Just Say Yes (Escape to New Zealand Book 10)

by Rosalind James

  Some ways, he could still win. But only some ways.

  That was Sunday. On Monday, Chloe’s real life started up again.

  Zavy woke up calm, which was good. But when she’d dropped him off at Carolyn’s and taken class, despite the feeling of being right in her skin again, despite how much she wanted to hang onto that feeling, and the buzz from the night before—she couldn’t. She had decisions to make, and choices that weren’t choices at all, but weren’t any fun, either.

  Her first call, made from her car as soon as she’d tossed her bag inside, was to her lawyer. That one couldn’t wait another second. She’d have called him the day before if she’d thought he’d have picked up.

  She didn’t waste any time getting to the point, either He wanted to charge her by the minute? Then he’d better start earning his money straight away. She said, “Rich put Zavy into danger on Saturday. I want him out of his life.”

  “What sort of danger?” Seamus sounded as cautious and calm as always, and even though she hadn’t explained yet, that calm was already making her furious.

  She told him what had happened, trying to make it as concise as possible, hating that she had to get his help and permission to do what she knew was right.

  When she stopped, Seamus paused for a long moment, then said, “Did he leave the boy alone in the car after he locked him in?”

  “Not the way you mean. But I think from something Zavy said that Rich may have left him before that. I think he went and got his groceries, or whatever they were, and left Zavy in the car while he did it.”

  “You think? You don’t know?”

  “No. He’s three. He was traumatized. I asked him again this morning, but the story wasn’t that clear.”

  She’d thought about fudging that, of course. But if she used Zavy’s response as grounds for ... for whatever her lawyer could make happen? Somebody else would question Zavy, and she’d have put him through all of it for nothing, because it really wasn’t clear.

  “If it’s not clear, it doesn’t count,” Seamus said, confirming her suspicions. “And yes, Rich showed poor judgment in waiting for his friend rather than calling AA or the police immediately and at least getting the boy out of the car. But—”

  “Poor judgment? Poor judgment?” Chloe’s hands wanted to shake, and she had to take a deep breath, shove one hand between her knees, and keep it there. “He cared more about his car than his own son. Zavy was soaked with sweat when we finally got him out! How can that be acceptable? How?”

  “Hm. I’ll get a copy of the police report, of course, but honestly, Chloe—locking your keys in your car isn’t a crime, or my wife would never be out of the dock. Your friend probably shouldn’t have damaged the car like that, especially as the police had been called. It doesn’t make your position look good. It looks like two parents feuding, leading to violence, and that’s not in the child’s best interest.”

  “Really?” She thought her head was going to blow straight off her body. “In what way doesn’t it look like somebody else caring more about a child than his own father does? If Zavy had been locked in Kevin’s car, Kevin would have done the same thing.”

  “That’s another aspect as well,” Seamus went on. “This is your partner, I take it, displaying violence toward the father?”

  Chloe tried to get herself under control, and failed. “What would you have done if it had been your son?”

  “That isn’t the point,” Seamus said. “The point is how the court would see it. I understand your feelings. I understand it’s upsetting. But the bald truth is, as I told you last time, that a judge isn’t going to order supervised visits, much less take away any of Rich’s visitation rights, unless there’s a very good reason indeed. We’d have to show proof of serious drug use, or something equally detrimental, and even then ... the only really ironclad reasons are sexual abuse, physical abuse—and I mean severe bruising—or real neglect, which this incident isn’t. This is one incident, and we’d need more to show a pattern. Right now, Rich looks like an inexperienced father who’s making perhaps understandable mistakes. That’s not actionable, and feuding with him and destroying his property is only going to make your situation worse. From now on, please document anything noteworthy, with photos if possible. And ‘noteworthy’ doesn’t mean Xavier didn’t get a nap or had to eat something he didn’t like. ‘Noteworthy’ means abuse or neglect, like I said. We’ll hope it doesn’t come to that.”

  Chloe wanted to ask, Don’t you have red hair? Don’t you ever show it? Would this really be how you’d respond? Then what kind of father are you? But she’d just be spending even more money on a fruitless argument with the only person who could help her, so she didn’t. She rang off, and then she made the other call. Before she had time to cool off. Before she was prepared to be reasonable.

  She rang her mother.

  “I was wondering where you were, darling,” were her mother’s first words. “I made you something special today. Zavy’s back to his normal happy self, I hope.”

  “Not entirely,” Chloe said. “And I’m not coming to visit today, Mum.”

  “Oh.” Her mother sounded truly surprised. Chloe always came. It was part of the routine she lived by, like everything else in her life. “You could have told me earlier, so I wouldn’t have cooked for you.”

  Tell the truth. “I couldn’t even bear to ring you earlier. You didn’t see how Zavy looked yesterday, or the day before.”

  “Hang on, Chloe Ann. Are you telling me you aren’t visiting out of some tantrum? You know I was as worried as you were. Who rang you to tell you he was locked in?”

  There was ice in her veins. Every word was cold. “No. You weren’t as worried as I was. If you had been, you’d have rung the police. If Kevin hadn’t got Zavy out, if the police had taken longer than they had, it could have been very bad. He was hot. He was in a bad way, and that’s partly your fault.”

  Silence for a minute, and then her mother said, “I’m very sorry about Zavy. That’s frightening, and I wish you’d told me. But for the rest of it—I’m not going to dignify that with an answer, because you must know how ridiculous it is. I was beside myself until you told me he was all right. And what do you mean, Kevin got him out? I thought you said the police came.”

  “No. Kevin kicked out the windscreen.” It gave her real satisfaction, her first of the morning, to say it.

  “Oh, that’s wonderful. That’s going to help.” It took Chloe a moment to realize that her mother was being sarcastic. “Now you’ll have Rich going to his lawyer and saying that your over-muscled rugby-player boyfriend got violent. How do imagine that will look?”

  It was exactly what Seamus had said, and it was wrong. “Like Zavy has one man in his life who cares about him? The cop seemed pretty happy with Kevin. I’ll bet he’d have done exactly the same. And I have to let Rich take him again, and Zavy’s ...” Her voice wavered despite every effort to control it. “He’s not going to want to go. How am I going to put him in that car seat again? How? I can’t, Mum. I can’t. And that you don’t see that ... it ...” She had to stop.

  “Darling,” her mother said, “come here. Don’t tell me this on the phone. Come here, and we’ll talk it over.”

  “No.” Chloe wiped a hand under her eyes. “I can’t, Mum. I just can’t. Maybe next week. Right now? I can’t.”

  That was Monday. Tuesday was a little better, and a little worse.

  Worse, because she started it by saying goodbye to Kevin again. Kevin, looking big and tough in his Blues warmups, crouching beside Zavy in his car seat and having a spot of serious, manly chat, then standing up, holding her close, kissing her so sweetly under a threatening gray sky that looked exactly like she felt, and saying, “I’ll ring you soon as I can. Two weeks, eh.”

  And better, because that evening, when she and Zavy had been home barely half an hour, there was a knock on the door, and when she answered it, the woman outside was barely visible behind a screen of blooms.

  “
You’re my last of the day,” the woman said as she handed over the extravagant bouquet. “But he asked for that time slot specially.”

  “Oh,” Chloe managed to say. “Thank you. They’re beautiful. But ... how? In autumn? Or do you know?”

  “Course. It’s my shop. Well, mine and the hubby’s. Kevin asked us last week, so we’d have time to order them. All the way from the States, love. And we were glad to do it. Lovely, isn’t he. So natural and polite, you’d never know he was anybody special.”

  Last week. He’d planned this. Chloe’s heart felt about two sizes too big for her chest. When the woman left and she’d shut the door again, she had to sit down and pull Zavy into her lap. She had to do something with all that love.

  “The flowers are very pretty, Mummy,” Zavy said.

  “Yes. They are. They’re from Kevin.”

  Peonies. Kevin had found them, because they were her favorites, and never mind what that must have cost him. The lush, ruffled petals in the palest pink wafted out a softly scented message of hopeful spring and the promise of summer, exactly the opposite of the late-autumn squall that was sending raindrops spattering against her windows. And suddenly, she felt a little less lonely, and a whole lot more ... loved.

  Zavy said, “Mummy. There’s a bag in it,” and there was. A tiny gift bag, stapled shut, together with a big white envelope, both of them fastened to a stake in the middle of the flowers. She pulled both of them out, held up the bag, and asked Zavy, “Who’s this for?”

  “Me!” he said happily. “’Cause it has a zed and a y, and that spells Zavy!”

  “Better open it, then,” she said, and helped him do it.

  When Zavy pulled out what was inside, he clutched it in his fist and said, “He found it! Kevin found my ’ment mixer!”

  “Maybe,” she said. “Let’s see.” Because there was a note in the bag, too.

  “Is it for me?” Zavy demanded when she was holding it in her hand. “Did Kevin write it to me?”

  “Yes. He did.” She read it aloud.

  Here you go, little mate. Hold onto it tight for me, OK? And have your mum show you what’s on her phone. I’ll see you soon. Kia kaha. – Kevin.

  “What’s Kia kaha?” Zavy asked.

  The lump in Chloe’s throat was getting hard to talk around. “That’s Maori, baby. It means ‘Stay strong.’”

  “Oh. ’Cause I was in the car?”

  She hugged him close and kissed him on the top of his head, and had to close her eyes a minute, remembering when that spot had showed the pulsing beat of his heart. Her baby. Her boy. “Yes, love. Just like when you were in the car, and we came and got you. And Kevin sent something else for you, too. On the phone.”

  She was picking it up, thumbing through it. She needed a moment to collect herself anyway. She’d seen the text at noon, and straight away, he’d sent another one.

  Wait to show it to Zavy until he gets my note.

  She’d waited all day, wondering how Zavy would get a note, and whether she’d get one, too. Now, she knew.

  It was a photo, of course. Of Walter, who was going to Johannesburg this time. Walter being held up, one paw each in the enormous hands of a grinning Hugh Latimer and Iain McCormick, their oversized forms sprawled in space-pod seats, the best Air New Zealand had to offer.

  “Here’s the message, love,” Chloe said, and read it.

  Walter said he wanted to ride to South Africa with the forwards. He says any self-respecting bear would feel the same.

  “What’s forwards?” Zavy asked. “Why doesn’t he want to go with Kevin? Walter likes Kevin, ’cause he’s nice.”

  “Forwards and backs,” Chloe said. “It’s to do with rugby, darling. Forwards are bigger than backs, and Kevin is a back. I guess Walter wanted to be with the biggest players, because bears like to be big and strong.”

  “But Kevin is big. And he’s very strong, too. Kevin is strong as Batman.”

  “Yes, he is. He’s unusual, maybe. He’s special.”

  That was the word, because surely a man who made love that inventively, who took your body over with that much assurance, yet kissed you goodbye that sweetly—surely he was special. A man who bothered to take those photos of Walter was special, too. And a man who stroked your cheek and said, “Missing you already, baby. Take care of yourself until I’m home again,” and made you want to cry at the tenderness in his eyes—surely he was the most special of all.

  She waited until she’d put Zavy to bed to read her own card. Saving it up, her reward and her solace. And because Kevin was still on the plane, the entire eighteen-hour ride of it, and she wanted to wait for him.

  Finally, though, she had to do it. When Zavy was snugly asleep with Rainbow Dash, when the storm was howling outside, rattling the panes and whipping up the dark sea, and when Chloe was in her dressing gown with a cup of tea and her laptop, preparing for that last hour of paperwork before bed. But first—this.

  She sat at the table and picked up the white envelope. Not the tiny thing that normally accompanied a bouquet, but proper card size. Before she opened it, though, she took a moment to inhale the scent of the enormous ruffled peonies, as feminine as a dancer, as graceful as a swan.

  Then she pulled out a sheet of notepaper and read what was on it.

  Baby,

  I’m writing this and not dictating it to the florist, because I’d be embarrassed. I hope you get these the way I meant you to, to give you a lift at the end of your day and to let you know I’m thinking about you. I hope Zavy’s cement mixer gives him the same thing. I wish I could be there when Rich comes for Zavy again, because I know you’re worried about it. But Zavy will get through it, and so will you. And I’ll be there next time.

  I remember when you said that peonies were inconvenient and temperamental. Hard to find, but so beautiful. And that’s you. Inconvenient, because I didn’t mean to fall in love, and nothing about it is going the way I would’ve planned. Hard to find, because it took me until I was 28 to even know what I was looking for. And temperamental—well, maybe we’ll call it ‘fierce.’ ‘Strong,’ maybe. Those are probably better words. And beautiful. Beautiful in the light, and even more beautiful in the dark, where only I see her.

  I’ll stop now, because even though I’m writing instead of dictating, I’m getting embarrassed. This is the job I’ve always wanted, and the only one I know how to do. And sometimes, it asks too much. It’s asking it now.

  I’ll see you in two weeks, and from the moment I step off the plane in Auckland again, I’ll be looking for you.

  Love,

  Kevin

  It rained off and on all week, and on Friday evening, the very heavens were opening, as they always seemed to do as soon as a person stepped out of the house. Chloe hurried down the slippery wooden stairs from the apartment with Zavy, which was when her phone started to ring Another thing that always happened at the wrong moment. There was no way she was answering.

  Downstairs, Kevin’s bedroom window was dark, but the rest of the house beckoned with light glowing from every window, and as they came around the corner, Holly flung the glass sliders open from the dining room and said, “Come in! Hurry!”

  “Good day for ducks, eh,” Chloe said, stepping inside and pulling off Zavy’s anorak and boots, which he was wearing over his pajamas.

  “Awful,” Holly said.

  “I thought you were going out,” Chloe said. It had been meant to be just her and Noelle cooking tonight.

  “Oh, you know.” Holly’s voice was too casual. “Tom said he was meeting his mates instead.”

  Noelle, who’d come into the room, said, “Hi, Zavy. Yeh, Tom bailed.”

  “Excuse me,” Holly snapped. “He didn’t ‘bail.’ He asked if I minded, and I said no. It’s better to be easygoing, for your information, instead of a drama queen. Right?” she asked Chloe. “You were a star once, and you’re normal as anything, just like Kevin.”

  “Whoa,” Chloe said. “Hang on.” She tried to pay more atten
tion to “It’s better to be easygoing” and less to “You were a star once,” but it wasn’t easy. She decided on, “Give me a minute, if I’m going to answer that.”

  “Come on, Zavy,” Noelle said. “Let’s watch Thomas while I practice.”

  “I thought you were cooking with me tonight,” Chloe said.

  “Nah. Switched with Holly. I’ll do Monday instead.”

  When Chloe and Holly were in the kitchen, Holly said, “You should be glad you don’t have a sister. Ever since she started taking ballet, she’s different. Even when I ask her specially to do something with me, she won’t.”

  That was interesting. Opposite twin, same story. “Actually,” Chloe said, tying on an apron, “I always wanted a sister. Never thought about the less wonderful bits, I confess. It’s not always easy being an only. What kind of thing won’t she do?”

  “Oh, you know.” Holly had her head stuck in the fridge, was pulling out chicken breasts, a knobby bit of ginger, a head of garlic. “I asked her to go see a movie with me tonight, since I wasn’t going out after all, and she didn’t even want to do that. She said she was practicing for class tomorrow.”

  “Hmm.” Chloe took the packet of chicken to the sink to rinse. “What was she like before?”

  Holly shrugged, pulled out a cutting board and knife, and began to peel the bark back from the ginger root. “She’d be around, that’s all.”

  “And you miss her.”

  “Well, yeh.” Holly was attacking the ginger now, her knife aggressive. “Just because she’s lost a bit of weight and all and is doing her hair better, why should that change her that much? It’s like she’s got above herself. She has those odd friends, too, science nerds and all.”

  “Mm. You know ...” Chloe hesitated, then said, “You could think about taking ballet as well. Could be something the two of you did together, maybe. It’d be nice to have a shared activity, I’d think. If I did have a sister, that would have been ... cozy.”