“Sweetheart.” He reached into the backseat and laid his hand over Charlie’s bare toes—the only part of her he could touch while being restricted by his seat belt. “Of course I wouldn’t make you go in the water.”
“Mummy and Daddy went to heaven after they went swimming.” More tears spilled down her face.
“I know. They went swimming at a beach that wasn’t safe, and they got into trouble because there was no one around to help them.” He patted her hot little feet. “I wouldn’t let you get into trouble.”
I’ll always be around to help you, was on the tip of his tongue, but he snapped his mouth shut before he could say it. Because it wasn’t true, was it? He wouldn’t be around after his mum was well enough to resume guardianship. He wouldn’t be the one patiently working on Charlie’s fears, holding her while they sat in Bounty Bay’s sun-warmed rock pools day after day until she felt comfortable tackling the ocean, inch by inch.
At least…Owen stared at his hand resting on her little foot, remembering the time Ali introduced him to his youngest niece. The awe he’d felt with Charlie’s tiny feet resting in the palm of his hands. At least…he could try. Just not today when she was already upset.
Gracie pulled the Land Rover over to park beside a few other cars lined up on a bank of hard sand. He slanted a glance at her and was stunned to see her cheeks were also damp. She remained silent, pulling on the handbrake and killing the engine.
“Charlie, when we were talking about surfing, we meant sand surfing,” he said. “We’re going to climb to the top of the sand dune and slide down.” Owen forced a cheery smile. “We’ll have a race.”
He caught the movement of Gracie swiping a hand across her cheeks. She unclipped her seat belt and turned around. “That’s right. I’ve got three boogie boards and two sheets of cardboard in the back, so we can all race.”
“Like when Gramps took us to slide down the grassy hill on those bits of plastic,” Morgan said. “Remember? You had, like, fifty slides.”
Charlie gave a tentative little giggle, but she unfolded from her hunched position. “It was fifty hundred times.”
“Whatever.” Morgan unclipped her seat belt and then unexpectedly leaned over to kiss her sister’s temple. “Let’s see if you can make it fifty thousand today, okay?”
Once everyone was out of the Land Rover, and Owen had handed out the three boogie boards to the kids—who abandoned the adults and ran for the dunes—he slid out the cardboard sheets.
“Natalie still had some packing boxes left in her garage, and I borrowed the boards off her, too…” When Gracie met his gaze, her eyes filled with tears once again. “Jesus, Owen. I’m sorry. I just didn’t think—”
“Hey.” He dumped the cardboard and wrapped his arms around her, drawing her close for what was supposed to be a friend-comforting-friend hug. Only invisible wires drew his mouth down to her forehead, and he just drank her in. Nothing at all friendly about it—he wanted to hold her tight then kiss her again. But that wasn’t what she needed right now. “She’s okay now. It was a great idea, and she won’t even remember she was upset five minutes from now.”
“No, but I will. You will.” Her mouth moved against his shoulder, tickling his skin through the cotton of his oldest tee shirt.
Then she pulled away—maybe, like him, realizing this embrace had gone well beyond casual comfort.
“We’d better catch up,” she said.
“Yeah.” Owen tucked the cardboard sheets under his arm, and they strode to the dune’s base.
“Ready for a killer workout?” he asked as they stepped up and up onto the constantly shifting sand. “Race you to the kids.”
She shot him a cocky smile. “You’re on.” And gave his arm a hard shove.
Owen toppled sideways, his feet sliding out from under him. “That’s cheating,” he shouted to her retreating back.
Gracie paused long enough to say, “You have longer legs. Now we’re even,” then threw her weight forward again.
He remained sprawled on the dune. He watched the flex of her leg muscles as she fought her way upward. A salty breeze from the nearby Pacific Ocean ruffled his hair and cooled his sun-warmed arms. For a moment, he forgot about patients, and emergency surgeries, and motherless nieces. He was just Owen Bennett…a man who wanted this woman with the same breathless desperation, the same heart-pumping passion he felt struggling to climb this mountain of ever-shifting sand.
***
“Uncle Owen? If you’re gonna stroke out, can you pull over before the school gates so none of my friends see?”
Owen snapped out of his metaphorical man cave, where his reptilian brain was in quiet panic mode over Morgan’s first day of school. He glanced across to the passenger seat, where his niece, wearing a white blouse and a blue plaid skirt, had her arms folded and her eyes directed at the car’s roof.
Owen loosened his death grip on the steering wheel and tried to relax his shoulders. Other than the fun he’d had with Gracie and the kids on the sand dunes three days ago, his scapula felt as if it’d been replaced with cold, hard steel. Or maybe lead, since he stooped under the weight of going against his late sister’s wishes.
“I’m cool,” he said. “I’m down with your groove, Morg.”
Morgan snorted and turned her face toward the passenger window—but a dimple popped up in her cheek.
Owen breathed out a quiet sigh. Yeah, his resolve had collapsed like tissue paper on the return trip to Bounty Bay from the dunes. Gracie asked him to drive since she was unfamiliar with beach driving, and he had to confess he was a little reluctant because he’d enjoyed the hell outta watching her behind the wheel. But with miles of wide, hard-packed sand to drive along on an almost deserted stretch of coastline, the temptation to cut loose was too tempting. He’d had the carful of sandy kids whooping as they blasted along the beach. They slowed down only for the few streams that cut low channels through the sand on the way to the ocean, and the few times they spotted other vehicles.
One such vehicle made Morgan’s face light up like a department store Christmas tree. “That’s Harmony’s dad’s car—slow down!”
His niece had rolled down the window, and the girl in the opposite four-wheel drive did the same.
After a brief shouted conversation, Harmony said, “See you at school this week?”
Morgan’s excitement had vanished. “I dunno.” She’d hunched down into her seat.
With a silent apology to Ali, Owen buzzed down his window. “She’ll be there. I’m enrolling her Monday morning.”
“Best. Uncle. Ever!” Morgan had said once the other vehicle had pulled away.
Owen had resumed staring through the sand-splattered windshield, his hand resting on the gearshift, pulse throbbing thickly in his throat. He couldn’t—and wouldn’t—go back on his word now, he’d thought. A cool palm had smoothed over his rigid knuckles. Gracie had smiled at him, warm approval in her eyes.
It’d flowed over and soothed him then but now, on School Day One…
He signaled, turning onto the street leading to Bounty Bay High School and braking a little too hard as backpack-wearing teenagers jostled and ran across the road to the school gates. Strays who weren’t part of the laughing clusters followed at a safe distance. Then came the gangly kids with hunched necks from staring at the ground. Kids who looked far too young to be high school age. Kids who put on a swagger, but the frown lines etched into their foreheads gave them away.
His stomach knotted. “I know I enrolled you yesterday, but it’s not too late to change your mind today.”
He pulled into a parking spot a short distance away from the school gates, so Morgan wouldn’t be scarred for life by his presence.
“I thought you liked high school?”
“I did,” he said. “After a while. It was rough the first few months—lots of adjustments to make.” Like trying to establish a position in the school hierarchy, where everyone knew everyone from kindergarten.
Hippie. Whit
e trash gypsy. Homeschooled.
“Sometimes kids can be mean when you’re a little different—when you’ve been raised differently.” Owen dragged a hand over his face. God, how lame did that sound? It was true, but, yeah, lame.
Morgan looked at him with her big dark eyes—the color of them all her dad’s Mediterranean heritage, the expression in them all her mum’s impatience. “Homeschooled kids can be just as mean. Being homeschooled doesn’t mean you don’t turn out to be an ass—I mean, donkey-hole.”
Owen chuckled. “You’re right. I’ve met some homeschooled donkey-holes in my time.”
“It’s different now. Different than when Nana taught you guys, like, thirty years ago.”
Owen winced but kept his mouth shut.
“Homeschooling isn’t so different now,” she continued. “It’s mainstream—like girls who wear hijabs and kids with two mums or dads, or even girls who play rugby.”
Whoa! “You want to play rugby now?”
“Maybe.” She swatted aside his surprise. “I just mean you don’t have to worry about me. I’ll adjust. I’m good at making adjustments.”
Not only with fitting in with her peers—she didn’t have to say it. As the eldest, Morgan had made the hardest adjustments since her parents died. She’d gone from bossy, older sibling to the responsible one, the second mum, in record time.
“You’ll be fine,” he said. Reassuring her, or reassuring himself? He didn’t know.
Morgan unclipped her seat belt then popped open the door. She kept her gaze locked on her hands. “You gotta be willing to be hurt entering the ring, or you’ll hide terrified in the corner, never knowing if a fight could win you the match. That’s what Mum used to say when I was scared to try something new.” She raised her head, offering Owen a lopsided smile. “She was so brave.”
Owen’s heart fisted in his chest. “And you’re so much like her; I know you’ll kick donkey today.”
His niece stared at him a moment longer. An understanding and connection that bypassed the years of age difference zipped between them. In some weird way, it was like looking into his big sister’s eyes again.
Then Morgan giggled so hard she nearly toppled off her seat. Righting herself, she snagged the shoulder straps of her new backpack and climbed out.
“You’re so embarrassing.” She bent down so she could see him. “That’s why I’m catching the bus home today.”
“You do that.” Owen pointed a finger at her. “Smart-donkey.”
With a disgusted groan, Morgan slammed the car door and merged into the stream of kids pouring into the school.
Owen did a U-turn and headed toward the hospital.
You gotta be willing to be hurt entering the ring, or you’ll hide terrified in the corner, never knowing if a fight could win you the match. Morgan’s words rolled around his head as he pulled into the hospital parking lot.
Damn if it didn’t perfectly describe the situation with Gracie. Question was, how brave was he, really?
Chapter 12
Just how Gracie didn’t want her sexy boss finding her three weeks after she officially started homeschooling the two younger kids—lightly dusted in flour with smears of cookie dough on her mouth.
Not to mention that Charlie had pink playdough in her hair, and William was doubled over laughing as his “Snape’s potion” experiment foamed over the kitchen table.
With Taylor Swift cranked up to eardrum-puncturing levels, Gracie hadn’t heard Owen’s car rumbling up the driveway. It wasn’t until the back door banged open and Owen walked in that the three of them froze. Busted.
Gracie cut the music, and Charlie recovered first, launching herself at Owen, smearing her cookie-dough mouth across his navy-blue scrubs.
“Why are you home?” she asked. “Are you gonna have lunch with us?”
“That’s the plan. I stopped in at the bakery for some fresh bread.” He pulled a clump of pink playdough from Charlie’s curls with a grimace. “Why don’t you and William wash up?”
“Yay! Lunchtime!” Charlie released Owen’s legs and ran from the room.
William, his hands covered in green foam, ran after her.
Frown lines appeared on his forehead as Owen went to place the paper bag on the table. He crossed to the kitchen counter for a clean spot to leave the bread then ran his pink-doughy fingers under the faucet.
“This is an unexpected but nice surprise.” The urge to check for dough clumps in her hair almost overwhelming, Gracie snatched up a dish sponge. She glanced at the dining table. Playdough smeared one end, and green goop dribbling over a metal bowl sat at the other—goop headed toward the table’s edge and Owen’s clean floors. Oops.
Gracie scooted around six foot of scowling male, cutting off the goop at the pass.
“Isn’t eleven to midday time for science?” he asked.
Footsteps clicked behind her, then the rustle of paper as he thumbed through the plastic folders containing William and Charlie’s worksheets. Worksheets she and the kids had barely glanced at this week.
“We were doing science.” Gracie sponged the last of goop into the bowl and carried it to the sink. “We baked cookies, made playdough for Charlie, and imagined we were in Snape’s potion class, and discovered what happens when baking soda, food coloring, and vinegar combines. Kitchen chemistry.”
More papery sounds. Owen flipped through the printed-out pages, frown lines deepening by the second.
“That’s not what I’d set out for today.” He snapped the folder shut. “And why are most of William’s worksheets not filled in?”
His tone made her insides bristle with the same irritation her father’s lectures used to invoke. Heat mushroomed in Gracie’s cheeks. “Because they’re bloody dull, and William hates them. So I decided to switch things up.” Green goop swirled down the drain as she rinsed the bowl.
“It doesn’t matter if he hates them,” Owen said. “I agreed to continue their education while they’re with me.”
“It doesn’t matter if he hates them?” Gracie’s peripheral vision caught the flash of navy blue farther along the counter. “Are you even listening to yourself?”
She ignored the little tingle of awareness and continued to clean the bowl until the damn thing sparkled. “A kid shouldn’t be forced into doing something they hate, not when there’s a perfectly good alternative. It’s called self-directed learning—I’ve been reading about it.”
Owen let out a soft snort. “You sound just like my sister.”
Wow. The man sure knew how to make a girl feel good because the undertone in his comparison wasn’t complimentary. Oh—he loved his sister, she didn’t doubt that. But Gracie sensed he didn’t approve of the way Alison had chosen to live her life. And by extension, the way Gracie lived hers.
She slowly turned off the water; the rapid drip-drip-drip mimicked the blood thudding inside her head. She dried her hands on a dish towel and faced him.
“You know, I was thinking almost the same thing. You sound just like my father. He was all for homework clubs and extra tutoring if I, heaven forbid, got a grade less than an A. He decided the school subjects I studied, regardless of my interests, and he dictated what extracurricular activities were suitable for a young lady”— Gracie sucked a breath into lungs that felt set in concrete—“and hint, if it didn’t further my education, it was considered out of the question. For all the hours and dollars spent on tutoring, I still don’t understand calculus. But I remember every single thing I learned during one week of school holiday art lessons while Dad was overseas on business. For that hour, I soaked up everything I possibly could, whereas calculus? Please.”
“I happened to like science and math as a kid—”
“Hello, have you met you? Of course you did. You wanted to be a doctor.”
Gracie subtly arched away in a valiant attempt not to inhale the scent of eau-de-medical-professional off Owen’s scrubs while she stood covered in flour and, yup—a little gritty sweetness of the butter-suga
r combo she’d tested remained on the corner of her mouth. She swiped her tongue over it. Maybe he wouldn’t notice.
But his gaze zeroed in on her face, and a muscle twitched in his jaw. He folded his arms, drumming his fingers on one very nicely bunched bicep.
“My brother didn’t learn to read fluently until he was fourteen,” he said quietly. “He was more interested in building stuff with Dad or riding his bike or doing science projects like that”—he nodded toward the table—“than reading. Mum never forced him, so he continued to do his own thing.”
“What happened at fourteen?”
The corner of Owen’s mouth kicked up. “Tolkien.”
“Tolkien?”
“The Hobbit. Mum would read one chapter to us each night. About a quarter of the way through it, she got laryngitis and couldn’t continue.” He huffed out a laugh and shook his head. “Daniel, frustrated at not knowing what Bilbo Baggins got up to next, continued to painstakingly read it aloud himself. Didn’t matter how many times I told him to shut up, he struggled on. By the end of the week, he’d finished the damn thing, and read like a voice actor.”
“A perfect illustration of self-directed learning. Your brother was highly motivated to learn to read better in order to finish the story.”
Score one for Google and Gracie!
Only Owen’s face remained implacable. “It’s a perfect explanation of why he failed his first formal English exams in high school because he was still behind his peers. Why he had to study twice as hard as any other kid to achieve academically. If he’d done the work when he was younger…”
From out in the hallway came the sounds of running footsteps and Charlie’s giggles. Owen selected a bread knife from the wooden block and pulled a crusty loaf out of the bakery’s brown paper bag.
The scent of fresh-baked bread should’ve been pleasurable, but instead, it made Gracie’s stomach clench. “I guess your brother didn’t have the same definition of success as you did.”
“No. And it’s my duty to ensure Morgan, William, and Charlie have a well- rounded education, starting with the worksheets I assign. I’m not saying William’s fascination with Harry Potter is wrong.” His fingers tightened around the knife’s handle, his knuckles becoming prominent. “You understand why he identifies with the series so strongly?”
Teach Your Heart: A New Zealand Opposites Attract Romance (Far North Series Book 3) Page 14