Just in Time (Escape to New Zealand Book 8)

by James, Rosalind

  “Being with you wasn’t about the money, or the books,” his sister read slowly. “It was about you.”

  “What money?” she asked him when she’d finished. “I don’t understand. Did she steal from you? I can’t believe Faith would do that.”

  “No. I’ve got to…” He was having trouble with his voice. “Got to go.”

  “I think you should find her,” Talia said. “I think she loves you. When she gave me this…she was crying.”

  He rang off, tried to ring Faith again in the hope that she might have turned on her phone. Voicemail again, but he knew where she was now. She was here.

  Back to the Air New Zealand counter again, back in the queue, behind two other passengers this time. A middle-aged couple who fumbled for passports, then seemed to be buying a cruise, based on the amount of time the agent was spending tapping details into her computer, and Will was bouncing the phone in his hand, seething.

  At last, though, it was his turn.

  “I still can’t tell you,” the agent said, eyeing him suspiciously.

  “I don’t need you to tell me,” Will said. “I need you to get me on tonight’s flight to LA.”

  More tapping from long red-varnished fingernails, while he shifted from foot to foot and waited.

  “Sorry,” she finally said. “Sold out.”

  “What? No.”

  “Sold out,” she repeated. And then, as if he might be too dim to get that, “No seats left.”

  “I know what sold out means. Sell me one anyway. Somebody can volunteer to be bumped, right? Get a lovely voucher for a free journey. Happens all the time. I’ll pay for it myself, but I need to get on there.”

  She stared at him. “No.”

  “Look,” he said. “My girlfriend’s on that flight. She’s leaving me. I need to get on there and get her back.”

  “You think that’s making it better,” the woman said, “but you’re wrong, because you just escalated from Potentially Scary to Security Risk, and I’m about two seconds away from getting them over here. If I didn’t know who you were, I’d have done it already, but that blue shirt’s only going to take you so far, and you’ve just reached it. I can’t sell you a ticket I don’t have. No.”

  “Right,” he said. “Plan B.” There was always a Plan B, and a Plan C, and on down the list. “Sell me a ticket to Las Vegas however you can do it, the one that gets in at the closest time to the flight that connects from LA.”

  More endless clicking. “Have to connect through San Francisco,” she said. “And a three-hour layover.”

  “Fine. Good. Do it.” He pulled out his credit card and shoved it across the counter together with his passport. “Go.” He glanced at the monitor above the woman’s head that listed the departing flights. San Francisco in two hours. And LA in one. He hefted his duffel onto the platform. Sacrificed to the cause.

  “You know,” she said as she began the insanely tedious process of booking him in, “if she doesn’t want you, there’s no point.”

  “That’s helpful. Cheers.”

  “Sometimes a man has to take no for an answer,” she said, “no matter who he is.”

  And sometimes, Will didn’t say, because that would have brought Security running for sure, he has to die trying.

  After that, it was passport control, and security, and all the rest of it. And then he was running, because the flight for LA left in forty-five minutes, and they’d be boarding any minute. Up the stairs, taking them three at a time, past the wine bar, all the way to the end of the corridor.

  Where he stopped. Because he’d forgotten this. Completely forgotten.

  Another security gate, a cobbled-together one just beyond the seating area where the passengers waited to board. Two little tables, each manned by an agent. One last scanner to walk through. One final inspection before boarding a flight to the States.

  Maybe, though…He pulled out his passport and boarding pass, chose the table with a woman at it, and handed them over. He gave her his best smile in hopes that it would distract her, keep her from looking too closely at what was on that boarding pass. Who knew, maybe she liked big, wild-eyed, sweating Maori blokes.

  Or maybe not, because she was handing his documents straight back to him. “Wrong gate, love,” she said. “You want 13 for San Fran.”

  “Actually,” he said, trying, this time, for something that sounded more confiding and less like a mad, scary ex, “I was hoping to nip in for just a moment. My partner and I got separated. Flight’s sold out, eh. She’s on this one, and I need a quick word.”

  “Can’t do it, sorry. Why don’t you call her, have her come out? They haven’t started boarding them yet.”

  “See, that’s the silly thing. Her phone’s off. If I could—just for a minute.”

  “Can’t,” she said again. “It’d be my job.” She glanced at the fella at the other table, and he nodded.

  “Can’t,” he told Will, as if he wouldn’t have heard it the first time. “Will Tawera, aren’t you?” he asked. “Well done last night, by the way.”

  “Cheers,” Will said. “So you see, not a security risk. Tell you what, you can hold my passport and boarding pass,” he thought to add. “I won’t be going anywhere without them. Five minutes. That’s all.”

  “Nah, mate,” the man said. “Sorry. Can’t.”

  Will could hear the announcement coming over the loudspeaker. They were about to start boarding, and it was now or never.

  Die trying.

  He filled his lungs with the training of years spent shouting to his backline over the voices of sixty thousand rabid fans.

  “Faith!”

  Both agents jumped, and he heaved in another breath and did it again.

  “FAITH!”

  “What are you doing?” the woman exclaimed as the man began to rise, his radio in his hand.

  “What you said,” Will said. “I’m calling her.”

  Stay

  Faith sat with her forehead pressed against the little oval window and watched the ground fall away beneath her. The ribbons of rain that streaked horizontally across the glass were a perfect match for the tears that ran down her cheeks. She’d tried so hard not to give into them, but it wasn’t possible anymore, not now that she was here. Not now that she was leaving.

  She had one last brief glimpse of silver lake, the green folds of the hills. The emerald of fern trees, and the darker color of the mighty giants through whose tops she and Will had walked, on a carefree day that felt like a lifetime ago.

  Just one glimpse, and then it was all gone, lost beneath a layer of gray cloud that lay between her and her last moments in Rotorua.

  Kua hinga te totara i te wao nui a Tane. A totara had fallen in the forest of Tane. When it fell, it left a hole in your life. In your heart.

  A mercifully short flight, this one, and they were through the cloud cover again, descending over the western suburbs of Auckland, and touching down. Passport control, security, one last polite Kiwi smiling at her and telling her to have a pleasant flight, and that was goodbye. She was at the gate for Flight NZ6 to Los Angeles, almost the only passenger here this early, sitting for two hours as the seats gradually filled around her. Sitting looking out at the big white jets lined up on the tarmac, Air New Zealand emblazoned on their sides, the stylized swirl of the koru on their tails.

  The symbol of life, of hope, of new beginnings. Of everything that was New Zealand, but not for her. Not anymore. Not ever, no matter how it had felt, because she’d never really belonged here. Because it had all just been pretending after all.

  There was a dad beside her now, big and brown, holding a curly-haired toddler in one broad arm to look at the jets, a stroller at his feet. She saw the flash of white teeth as he talked to his little boy, his big hand at the end of a tattoo-bedecked arm pointing to a baggage cart trundling out to load suitcases onto a jumbo jet.

  That was nothing to do with her, either. That was the worst kind of wishful thinking. She could put it into a
book, and that was all.

  Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. She’d always hated that saying. But she knew one that worked, at least for her. Those who can’t, write.

  And all the same, she would sit here and look at all of it until she couldn’t see it anymore. Until she was in a darkened cabin, flying through the night back to her real life, her lonely life, drinking one too many glasses of wine and watching a movie she wouldn’t really see, just so she could finally find the comfort of sleep.

  She would go back to her life, she would live it as best she could, and she would try to be grateful for what New Zealand had given her. Even if that was only book material.

  She didn’t realize the shout was for her at first, so lost in her thoughts was she. But as the second one came, she was rising in disbelief.

  “FAITH!”

  It was a bellow, and other passengers had turned to check out the disturbance, but Faith barely noticed them. She was hurrying through the gate area, her laptop bag swinging from her shoulder, banging against her side. And then she was screeching to a stop at one side of the security post.

  Because, of course, the bellower had been Will.

  Will, standing smack-dab in the center of two beleaguered security agents who were on their feet now, his legs planted as if it would take an army to move him. Showing, for once, how much of the easygoing manner was a disguise for the steel beneath.

  “Will,” she said weakly. “Why?”

  “We were going to talk,” he said. “Remember that?”

  Her heart, which had begun to beat so hard at the sight of him, settled right back down again. Sank, if the truth were known. Of course that was why he was here. He thought she was running away so she didn’t have to face him. And it was true, but not in the way he thought.

  “If you came here to yell at me some more,” she said, “I guess you’ve got the right. I’m here, and so are you. So go ahead.” She wrapped her arms around herself to bear it. “I thought this would make it easier for you. That you could say whatever you needed to say about me that would make things better, without worrying about hurting me. Because I knew you’d worry about that, no matter how angry you were. I thought that this way, I could be gone. I could have run, have used you and dumped you. I could just be the bad guy.”

  “And you think that’s all I care about. You think that’s all that matters.” His own arms were folded across his broad chest, and he looked nothing but fierce. Nothing but furious.

  “I know it is,” she said sadly. “I know how much it matters. You care so much about rugby, and you care about taking care of your family. Which is nothing but good, and which is what makes you so…” She swallowed. “So special. But what I did, what I am…it’s in the way of both things, and I don’t want to get in your way. I’m trying to do the right thing, and it’s so…” She took a breath and tried to still the trembling that was taking over now. “It’s so hard. But I’m trying to do it anyway. So say what you need to say to me, and I’ll listen, and then I’ll leave.”

  “That would be brilliant,” he said, “if that was what I wanted. But I care about more than that. This thing coming out right now—it isn’t good. I’d be lying if I said it was. But it isn’t the end.”

  “But it is the end, whether I leave today or tomorrow. It was always the end.” It hurt so much to say it. Even more than it hurt to know it.

  His arms weren’t folded now, and he was leaning forward a little. Looking like he wanted to walk straight through the barrier, and her heart had begun to beat out a wild tattoo of wishing. Of longing. If only…if only…

  “Only if you want to go,” he said, and her heart was galloping so fast now, it was about to leap from her chest. “Only if we make that true. But we have a choice. We can choose to ride it out instead, and there’s no reason in the world we can’t do that. All right, you wrote some sexy books, and there’ll be a bit of excitement about that. And so what?”

  “So…plenty.” She fought to pull herself back under control. He wanted her? He did? How could that even be possible? “Plenty, because they’ve got your picture on them. And because I wrote them, and because my hero looks exactly like you. Because everybody’s going to think he is you, and if I’d known everything that would happen, I’d never have done it, but I did, and it’s out there, and it can’t be undone. Because I can’t put the genie back in the bottle. It’s too late.”

  The two security agents, who had sat down again, were twisted in their chairs now, looking between the two of them with some fascination. “Really?” the woman said.

  “Yeh,” Will told her. “This is Faith Goodwin. My girlfriend, who’s written some sexy books with my photo on the covers. You can read all about it tomorrow. And you can read the books, too. You should, because they’re good. Even though, sorry to say, they’re not about me.”

  “You didn’t…” Faith tried to say. “You didn’t read them.”

  “Yeh. I did. And you’re right, and you’re wrong. Hemi isn’t me. Nothing like me. And Hope isn’t you. But you haven’t just written sexy books. You’ve written a story, and it’s a bloody good one. You’ve written something real. You made me choke up, and you may even have made me cry. You made me care.”

  “I…I did?” She couldn’t believe it. She’d made him cry?

  “Yeh,” he said, and his face was so—so sweet. “You made me need to read the end, to know that Hemi’s going to be able to convince Hope that she can trust him. I need to know that he’s going to be there for her and Karen. And I wouldn’t say that I’m your target audience. So if you want to write stories, I think you should go on and write them. We all need to do the thing we’re best at. I need to play rugby, and you need to write books. And I think we need to do those things together.”

  She made a little gesture, just a rise and fall of her hand. Helpless. Hopeless. “But it’s…we can’t. Not now, not with all this happening. It’s too late.”

  “No. No. I’m not going to believe it’s too late. It’s never too late. Meeting you, knowing you, all of this? It happened at the right time. The only time I could hear it. The only time I could know it. It happened just in time.”

  “I need to…” She was having trouble breathing. “I need to go back. I have a ticket. I have…jobs.”

  “I know you do. But it seems to me—” Now he was the one hesitating. “That you could have a new job. Just one this time. That you could stay here and write books. That you could stay with me.”

  “With you?” She still had her arms wrapped around herself, and she was still shaking, but for a different reason now.

  “Yeh. With me. You could stay here, and we could see. I know it’s mad. I know it’s too soon, and I don’t care. Because I also know it’s right, and I think you do, too. And I can’t stand to let you get away without trying to hold you. I don’t know many things for sure, but I know this. When you put yourself to the test, when you put everything you have on the line—that’s a risk, because you could find out that you’re not good enough. You can play your guts out, and it still may not be enough. But if you don’t play, you’ll have no chance at all.”

  “Calling your flight,” the male security agent told Faith helpfully. She looked back behind her and hesitated.

  “No,” Will said, and she looked back at him. “Stay. Please, Faith. Stay. Walk to me. Just take the walk.”

  “And then what?”

  He closed his eyes, then opened them again. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I don’t have a clue, because this isn’t a book, and I’m not a billionaire, and I don’t have all the answers. I’m just a…bloke. I don’t own a company, I don’t have a jet, and I don’t have a limousine, and I never will. I’m just a bloke who makes a pretty good wage that could end the day I get one too many concussions or bugger my knee one too many times. I’m a bloke who’s got two mortgages, and a mum, and a grandmother, and a brother and sister to put through Uni. I didn’t send you a necklace while I was gone. I barely sent you a text
. But for better or worse, this is me. No more pretending. This is everything I am. Just a man, standing here in front of you and telling you that I want you, and I need you, and I…I think I love you.”

  She stared at him, and tried to think of something to say, and failed completely.

  “You don’t think I mean it,” he said. “Or you don’t think I can do it. And the truth is, I don’t know either. I don’t know the first thing about being in love, and I’m sure I’ll stuff up all over the shop. But I know it’s there, I know it’s real, and I don’t want to let it go. I can’t let you go without a fight, because we’re worth taking a chance on, if you think…if you think you might be able to love me, too.”

  “I don’t…” she said. “My suitcase is on the plane. I don’t have any clothes. And your mother hates me.”

  He laughed a little at that. “Oh, baby. We can go shopping. And your mother hates me just as much. It doesn’t matter. We’ve got all the time in the world to change their minds. Just…stay. Please. Stay. Even though I’m not a billionaire, and I’ve never been the hero of anybody’s story. I’m nowhere close to perfect, and I know it. But I need you to believe in me all the same.”

  She couldn’t help it, the tears had spilled over again, and she was crying. Because maybe, just maybe…it was true.

  “Of course you’re a hero,” she told him. “You’re your family’s hero, and you’re mine. You’re such a good man, and you don’t even know it. And I love you, too. Of course I do. I think I’ve loved you since that night on the roof, when you opened your heart that little bit to me, because your heart is…it’s beautiful. There’s so much more in you than you show, and it’s so special. I don’t know why you don’t know that, but if you need me to believe in you, you don’t have to wish for that, because I already do. And why would I want a billionaire if I could have you? Why would I want a tortured soul? If I didn’t write you, it’s only because some things are too precious to share. Some things are just…mine. Some things are only for my heart to hold. I don’t want Hemi any more than I hope you want Hope. I want you.”