at the cereal box on its side.

  “It came out very fast,” Zavy said. Usually, she helped him hold the box. “It all went on the floor, and I tried to put the pieces back in the box, but it fell over. And I couldn’t get the milk out. So I waked you up.”

  The refrigerator door was open, and Chloe got out the milk bottle and poured some into his bowl. “There you are, love,” she said, helping him climb up. “You did fine. Mummy’s going to get dressed.”

  She was in the bathroom when she thought she heard the beep of a text. Josie, maybe. Or her mum, asking whether she was coming by for her usual Monday-morning visit.. She didn’t know how she’d face her mum again, but she had to, she guessed. She couldn’t cut off contact with her parents just because of Rich. What would Zavy have lost then? What would she have lost? But how could she pretend this was all right?

  She finished getting her hair into some semblance of order, then put on lip gloss, considered doing more than that, and rejected the idea. Sunday was her day off, and she didn’t have to impress a single person. She went back into the bedroom and picked up her phone.

  Kevin.

  Want to go for breakfast with me? The girls forgot to buy more eggs.

  He’d ended with an angry emoji, and she had to smile.

  You could just borrow eggs from me, of course, she typed.

  Nah. It’s a good excuse. And I need to see my little mate. Got something for him.

  When? she asked.

  Now? I’m a wee bit hungry.

  She didn’t stop to think it through. She just typed, Now’s good.

  Kevin took the stairs two at a time, ignoring the protest from his aching legs, and knocked at Chloe’s door. It was only a minute before it swung open, and there she was. Lace-trimmed pink singlet, open cardigan, gray leggings. No bra again, which made it a major effort to keep his eyes on her face.

  He’d probably been planning to say “Hello,” but his body had other ideas. He put a hand on her lower back, she rose onto her toes, and he was giving her a soft, sweet good-morning-baby kiss, because how could he possibly resist her? And then he said hello. Actually, he just said, “Hi,” and smiled down at her like the lovesick fool he was. “I’m glad to see you,” he added, in case that might have been in doubt.

  She was smiling back and stepping inside. “Hi,” she said, then laughed. “I told you to come up now, though, and I wasn’t even thinking that Zavy and I aren’t dressed.”

  “Works for me,” he said. “I like the way you’re dressed.” To put it mildly. Her nipples had hardened under that pale-pink, lace-trimmed singlet, and his hand needed to be there. He needed it. To slide that singlet up, to touch her and feel her up, his hand sliding slowly over all that silken skin. Preferably while she was on her back.

  He didn’t get any of it. He saw Zavy, holding back a bit, wearing pajamas printed with pictures of construction equipment, his hair sticking up on one side. Shy, but why? Kevin tore his attention from Chloe, dropped to his haunches, and said, “Morning, mate. How ya goin’?”

  Zavy said “Good.” Kevin glanced at Chloe, and she looked back at him, but he couldn’t read her expression.

  Normal, he decided. That was the ticket. “Reckon it’s good you’re in your pj’s, because I brought you something.” He held up the shirt in his hand. “Blues jersey, eh, so we can make you into a rugby supporter. And if you like the Chiefs best, don’t tell me. I have a rugby ball for you as well. We could do a bit of passing after breakfast, maybe. You could help me practice.”

  Zavy asked, “Are they presents?”

  “Yeh, mate. They are. Come here a sec. Let’s see how this jersey fits you.”

  “It’s blue,” Zavy said. “Blue’s the best.”

  “See?” Kevin pulled the jersey straight over the boy’s pj top. “I knew you had good taste.” He stood back and regarded it. “Looks awesome, eh.”

  “Do I get to keep it?” Zavy asked. “Or does it have to stay at your house all the time?”

  “No. A present belongs to you.”

  “Oh.” Zavy still looked uncertain.

  Kevin looked at Chloe. “Yesterday?” he asked quietly.

  She shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I’m still finding out.”

  “Tell you what,” Kevin told Zavy. “We’ll let your mum get dressed, you can put on some trousers and shoes yourself so you’re ready to run, and we’ll go have breakfast and then find a place to play a bit of rugby. How does that sound?”

  “I ate my cereal,” Zavy said. “I poured it by myself.”

  “Oh.” Kevin considered that a minute. “You could just have a coffee, then.”

  Zavy giggled. “I don’t have coffee. Coffee is only for grownups.”

  “Really?” Kevin said. “Huh. Hot chocolate, then?”

  “Yeh,” Zavy said.

  Chloe said, “Give me five minutes. Zavy can dress himself with a bit of help finding the right way round, if you don’t mind doing that.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  Forty minutes later, Kevin was on the outside of half his enormous breakfast and starting to feel less hollow. Better yet, Chloe was sitting beside him on the patio of the Takapuna Beach Café, looking out at the sea in a blue dress with a wrap front that made her look as pretty as a flower, her slim legs crossed and one thin-strapped sandal dangling off her flexed foot. She was swinging that foot as she ate her own much more veggie-centric breakfast, and surely her sandal was going to slip right off her, the same way it looked like the dress could. All you’d have to do was pull that tie ...

  Back to the program. Zavy was sitting beside her, eating pancakes with strawberries that Kevin had had to talk Chloe into.

  “He won’t eat them,” she’d said. “He ate cereal, and he’s three. He can have a bit of mine.”

  “We’re celebrating, eh,” he’d said.

  “Uh ...” she’d said with a sidelong look. “I’m sure I shouldn’t refer to it in case the memory’s painful, but ...”

  “We lost,” he’d finished. “Yeh. We did. On the other hand, this is our first breakfast together. Works for me.”

  Zavy was actually making a valiant effort, especially on the strawberries. His trainers were even on the right feet, which had involved some negotiation of a different sort, but Kevin did have four younger brothers and sisters.

  “I didn’t see all of your match,” Chloe said now. “I need to admit that, in case there’s an exam. I did see your try, though. That was worth celebrating.”

  “It wasn’t really ‘my’ try,” he said. “Team try. Team sport. I’m just the one who dotted down.”

  “Very modest,” she said. “Very nice. But I saw it. It looked like your try to me. I was ...” She took a breath, gave a little shrug, and smiled. “I was impressed. You could even say I was thrilled.”

  “Well,” he said stupidly, “that’s good, then.” And then had to keep looking at her, until the color was rising in her cheeks.

  He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to take her hand, kiss her mouth, take her home, lay her down, and take off her clothes. But she was reaching for Zavy’s plate, saying, “You’re finished, love,” and wiping his face, so that wasn’t on. None of it.

  Zavy picked up the two vehicles he’d brought with him, and Kevin said, “No cement mixer today, then.”

  “It got lost,” Zavy said sadly. “The man said we couldn’t go get it, because it was very far away. And he said I could have any toy, but then I couldn’t have a pony, and I wanted a pony.”

  “Ponies are good,” Kevin agreed, because Chloe was looking like she simultaneously wanted to jump in and was holding herself back.

  “No,” Zavy said, running his fire engine along the tab
le and not looking at Kevin. “Ponies are only for girls. Reesa has a rainbow pony, ’cause she’s a girl. But I’m not a girl.”

  “Did your dad take you to a toy store, love?” Chloe asked, clearly staying calm with an effort.

  “Yes. And it was very, very many toys, and I can have any toy I want. But not a pony. But you can comb the pony’s hair, ’cause it has a comb. But boys don’t comb hair, and boys can’t watch the pony show. Only girls. And I forgot my ’ment mixer, ’cause I was crying, but we can’t go back and get the ’ment mixer, ’cause it’s gone. And boys don’t cry, and if you cry, the man will take all your toys away.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Kevin said. Chloe’s expression was defining “tense” now. “I’m a boy, and I cry sometimes. I like ponies, too.”

  Zavy looked at him doubtfully. “But you can’t. Specially if it’s a rainbow pony.”

  Kevin looked at Chloe, and she looked back at him. “I like rainbow ponies best of all,” he said. “Always have. They’re my favorites, you could say.”

  “Oh,” Zavy said.

  Chloe seemed to have finished her breakfast, so Kevin said, “I tell you what, mate. Let’s go give that rugby ball a workout.”

  They did. And he wondered the entire time he was doing it if he could get that fella’s address. And exactly how hard New Zealand Rugby would come down on him if he punched him in the face.

  Chloe wasn’t sure she was going out with Kevin until she did.

  She and Zavy had spent a quiet day after their breakfast outing, with as much simple routine as she could work into it. He’d taken an extra-long nap, maybe because Kevin had run around with him so much with the rugby ball, or because he was settling down after the day before, or both. She still wasn’t sure, though, even while she got dressed and made herself up truly carefully for the first time in ... much too long, that she was going to go through with it. Zavy was watching a Thomas and Friends DVD and seemed perfectly happy, but ...

  Then she opened the door once more to Kevin and Noelle. Kevin was wearing a pale blue dress shirt open at the neck, black trousers, and a suit coat, looking like he’d made a major effort, looking too big and too strong and too ... too much like what she’d want, if she let herself want something. It was going to be so hard to send him away. Especially after he asked her, “All good? We still OK?”

  She hesitated, looking at Zavy, who was in his pajamas already, of course, and had even abandoned Thomas and his friends for the moment. Kevin told him, “Your mum’s going to dinner with me, mate. But I’ve brought Noelle to stay with you and read you your book in bed. What do you think about that?”

  “Good,” Zavy said.

  “That’s what I thought,” Kevin said.

  “Did you pick out your story already?” Noelle asked.

  “Yes,” Zavy said. “In Busy Busy. But I want to watch Thomas now. You can come watch with me.”

  Chloe said, “Give Mummy a kiss first,” and Zavy did, but said afterwards, “Thomas is very, very important, Mummy.” Which didn’t exactly sound like he was traumatized.

  Kevin said again, though, when they were out the door, “If you need to stay, we can do that. Pizza on the couch, eh. I’d look at you in that dress anywhere and count myself lucky.”

  “No,” she said. “I’m sure. It’s better if things are back to normal for him. Noelle has my number and yours. And,” she said, looking at him from under her lashes, “I don’t eat pizza.”

  He laughed. “That’s brilliant, then. I made the booking at Thyme, though, just in case. We can be home in less than ten minutes.”

  “Oh,” she said, “that was kind.”

  “No. It wasn’t. It was me doing everything I could think of.”

  “Do you mind,” she asked as they headed down the staircase, “if we walk? I’d love to walk to dinner, and talk about ... good things. Better things. Or just walk.”

  He looked at her heels, at the red dress that ended a good ten centimeters above the knee, with some doubt. “Will your feet be OK? It’ll take all of twenty minutes.”

  She had to laugh. “I’m a dancer, Kevin. My feet are iron.”

  They didn’t talk much at all for quite a while, in fact. He’d been right. Touch mattered more to her. They walked to the restaurant, and when he took her hand, he thought she sighed. She definitely moved closer. And then she sat across from him in the candlelight, all eyes and graceful neck and red dress dipping in a wonderful swoop of fabric, smiled at him over her wine glass, and talked a little. About his sisters, about his match, about Zavy and My Little Pony and the irresistible allure of construction equipment. And nothing at all about eviction and apartment-hunting and exes.

  And then they were interrupted.

  “Excuse me.”

  It was an older couple, and Kevin had to force himself not to sigh. Public recognition went with the job for an All Black, and so did public graciousness, but tonight? He didn’t want to belong to New Zealand.

  The woman continued, not the man. Sixtyish, with chic ultra-short white hair and a bold necklace over dark-blue silk. “I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner,” she went on, “but aren’t you Chloe Donaldson?”

  Oh. Showed him. Chloe said, “Yes, I am.” Looking like exactly that thing he was meant to be. Gracious.

  “Oh.” The woman put a hand to her breast. “I thought you must be. Oh, my goodness. I saw you last in Swan Lake, how many years ago was that?”

  “Four.” Chloe was still smiling, but it looked like an effort.

  “I said to Harold,” the woman said, “that we’d never see an Odette and Odile like that again. I said it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and I was right. We went to a performance of the Royal Ballet in London last year, and yes, she was good, but it wasn’t the same. You had something special, a musicality, a passion, is what I’d call it.” She stopped, shook her head, and laughed at herself. “But here we are, interrupting your evening just so I can be a fan, as if I were a kid spotting an All Black. I’m ashamed of myself, truly. But—are you dancing anywhere now? Anywhere we could see you?”

  Kevin caught the microsecond of hesitation before Chloe said, “No. I have a dance school now.”

  “Oh. What a pity. Well, please know how much pleasure you gave me. Us,” she added with a glance at her husband.

  “Certainly,” he said. “A real pleasure.”

  “Thank you.” Chloe made it dismissive, and Kevin knew about that, too. The couple moved off, out of the restaurant and into the evening, and Chloe looked at Kevin again, her head on one side, and asked, “What were we saying? I have a feeling I liked it better.”

  He said, “Why?”

  “Why what?” She looked at her wine glass and seemed surprised that it was empty, so he handed her his.

  He said, “I’ve been wondering all along. Why didn’t you go back to it? After what I’ve seen you do ...”

  “You’re not an expert, though, are you.” It was light, and it wasn’t. “If you’d retired from rugby and I saw you catching and passing on some field, I wouldn’t say, ‘Can’t you go back again?’” It’s not that easy. You of all people must know it.”

  “You said you were on your way back, though, until Zavy came along. You said it was possible. And yes,” he said when she would have cut him off, “when he was a baby. But why not now?”

  “It’s four years. And the school. I have a life now. A different life. A good life.”

  “But is it enough?”

  It was quiet, and still, he could swear that it jolted her. “You don’t understand getting back,” she said. “You don’t know what it takes.”

  He just looked at her, and she seemed to realize the truth of that. “Oh. Well, yes, you probably do. What’s the longest you’ve been out?”

  “Nine months. Torn Achilles. I’ve been back every time. Every single time, the same way I’ll be going back forever, until the coaches and the trainers and every single person in the world says no. Or—no. Until I say no. Until I push my bo
dy and it doesn’t answer.”

  “But you don’t have a child.”

  “No. I don’t. So I can’t know. Tell me why. Tell me what was so bad that it put out your fire.”

  “How do you know I have it?”

  He just looked at her, and she sighed. “All right. I have it. But I ...”

  “Would you like another glass of wine?”

  “I had two. I have to work tomorrow. No, thank you. And the answer is, he left me at the altar. Rich.” She was tensing up, and he could see the moment where she caught herself and changed her breathing. “Literally. Nine months pregnant. You could say it was a wake-up call. And after that ...” She shifted, and he didn’t have to look to see that under the table, her feet were tapping. “After that, I still thought I’d go back. But then there Zavy was. He was mine. I could take him to the studio with me, but I couldn’t have taken him to class, to rehearsal, to a performance.”

  “A babysitter?”

  “I ... that’s what my mum said. But he was a newborn, and he was mine, and I was ... all he had. And dancing is ... it’s long. It’s not eight hours a day. It’s ten, or twelve, or fourteen hours, even, by the time you’re home again. It’s your life. It has to be.”

  He nodded. “Like rugby. The days may not be as long as that, but you’re gone from home, eh. And yet there’s the odd fella with kids and no partner—those blokes do it, and nobody asks why, or how. Nannies, I reckon.”

  “But they’re not mothers.”

  “No. They’re not mothers.”

  The waiter brought over his crème caramel, and the moment passed. He offered her a taste, and she said no, but she said it absently, as if she were really thinking about something else.

  “Tell me,” he said, pushing it a bit more, “about the best role. You said Swan Lake, and your fan there said the same. Why? What’s so special about it?”

  A long pause, then a sigh. “How can I explain? I’m not good at explaining. It’s the best, that’s all. It’s everything. It’s soft and ... and fluid, and so heartbreaking when you’re Odette, and just the opposite, so sharp and devious when you’re Odile. It’s such a physical challenge, but it’s also the most emotion you can show. It’s being two women in one ballet, the two women we all are inside, maybe, and all the contrast of them. It’s how much you can make the audience ache, only because of the way you ache, and because of the music. Tchaikovsky’s music, that hurts you in your heart, it’s so beautiful. How can you do justice to that music, to the ballerinas who have danced it before you? You have to show your anguish, your surrender, and then you have to do thirty-two fouetté turns while you smile, because now you’re Odile and you’re full-on seductive and triumphant. One extreme to the other, and then you die, and you win. Which is nothing but Russian, isn’t it? You transcend your enchantment, you defeat your enemy by sacrificing everything for the man you love. By dying for him.”