Kiwi Strong (New Zealand Ever After Book 3)

by Rosalind James

  I sighed. “Mum.”

  “Why would I worry those girls?” she said. “He told me his wife had gone for a walk and hadn’t come back, that she had mental problems. Delusions of persecution, he called it, thinking she had enemies. She had medicine, he told me, but she refused to take it. Convinced he was trying to poison her. Very persuasive, if a person was a fool who’d never been around the block. I asked him if he was in the auto business. That surprised him. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I’m a farmer.’ I said, ‘Oh. With that line of chat, I assumed you were in sales.’ Didn’t look quite so friendly then, did he. Asked me, ‘Has she been here, or not?’ And I said, ‘Why on earth would she be? I’m out at work all day long, and if you’ll notice, I’m up here on this hill. I don’t get lost trampers banging on the door,’ I told him. ‘Best go to the police.’”

  “What did he say to that?” That was Daisy. She had her palms on the edge of the island and was doing a sort of yoga stretch, bending one leg, then the other, her bum in the air. Distracting, I’d call that. She was barefoot again, her pale-blue nails right there to see, flexing and bending. She did have high arches. I seemed to be developing a thing for a woman with high arches and pretty hands and feet. And the kind of thighs that could wrap around your waist and hang on.

  Oh. Mum was talking. “He said that the cops were useless. Which means, I reckon, that they recognized the signs of a woman who’s run away from her husband—run away from Mount Zion at that—and sent him on his way.”

  “I don’t understand,” Daisy said, still doing her stretches, as if I hadn’t noticed that she also had a very nice little round bum, so she’d better show it to me some more, “why he didn’t come sooner. We were there a full day, and he knew it, so why didn’t he come?”

  “Maybe he did,” I said. “Maybe he came that first evening. When we brought home pizza, and Mum had come home from work. When he saw us go into the house, because he knew me when he saw me today.”

  Daisy stopped stretching and stood up—the stretching had caused her T-shirt to ride up, exposing a few centimeters of pale-brown skin before she pulled the shirt down again—and said, “He did? You didn’t say …”

  I said, “I just realized it, is why. When he looked in the rearview mirror, I’d swear he recognized me. And I doubt it was from rugby.”

  “No,” Daisy said. “It wouldn’t have been. There’s no TV at Mount Zion, and there’s no sport. I told you. They’re about the only people in New Zealand who don’t care a bit that you were an All Black.”

  Mum said, “Well, no worries. I sent him about his business, so that’s done.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said, finally forgetting about Daisy’s arches, et cetera. “He knows the girls were there, and now you’re there alone? No.”

  Daisy said, “If he knows they were there … isn’t there a way you can find out who owns a house? A … record, or something?”

  “Title search,” I said. “Yeh. There is.”

  Daisy said, “If he finds out your name because of that, and he knows you live in Dunedin, because he saw you at my flat today …”

  Obedience said, “He could find out about this house. He could come here.”

  The words fell into a well of silence, until Obedience, who’d taken over the tea-making from Daisy, slid my mug in front of me, then offered one to Fruitful, who was on the stool beside me, not saying anything. Her hands were in her lap, and I could see them twisting.

  I said, “The deed isn’t in my name. It’s in Mum’s.”

  Mum said, “No, it isn’t.”

  “Well, yeh,” I said. “It is.”

  “Gray.” I could hear her sigh all the way down the line. For a man who was only trying to be helpful, I had the most reluctant group of women around me that you could possibly imagine. At least the dog was grateful.

  I said, “Of course it is, Mum. I wanted you to have a place that was yours even if something happened to me. Even down the road.”

  “I don’t need a house,” she said, “and I certainly don’t need a house that flash. I was quite happy in my little flat, and I make a good wage and have my superannuation, thank you. And what about when you get married and have children of your own? Your wife may have something to say about that.”

  “Well, what if I died before you?” I asked. “And I was married and had children?”

  “If you die before me,” she said, “the house will be the least of my worries. And you’re going to marry some witch of a woman who’s going to sell the house out from under me, put her children’s Nana out on the street? Yeh, right.”

  “You never know,” I said.

  “Well, yeh,” Mum said. “You do know. I know. If you’re in danger of marrying a woman like that, I’ll be telling you about it, no worries. Put that house back in your own name, Grayson Loto Tamatoa. Do it now.”

  I said, “We’ll talk about it later.” When she would have said more, I went on, “Lucky it is in your name, anyway, because it means Gilead can’t sniff out this house, and neither can anybody else at Mount Zion.”

  “Because Tamatoa’s such a common name,” Daisy said. “And there won’t be, oh, an article or two in some newspaper somewhere, with your mum talking about how proud she is of you, and your photo right there to see. If he knew about that—how to do a title search—which he won’t, but somebody else might. If the Prophet knows, more like—they can find you. They can find us. I need to find us a new place. I need to find it now.”

  “No,” I said. “You need to stay here. You’re working all night,” I went on when she would have argued. “Leaving the girls alone. He knows you’re a nurse. He can suss out that you work in Emergency. Sounded like he had enough clues. Just how long do you think it’ll take him to find you and follow you home from work?” And when she still would have argued, I added, “Or maybe it’s not you he’s looking for at all. How long will it take him—take them—to find Fruitful and Obedience?”

  Obedience’s face had gone white. She’d forgotten about the tea and was just standing there, looking stricken. I said, “Sorry. I know you don’t feel safe, and neither does Fruitful. That’s why I want you here with me. And with Xena.”

  “Who’s Xena?” Mum asked.

  “The dog,” I said.

  “Oh,” Mum said. “Well, that sounds lovely, darling. You keep them there, then. Keep them safe.”

  Ringing-off imminent, I could tell. My mum wasn’t one for long, cozy phone chats. I said, “And I’d like you to come here for a week or so as well.”

  She sighed. Of course she did. “How would I do that? Why would I do that? It’s not time for my holiday yet.”

  “You’re leverage,” I said. “You’re the best leverage anybody could have. And, yes, I know you have a job. If you explain the situation, though, I imagine they’ll cooperate. You do most of your work on the phone anyway, right? Why can’t somebody else deputize for a week or two, and you can supervise from here?

  “You don’t do housekeeping on the phone,” she said.

  “Deputize,” I reminded her. “Also, it’ll be November. Rainy. No autumn colors, and no snow for skiing. Lambing season, too, and all the good tracks closed. You can’t tell me it’s a busy time in Wanaka, because I know it’s not. And you’ve worked for them for thirty-five years and never asked a thing. Ask them now. Please.”

  “I don’t—” she began.

  “Mum,” I said. “Please. I’ve got Daisy and Fruitful and Obedience here, keeping them safe. Daisy’s working nights and sleeping during the day, while I’m at work. The girls don’t know how to drive yet, and they don’t know their way around the … the world. You saw that. They’ll be starting school. Changes all over the shop. Adjustments. The first couple weeks will be rough.”

  “Oh, please come,” Obedience burst out. “It would be so much nicer if you were here. It would be almost like—”

  She stopped, and Mum said, “You’ll be missing your own mum, love. Your sisters and brothers.”

&n
bsp; “Yes,” Obedience said. “I mean, Daisy’s my sister, too, but … she’s not my mum.” Fruitful was still silent.

  Obedience cast an imploring glance at Daisy, who said, “No worries, love. I’m not your mum, you’re right. You haven’t seen me since you were four. Honor, if you can come, we’d love it. It would be helpful, honestly.” She glanced at me as if to ask, Is that what you wanted me to say? It was.

  Mum sighed again. “All right, then. I can’t just drop everything, mind. I’ll go in tomorrow and see if I can get it sorted.”

  “Two weeks,” I said.

  “You said one week,” she said.

  “Changed my mind.”

  33

  Rose Gold

  Daisy

  I woke to sunshine and birdsong and the buzz of honeybees, and didn’t roll out of bed.

  Normally, I bounced straight up and got going. I wasn’t a let’s-be-lazy person. I was a get-it-done person, and I’d had—I checked—six and a half hours of sleep. I had a spa appointment at five with the girls, Gray’s mum was coming, possibly tonight, Gilead was out there looking for me, and I still had that long list of things to do. And all the same, I lay in crisp white sheets and looked up at the radial beams of pale wood that Gray had put together, building his first house, and at the treetops and blue sky through the glass at the dome’s peak. The windows in the lounge must be open, because I could hear birdsong. Warbles and chirps, and the familiar, clear tones of bellbird and tui. And the sound that I’d heard through my dreams, the crow of a rooster. I felt warm and safe and so cozy, and …

  When I woke up again, it was nearly four. This time, I did roll out of bed. No choice. Fifteen minutes later, I was headed through the front garden and down the track. I wasn’t running, though. That was because I had a mug of tea in one hand and a scone in the other. I’d found the scones on a plate in the kitchen which meant one of the girls must have baked. Obedience, probably.

  They were in the vegetable garden. Fruitful sat on an overturned box, her crutches beside her, weeding an herb garden, and Obedience knelt on the ground with a trowel in her hand, transplanting vegetable seedlings. A tall, rangy figure dressed in overalls, with blond hair in a ponytail, trundled a wheelbarrow full of soiled bedding from a chicken yard full of a couple dozen friendly Orpingtons, fluffy Easter Eggers, and black-and-white-speckled Plymouth Rock hens, overseen by three strutting, magnificently multicolored roosters.

  The woman dumped her load of shavings into a walled compost bin and said, “You’re Daisy, then.”

  “Yes,” I said. “You must be Iris.”

  She nodded, then went back into the chicken yard for another load. Obedience said, “It’s so beautiful here. So peaceful.”

  “Not necessarily,” Fruitful said. “You should’ve seen the chickens earlier. Somebody found a spider, and one of the roosters had to come break up the fight.”

  I smiled, but said, “A couple more minutes, and then you’d better come clean up so we can go to the spa. Manicures. Pedicures. Waxing. You should probably allow time to dig the dirt out from under your fingernails.”

  Iris came out with her wheelbarrow again and said, “Manicures. Huh.”

  Just like that, my peace was gone. I said, keeping my voice as even as I could manage, “Manicures are a choice. I don’t judge anybody for not getting them, but I don’t accept anybody judging me for getting them, either.”

  Iris was using her pitchfork now. She said, “You’ve got opinions, eh.”

  I said, “Well, yes. I do. My sisters have just come from Mount Zion, just like I did when I was sixteen. Finding out you have choices is the most powerful message in the world. The last thing they need is another voice condemning them for vanity.”

  Iris turned and leaned on her pitchfork. “Prickly little thing, aren’t you.”

  I said, “Seems to me you have opinions yourself. Gray said you didn’t like his yurt.”

  She grinned. “You’ve got me there. That’s true enough. Too flash for me. All right for some.” She moved to a second compost pile, what I recognized as the finishing pile, and began pitchforking rich, dark, loamy soil into the wheelbarrow. “Soil amendment,” she explained. Not to me. To the girls. “I’d ask you to spread it, O, but you’re getting a manicure instead.”

  Obedience said, “I could do it tomorrow, if you like.”

  Iris huffed a little and said, “We’ll see. Come down in the morning and have a cup of tea with me, if you like. Find something more sensible to wear, though. You won’t be much use dressed like that.”

  Obedience said, “I don’t have anything more sensible. Not work clothes. I could get some, but it’s Daisy’s money, and …”

  Iris said, “Reckon I’ll have to loan you a pair of overalls, then, because you can’t dig in those trousers.”

  I said to nobody in particular, “I’ve spent twelve years not telling anybody about my background. It’s a little disconcerting to finally do it and discover that nobody cares.”

  “Why should they?” Iris asked. “More likely to care about what they see in front of their noses. Though there’s enough who can’t see even that far.”

  Obedience said, “We were talking about names. Iris changed her name, too, because she used to be a man. I didn’t know that was possible, but I guess it is. Her name was Isaac. She says it’s easier if you use the same starting letter, because you’re used to it, and your name doesn’t sound so odd. I was thinking, though, that you didn’t do it. Why didn’t you choose something that started with a C? Her name was Chastity,” she told Iris. Who snorted. Predictably.

  “Because I hated it,” I said. “It’s a horrible name.”

  Iris said, “Got to agree with you there, though ‘Obedience’ could be worse.” She considered a minute, then said, “Nah. Both awful. ‘Fruitful,’ too.”

  I was dying to ask how she’d met Gray, and how she’d come to live here, and—oh, any number of other questions one had, all of which were probably inappropriate. Which may have had me thinking about how difficult it was for somebody to ask me questions, and how, if I wanted somebody—anybody—to understand, I was going to have to tell them before they asked. I was going to have to share.

  I hated sharing. You ended up crying, and I hated crying even more than sharing.

  I said, “Come on, you two, and get a shower. We have that appointment. Nice to meet you, Iris.”

  She snorted.

  Gray

  I got home at six-thirty, the light getting mellower, the shadows getting longer, and the car was gone. And when I went over to the yurt and knocked, nobody answered.

  They were off doing something or other, that was all. Even though it was well past dinnertime at Mount Zion, which had seemed to be an important fact to those girls.

  I checked Daisy’s phone one more time, but she still hadn’t texted. I’d swapped phones with her last night, which meant she’d recognize the number. So why?

  The house was empty as well, of course. I flipped lights on, rattled some kibble into the dish for Xena, and checked the fridge. Also empty. Or not empty, but empty of things I didn’t have to cook for myself.

  In other words, exactly like my normal life, except that now, I had a dog.

  When I heard an engine, I tensed. Then I recognized the growl of the Mustang, and I relaxed. I also went out onto the porch. Just checking.

  They came up the track together. Obedience was talking, waving her hand, and I could see the color of her nail varnish even from here. Red.

  Daisy saw me and came up the steps to the house fast, with her sisters behind her. She said, “Hi,” and laughed, then shoved her hair back over her shoulder and said, “Did you eat? I have food for you at the yurt, but I woke up late and completely forgot, sorry. Can I get it for you now?”

  I was so relieved to see her. I was so angry to see her. I was so confused. I said, “You should’ve texted. I worried.”

  Now, she looked confused. “What?”

  “I texted you to say
when I’d be back. Thought you might be concerned, being alone out here, and want to know. I didn’t get a text back, and then I came home and you weren’t here, and I was afraid something had happened to you.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Well … here we are. I’m, uh …” She looked away for a second, then back, and said, “Uh … I’m … I want to say that you’re acting possessive and that’s not all right, but you’re not, obviously. You’re just being worried, so I guess I’m … sorry?” She scowled a bit at that and said, “But if you’re being weirdly possessive, I’m not sorry. So we’re clear.”

  I couldn’t be narky anymore, could I? I had a hand on the side of her face, and she had her hand on my shoulder, somehow. I bent my head, brushed my lips over hers, and said, “I’ll take that reluctant apology.” She smiled up at me, a slow thing, like she’d lost the battle to be narky, and possibly like she would burst into laughter in another moment. I smiled back, because I couldn’t have done anything else. And then I kissed her again and said, “I’m glad you’re home. And safe.”

  “Me too,” she said. “Do you want some dinner? I made you meatballs.”

  “Yeh,” I said. “Yeh, I do.”

  What was I doing? I had no idea. But I knew what I wanted to do.

  We ate in the yurt. The meatballs were bloody fantastic, the pasta was perfectly cooked, and Obedience was excited and chattering. Showing me her fingernails, which were indeed blood-red. A bit much for sixteen, but I reckoned it was what Daisy had said. It could take a while to find your style, if you’d never been allowed to have one. Fruitful’s nails were a denim blue, and Daisy’s were unpainted.

  “Can’t,” she told me. “Nurse, eh.”

  “But you did your toes,” I said. “Pity. I liked that pretty blue.”

  “Maybe you’ll like this one better,” she said. “Why don’t you tell me?” Then she put her foot on my thigh, right there at the table.

  Bloody hell.

  She was flexible, that was for sure. She was wearing loose blue cotton trousers and a stretchy white top with a wide neckline that was, just now, showing a blue ribbon of bra strap, and she got that leg up high, the arch of her foot curving over my thigh, wiggled her toes, and said, “Well?”