Just Say Yes (Escape to New Zealand Book 10)

by Rosalind James

  Chloe didn’t answer that. Kevin knew what he thought. He didn’t think so.

  Chloe had to go to work, which was a pity, because he would have loved nothing better than to spend the day with her. A walk on the beach, maybe, holding hands while she told him all her plans and some of her worries and he told her how proud he was of her. While he watched her shine with that gentle light that reached all the way to his heart. Another coffee at the Takapuna Beach Café, where they’d eaten that first breakfast and talked about ponies with Zavy, and then going home, to his house or hers, and spending the afternoon making love. Showing her, with his hands and his mouth and every single part of his willing body, everything he couldn’t say in words, everything she needed to know, and then sleeping away the afternoon in a nest of blankets.

  As days off went, that would’ve come pretty high up his list. Pity it couldn’t happen. Instead, Chloe drove them to her studio, he spent a few minutes kissing her goodbye and told her he’d see her and Zavy for dinner, then hitched his backpack and duffel over his shoulders, headed over to the beach, and walked home along it. The tide was out, leaving the enormous expanse of sand exposed. Streamers of white cloud were moving fast overhead, the wind was fresh enough to blow away his final cobwebs, it wasn’t raining, and it was all pretty good.

  Plus, it gave him time to think, something the past eighteen hours hadn’t provided.

  At home, the house was quiet, although he could tell by the silver Nissan in the drive that Brenna was probably upstairs with Timothy. He should have gone up and welcomed her, but he didn’t. He contemplated changing his clothes to look marginally more respectable, and didn’t do that, either. If his dark-red hair was sticking up in its most aggressive fashion? If his jeans and snug black T-shirt had made Chloe’s parents eye him with alarm, as if his thighs were entirely too muscular, his biceps unnecessarily big, and his chest absolutely too broad for polite society? If his entire appearance had made them wonder what sort of uncivilized behavior a ruffian like him was capable of? He could live with that.

  That was why, half an hour after he’d walked in the door, he was climbing into his car and heading across the Harbour Bridge for the third time in four hours.

  Parking was the toughest bit of it, as usual. Soon enough, though, he was hiking up Shortland Street, past real estate offices and professional firms and the headquarters of Air New Zealand, with a bounce in his step possibly inappropriate to the occasion.

  Action at last, after all those hours on planes and in cars. Action was always his first choice.

  He wasn’t doing much thinking now. He’d played music in the car on the way over, the kind of hard-driving, head-banging discord he’d have played over his headset for the walk from the team bus into the sheds before the match, when he was psyching himself up and shutting out the crowds of spectators and the pressure they brought. The kind of music that tended to have any woman in the vicinity making a face and mouthing, “Could you turn it down? Why do you even like that?”

  He was sure that was what Chloe would say, too, except that he wouldn’t have played it around her. He’d found that he could get into an appropriate frame of mind just by being with her, especially if she was playing classical music and doing her exercises. Something about her femininity seemed to bring out the exact opposite in him. Half of him always wanted to tuck her under his protective arm—call it the good half—but the other half?

  Yeh. Well.

  I need it intense and hard and strong.

  Words to live by.

  All right. Now he was thinking. Enjoyable thoughts.

  There it was ahead of him. A sleek, modern building fronted by neatly trimmed trees and greenery, all reassuring prosperity and order. He went through the double doors and found the name on the building directory. Alexander Cameron, Lawyers. Commercial & Property Law.

  There was a lift, but he took the stairs. Three flights, the steps taken two at a time, his black rubber-soled Adidas trainers making no noise against the stone. Through another door, then, with another discreet sign, and facing a reception desk with a young brunette behind it.

  “Hi,” she said, her practiced smile turning more genuine as she looked him over. The impolite musculature worked for her, he could tell. “Can I help you?”

  He said, “I’m here to see Richard Clemmons.”

  She glanced at her computer screen, then back at him, a slight frown between her well-groomed brows. “Do you have an appointment?”

  “No. Took a chance.” He smiled at her. Sometimes, your best route wasn’t straight through the opposition. Sometimes, it was a sidestep, even a stutter step. Something that would look like a mistake to somebody watching, until it made your opponent grab at the place his brain had told him you’d be instead of where you actually were. “Tell him Finn Douglas would like a word, will you?”

  All right, maybe it wasn’t a sidestep. Maybe it was a lie. Too bad. Finn was a few years retired now, he was built along much the same lines as Kevin, and this girl looked about twenty-two. He doubted she had the faces and names of All Blacks Past in her memory banks.

  She said, “Oh,” in a surprised tone, then, “One minute, please,” smiled at him again, put a hand to her hair, and picked up the phone. She knew the name—probably from a dad who’d shouted at the television every Saturday night—but not the face. So far, so good.

  She rang off and said, “He’ll be with you straight away, if you’d like to take a seat,” and looked excited, as if she were mentally composing her Facebook status and wondering if she dared take a photo.

  Kevin thanked her, but didn’t sit. Instead, he turned his back and studied the framed photos on the wall. Could be he’d pass for the retired and revered All Blacks hard man from the back, even to Rich, at least for a moment. Because if Rich walked in and recognized him, he’d probably turn straight around and sprint for the safety of his office. Or call the police. He’d seemed like that kind of bloke.

  To be fair, Kevin had stomped all over his shiny new car and kicked out the windscreen. He supposed that could make a person cautious.

  Sure enough, when he heard, “Finn?” and turned around, he got a dropped jaw and backpedaling worthy of a cartoon character. If Rich didn’t actually sprint away, Kevin had a feeling it was only because he didn’t want to lose face in front of the receptionist.

  Rich said to the girl, “You said Finn Douglas was here.”

  She was looking flustered. “He is! At least he said—”

  “He’s not,” Rich snapped, then told Kevin, “Unless you’re here to talk about the damage to my car and how you’re going to pay for it, I have nothing to say to you.”

  Kevin leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. Just try to make me go, his posture said, and hopefully also, Not jumping you. Yet. He said, “I noticed that I haven’t heard from your insurance company.”

  To be honest, he hadn’t noticed any such thing. He’d been gone for nearly two weeks. There could be a letter sitting in the basket on the kitchen bench at this very minute. But he’d bet any amount of money that there wasn’t, because Rich wanted the whole thing forgotten.

  He was right. Rich’s eyes slid away, and he said stiffly, “I decided it wasn’t in Zavy’s best interest to pursue it.”

  “Mm,” Kevin said. “Probably best. I thought you might want to get a coffee with me.”

  He got some more gaping for that. If Rich were going to become a politician, he needed to work on his unruffled manner. “What?”

  Kevin shrugged one shoulder. “Seems to me we’ve got a wee bit in common, and I could have some information you need. May be worth a discussion, don’t you think?” He glanced at the receptionist. “Or we could do it here if you’re not keen.”

  More shifting eyes. Rich clearly wanted to ask, Is this a ruse to lure me outside and do me over? So Kevin answered him. “It’s coffee. And a chat.”

  Surely two dogs had never circled each other more warily than the pair of them as they rode down in th
e lift and walked to the nearest café, then stood at the counter to place their orders. When Kevin pulled out his card to pay, though, Rich finally spoke. “I’ll get it.”

  Kevin glanced at him blandly, said, “I’ve got it,” handed the card over, and thought, I win that one, too.

  Too easy, really. Power position. Dominant posture. If they had been two dogs, one of them had his head over the other’s back, and it was him. Rich knew it, too. Rattled all the way.

  But then, lawyering was one thing, and signaling to your opponent that you were ready and willing to smash him to the ground was something else. That was where a rugby player had the advantage. Sending that signal was in your DNA, and Kevin had had twenty years to perfect his technique.

  He led the way to a table near the window, sat down first, waited for Rich, and then waited some more until Rich said, “Right. I’m here. What?”

  Kevin could have told him that talking first meant he’d lost again, but he didn’t. He said, keeping it calm, “You’re standing for Parliament.”

  Rich’s eyes widened fractionally before he caught himself and said, “What makes you think that?”

  Kevin didn’t answer that, either. Instead, he said, “It would look bad for you not to see your son. Could make you look like a bad father, even if you never miss a payment. Hardly seems fair, does it?”

  “Obviously not.” Rich still sounded stiff, and he still looked it, too. Poker-straight. In response, Kevin relaxed his shoulders more, leaned back farther. The girl brought their coffees over, Kevin thanked her and Rich didn’t, and Kevin stirred his flat white just to draw the tension out. Finally, he said, “Another unfair thing. Here you are, paying—what? The maximum possible?”

  The suspicion was clear when Rich said, “If you’re asking, you must know I am.”

  Kevin said, “Which will only cut into the funds more if you’re an MP, eh. Guessing that’s a pay cut, not a pay rise. From what Chloe tells me, you didn’t even want a baby, and yet you have to make those payments until Zavy’s eighteen, and even that isn’t good enough for the party, or the voters. It’s not even good for Zavy. You didn’t want him, but that doesn’t mean you don’t want what’s best for him now that he’s here.”

  Rich shifted restlessly. “Where are you going with this?”

  Kevin hadn’t drunk his coffee. He didn’t want it. The effort to appear reasonable was providing enough stomach acid. “I’ll lay out an alternative scenario, put my cards on the table. You could also think it’s unfair that a man who never set foot in a university gets that much attention and that big a pass. That he’s paid that much money for chucking a ball around in a kid’s game, too. You could, and you could be right, but you and I both know that’s the world we live in. That means something else too, though. Means that if I marry Chloe, the spotlight will be on the two of us. And if I wanted to adopt Zavy, your troubles would be over. You wouldn’t have a son who was living with a single mum barely scraping by, a son you barely saw. He wouldn’t have your name, and it wouldn’t even be a scandal. If it came up? The boy was so young, and you thought it was in his best interest to let me adopt him, give him that thing voting mums love to hear about.” He made air quotes. “An ‘intact family.’ And a wee bonus for you—the money bit’s on me, too. You’re off the hook in every possible way.”

  Rich wasn’t looking furious, which was the only reaction Kevin could imagine. If it had been him, and some bloke had suggested that he hand over his son? He’d have been across the table by this point with his hands around his neck.

  Of course, Rich also wasn’t weeping with gratitude and pumping Kevin’s hand. Unfortunately.

  Sit back and wait. He drank some lukewarm coffee. Making it casual, like it was just a suggestion. Not pushing it, not making it into a power struggle.

  Rich asked, “Are you marrying Chloe?” Not in a That’s my woman sort of way. More in an I’m just curious sort of way. Which, again, wouldn’t have been Kevin’s reaction.

  “If she’ll have me.”

  “Ah,” Rich said, looking—something. Disappointed? Relieved? Kevin couldn’t tell. “So this is a hypothetical.”

  “That’s what it is.” No pressure.

  Rich stood up. “I’ll think about it.”

  Kevin didn’t stand up. He said, “Right. You do that. The offer stands.”

  Rich didn’t answer, and he definitely didn’t shake hands. He walked out, and Kevin had to practically hold himself down to keep from ... what? Running after him, spinning him around by the shoulder, and telling him what he really wanted to say, probably. That if Rich kept on taking Zavy, he should wonder exactly when Kevin would snap, when “reasonable” would become something very unpleasant indeed. Not to mention that Kevin would be telling the story of the father who’d locked his son in his new car, who’d stood and watched his three-year-old child wailing in discomfort and terror as the car got hotter for forty long minutes, just because he didn’t want to damage that car. That an All Black had one hell of a platform to speak from, and Kevin would be using every single plank of it to get that message out to every media source and every voter in Rich’s district.

  He breathed in, breathed out, and told himself that he could still do exactly that. All of it. This was just Plan A. A plan he could keep from Chloe, because he hadn’t burned any bridges for her. All he’d done was have a civil conversation and plant the seed.

  If it didn’t work? He was ready to go to Plan B. And anywhere else he needed to go, too.

  As far as he had to. All the way to nuclear.

  It didn’t work, unfortunately. For the next three months, it was status quo in that department. No overtures from Rich. No communication at all.

  Well, it had always been an outside shot. It was going to have to be Plan B—the “Discredit Rich” plan, the threat of taking the story to the media—but Kevin was going to wait until Rich announced his candidacy to approach him again. You always wanted the stakes to be at their highest, for your opponent to have the most possible to lose, because that hurt the worst. The end of August, that was the right time.

  And if that didn’t work? Plan C. Whatever that was. He’d figure it out. You played what was in front of you.

  Of course, he’d have to tell Chloe about it before he did it. She’d probably be narky if she knew what he’d done already. She’d need to buy in, but surely she would. Surely.

  Well, if she wanted the same thing he wanted, she would.

  That was why, though, on a Saturday night in early August, Zavy was at Rich’s, spending the night as he’d been doing for the past couple months, much to Chloe’s distress. For once, Kevin got to be there for her, because the Blues had been knocked out in the semifinals of the Super Rugby competition, and he didn’t have to leave for training at Mount Maunganui with the All Blacks until Tuesday.

  So how was he spending his Saturday night off? He was on the couch with Chloe watching TV. In her apartment, because that was another thing that hadn’t changed. She and Zavy were still here, and he was still biting his tongue about that. He was half-watching the movie—something with singing and dancing and cheesy costumes, which wasn’t exactly riveting him—with Chloe’s feet in his lap, giving them a massage.

  It wasn’t that taking her out wasn’t brilliant, but staying in with her wasn’t bad either. Relaxing, you could call it. Anyway, she was always jumpy, on edge, when Rich had Zavy. This was better.

  “Wonder if there’s a fetish for this,” he said, digging his thumbs a little harder into the ball of her foot. “That’d be an odd thing, eh.”

  “What?” she asked absently, her eyes on the screen. “Dancers’ feet? You’re right. So much ugly to get you to look beautiful.”

  It was true. Her feet, the foundation of all that grace and beauty, were nothing anybody would put in a painting. She always had a black toenail or three, not to mention some fairly monstrous bumps and bunions. If you wanted to look like you were floating, like you were flying, it seemed the tiny bit of you
that remained earthbound paid the price. At least her feet weren’t bleeding much anymore, though, not like they had at the beginning.

  It had been one hell of a job to work her way back. When she’d been reduced to a hobble by nightfall and he’d commiserated, though, she’d just said, “Ballet is pain,” and shut her mouth on anything more. It was only when he gave her a massage that her sighs, even the occasional moan, told him the real story.

  That stoicism was something else he knew all about. It was hard to imagine those fragile ballerina bodies being as battered and sore as a rugby player’s after a match, but that was the reality behind the magic. It had been a grueling three months for her, a fight all the way, exactly the way it was to come back after the sort of injury that kept you out for a season. When you worked through the discomfort, the fatigue, the outright pain of burning lungs, of muscles that screamed by nightfall, and nothing but sheer determination had you getting up the next morning to do it all again.

  It wasn’t for enjoyment. It was for love.

  Now, her phone dinged, and she reached out a lazy hand and looked at it, then swung her foot down and sat up straight. Staring.

  “What?” His body had gone to Full Alert. “Zavy?”

  “No.” The face she turned to him showed a complicated mix of emotion he couldn’t decipher. “It’s Renata from the company. She’s heard a rumor that they’re going to do Swan Lake for the summer season.”

  “And you think you could be up for that part? The main one?” He couldn’t remember what it was called.

  “No.” She had her composure back, was lying down again, and he started on the other foot. “They’ll work me into something, though, I hope. Dmitri ...” The artistic director, the man in charge of everything except the business end of the company. “He’s been giving me heaps of correction in class this week.”

  “Oh.” He worked her toes, rubbing them, pulling them, feeling the response and relief in her entire body. “Sorry, baby. But you’ll get there.”