Just Not Mine (Escape to New Zealand) Read online

  “I have diving,” Amelia said.

  “And? What am I meant to do about those things? You just come home later on the bus, right, Amelia?

  “Yeh,” she said. “But you need to know anyway. You’re supposed to care. You’re supposed to ask.”

  “Asking right now, aren’t I. So what about you, Charlie? Just over at the rugby field, right? You’d walk. So, again, where do I come into it?”

  Charlie shrugged. “Dunno. Make sure I go, I guess.”

  “Are you likely not to go?”

  Charlie considered. “I guess … you stand there and say, ‘D’you have your mouth guard and your water bottle, Charlie? And where did you leave your boots?’ Like that.”

  “Well, that sounds efficient,” Hugh said. “Think we can do better than that. I keep my kit in its bag so I know where it is. Why not just do that?”

  Charlie put his head on one side. “I could. I s’pose.”

  “Course you could. Go do it now, soon as you’ve finished your brekkie.”

  “But you’ll still be here when he comes home from school, right?” Amelia asked. “You have to be here. He’s too little to be home alone.”

  “I’m not,” Charlie protested.

  Amelia ignored him. “Girls who grow up without a father in their lives are more likely to fall pregnant,” she told Hugh. “And boys are more likely to join gangs.”

  “You planning on falling pregnant? You’re twelve.”

  “Twelve-year-olds can be pregnant,” she insisted. “I saw a program about it.”

  “Well, I’ll watch out for that, then. And what kind of gang is Charlie meant to join? The gang of eight-year-old schoolboys? Not sure I’d cross the street in fear.”

  She heaved a mighty sigh and rolled her eyes. “Not now. Later. You’re laying a foundation for our lives. We’re orphans, you know. We need a—“

  “A role model,” Hugh finished. “What was Aunt Cora, then? You’d think from the sound of you that you’ve both been begging in the gutter somewhere.”

  “You asked,” Amelia said. “What you were meant to do. I’m just telling you.”

  “And now I’m telling you. We’re going to sit down together this weekend and make a timetable, so we all know what you’re meant to do, not just me. We’ll post it on the fridge, and we’ll post a list for the two of you as well, so you can check the night before for homework, whatever else you need to remember, get it sorted then. If I’m your role model, we’ll do it the way I do. When I get to training every day, there’s a sheet of paper posted with my workout, and I follow it. Nobody’s trailing around after me seeing that I do it, and I don’t see why I should trail around after you.”

  “We’re children,” Amelia said.

  “Yeh, well, you’re not babies, are you. We’ve got three months here, and if we’re going to get through them, you’re going to have to give me some help, take some responsibility.” He looked at each of them in turn. “Charlie?”

  “OK,” he said, looking down again, his face closed. Hugh hadn’t meant to scare him, and he smiled, although Charlie wasn’t looking, tried to soften his tone.

  “Good,” he told his brother, and looked to Amelia. “How about you?”

  She sighed in martyred acceptance. “I guess. It’s not how a mum would do it, though.”

  “It’s how my mum did it,” Hugh realized. “More or less. And it’s the only way I know. Take it or leave it.”

  “All right,” she said. “I get it. Geez.”

  A Big Night Out

  Hugh leant against the railing of Koti James’s expansive deck a couple blocks back from the beach in Takapuna, where he, Nic Wilkinson, and Hemi Ranapia were “helping” their teammate with a Saturday-night barbecue. Which actually meant drinking beer and watching Koti barbecue, but supervision counted.

  At least somebody else was cooking. They’d been OK on Thursday, because there’d still been some steak and salad in the fridge, some kumara in the pantry, and he’d fixed those, since that was about his skill level in the kitchen. But on Friday, when Amelia and Hugh’s own stomach had reminded him that it was dinnertime, he’d been confronted by a pretty limited offering.

  “How is there nothing left?” he asked in frustration. “There’s not even any bread and cheese in here. And I thought there was some ham.” He’d had lunch out after his visit to the physio, hadn’t looked until now.

  “We took it for lunch,” Amelia said. “Didn’t you shop?”

  “No,” he said, only a little sarcastically. “Obviously, I didn’t.”

  She sighed. “You have to shop, Hugh.”

  He could see that. And that he’d have to think about what they were having for dinner before it was actually time for dinner, too. It was quite a bit different from keeping his fridge stocked for himself, and one hell of a lot different from having Aunt Cora keep it stocked for all of them. He’d ended up taking the kids to the pub for dinner, and this morning, he’d taken them to New World.

  “Why do we have to come?” Amelia had asked. “I want to go to Pippa’s house. We’re working on a project for school.”

  “You’ll have to go later,” Hugh said. “Right now, we’re buying groceries, and you two are helping, no arguments. Because,” he’d amended, seeing Charlie’s face, “you know what you want to take for lunch, what we’re out of. Another list. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, what do we need?” He sat back down at the table. “Come on and help me make it.”

  So that had been not too bad, though he’d got home and realized they were out of coffee, and nearly out of eggs as well, and had had to go straight back again. He was glad to have been invited to dinner tonight, and even gladder that he’d been able to bring the kids, because he didn’t know what he’d have done with them otherwise.

  “I don’t have a babysitter,” he’d told Koti when the other man had invited him a couple days earlier.

  “Do you need a babysitter?”

  “I do now. Alone with my brother and sister for a bit.”

  “No worries. Bring them along. Heaps of kids. Your two’ll make nine all told, counting the babies. I’ll get an extra pizza, and we’re all good.”

  Hugh had accepted gratefully, and Charlie and Amelia had been borne off into the nether regions of Koti’s house by Ariana, Hemi and Reka’s eldest, with a proprietorial air that suggested Amelia might have met her match.

  “Whoa. New blood. Nobody told me there were going to be so many big fellas,” Nic said now as Will Tawera, 1.95 meters of hard-kicking, hard-tackling No. 10, came through the ranch sliders onto the deck together with Finn Douglas.

  Hugh offered a handshake and a word of welcome to Will, the Blues’ much-hoped-for new acquisition from the Queensland Reds, here in Auckland to discuss a deal for the following season. Hugh meant to do his bit to woo him, because they needed Will. The loss of Hemi this year at first-five, the critical No. 10 position that provided a team with its on-field general, had been a blow from which the Blues hadn’t yet recovered. The addition of Will, along with Hugh’s own ongoing help in shoring up the forward pack and providing a bit of leadership to a young squad, could make next season look a much brighter prospect.

  He could see what Nic had been talking about, too. Will was one of the good-sized breed of 10, and there was even more of Finn than there was of Will. The deck was suddenly looking a bit crowded with rugby muscle.

  “Speak for yourself, Nico,” Koti said. “The rest of us aren’t intimidated by a couple of blokes with a glandular disorder and a suspicious slope to their foreheads. Just because you’re such a scrawny fella.”

  “I am not scrawny,” Nic said. “I am a lithe and nimble fullback. Bashing it up the guts may be the only way a muscle-bound centre like you knows how to do it, to say nothing of the forwards, but those of us with more finesse can pick our routes with a bit more brainpower. And I’ve got the best boot here, I’ll just point out. Barring Hemi, of course. Wouldn’t want to go up against you even now,” he told his former No. 10.


  “Nah,” Hemi said. “I’m retired. I don’t have to prove it anymore. I’ve earned the luxury of sitting back and criticizing.”

  “Cheers, Nico,” Will complained. “You mean the best boot except Hemi and me.”

  “Oh, yeh?” Nic said with a grin. “You want a competition for that goal-kicking spot, you know what you need to do.”

  “No argument from me either way,” Finn said. “Because my kicking’s always been shocking. And I’m not a forward anymore, am I, slope to my forehead or otherwise. My job now is cracking the whip on you lazy buggers, and I do my best to be an equal-opportunity taskmaster. How’s your head, Koti, by the way?”

  “You know,” Koti shrugged. “Getting there. Be ready to get stuck in when training starts up again, and I’ll be on the Tour, no worries. But first, family time. You bring the kids?”

  “Yeh. Jenna took them on back to find the pizza. I should warn you, Nico, Harry’s got a big Lego book with him he wanted to share with Zack.”

  Nic groaned. “Exactly what he doesn’t need to see. Going to break me. He can hardly find a path to his bed as it is.”

  “How the mighty have fallen, eh, Koti,” Will told his host. “Your entertaining style’s a bit of a change from the old days.” They’d been teammates when Koti had been with the Chiefs, Hugh remembered, and yeh, he could recall a few parties back in the day, after the Hurricanes had played the Chiefs. Both Will and Koti probably had an incident or two they were just as glad had never hit the press.

  “Shh,” Koti said with a laugh. “We don’t talk about that anymore.” He pointed with his tongs to the chilly bin filled with ice, then returned to the huge barbecue, turned over hefty chunks of chicken, added thick rounds of tender eye fillet.

  “Does everybody here have kids?” Will asked, helping himself to a beer. “Because I’m getting a bad feeling about this party.”

  Hugh could relate. He’d been to the odd barbecue or picnic before with the vague knowledge that his teammates’ kids were somewhere about the place, but he’d never paid any more attention than that. He felt like he was sitting at the parents’ table, and he wasn’t at all sure he liked it.

  “Pretty much,” Koti said. “I asked some of the single boys along tonight, but they realized how family-friendly it’d be, decided on a piss-up instead, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “Don’t say that,” Nic said. “First you invite the conditioning coach, then you tell him about everyone’s plans to get out of condition, not to mention having him eyeing us the whole time, counting the beers?”

  “If I’m drinking along with you, you’re safe,” Finn said, popping the top on a Monteith’s Black. “And I’m not concerned about the others, not tonight. What I don’t know, I can’t patrol. I don’t have to worry about Hemi anymore, either. He can get pissed, get fat too for all I care.”

  “Yeh, but I answer to a higher power,” Hemi said.

  “Didn’t realize you were that religious,” Will said.

  Hemi smiled. “Not the higher power I had in mind.”

  “Ah.” Will looked a bit mystified still, but the other men laughed.

  “Anyway,” Finn said, “we’re all on holiday. Except maybe Hemi. Cheers.” He drained what looked like a good third of the bottle, to Hugh’s practiced eye. Well, they said there wasn’t enough beer in the world to make a loose forward tight, especially not one the size of Finn.

  “Where did you say this other party was?” Will asked, a comical expression on his handsome face. “The one without supervision, and with single people?”

  “I’m a single person,” Hugh pointed out.

  “Yeh, well, you’re not the exact type of single person I had in mind.”

  “You just need to get married, Will,” Koti said. “Then you’d have the right kind of somebody to bring along, and fewer decisions to make as well.”

  “I heard that.” His wife Kate, a pretty brunette with a personality as large as her frame was tiny, came out onto the deck.

  “Close to done here,” Koti said. “Everything moving along in there?”

  “Are you kidding? What little Reka allowed me to do, I turned over to Jenna the moment she arrived. Couple minutes. We’ll give you a shout when we’re ready.”

  She headed back inside, and Will watched her go. “Don’t think being married would suit me,” he said. “Maybe in ten years or so. When I’m elderly, like certain formerly loose forwards I could name.” He gave his prospective conditioning coach a cheeky grin that made Hugh suspect Finn would be setting him right in the gym before very long at all. “Having too good a time right now, and one woman for the rest of my life? Nah. Can’t see it. And kids—I’m really not ready for that.”

  Finn leaned against the deck rail, lifted his beer bottle to Hugh. “Speaking of kids, how ya going with yours, Hugh? Jenna was asking.”

  “Didn’t know you had kids,” Will said. “Plural kids?”

  “My brother and sister,” Hugh said. “Back there.” He gestured with his own bottle.

  “Oh. I thought you meant they were yours,” Will said.

  “My father and stepmother died a year or so back,” Hugh explained, “so I’m living there right now. They’re my half-sister and brother, actually.”

  “That’s rough,” Will said.

  “Not so bad. It does put a crimp in the dating life, though. I like fast women, that’s my problem. They used to like me, too,” he said with a reminiscent sigh. “But you ought to see them run in the opposite direction now, when they find out. You know that thing when you go out with someone, and you can tell she’s sizing you up as the future father of her children?”

  “If they are, I’m looking the other way,” Will laughed.

  “Or they may just not want your dodgy genes in their pool,” Hugh suggested with a grin of his own. “But what’s worse than that is when you can tell they don’t want anything to do with the kids you actually do have around.”

  “May be time to consider a slow woman instead,” Finn said. “That little thing called getting to know somebody first? She may even like the kids, you never know.”

  “Think that’d work?” Hugh asked. “Get one of those sweet, motherly ones, one who wants to be home with kids who aren’t hers half the time while I travel, who wants to make those home-cooked meals? And still look good, of course. That’s the tricky bit.”

  “A hot babe who’s going to want to take care of you and a couple of kids who aren’t hers into the bargain, let you shove them off on her?” Will asked. “That’s a pretty sketch plan you’ve got.”

  Hugh didn’t answer, because he’d got rattled at realizing he’d just described Finn’s wife, and that the other man was looking a bit grim. Finn grim wasn’t a sight he’d ever relished on the paddock when he’d been playing against him, and he wasn’t enjoying the sight of it now.

  And then it got worse, because he heard a small voice at his elbow. “’Scuse me.”

  He turned to see Charlie, and his brother’s thin face didn’t look happy at all.

  “How long have you been standing there?” Hugh asked him. “What did you hear?”

  Charlie shrugged. “Dunno.”

  Hugh closed his eyes for a second. Shit. “Something wrong back there?” he asked. “Need something?”

  “That baby’s crying,” Charlie said. “In its room. I thought I should say.”

  “Which one?” Hemi asked.

  Koti had a look at the box set up on the table. Some kind of monitor, Hugh guessed, because it was flashing red. “Whoops. Falling down on the job, aren’t I.” He handed the tongs to Finn. “Finish this meat, will you? I’ll go check.”

  “So, Charlie,” Finn said, turning steaks with a practiced hand. “Think your brother should get married?” Tackling the problem the same way he tackled everything, Hugh realized. Head-on.

  “Yeh,” Charlie said with decision.

  “Got any candidates in mind?” Finn asked. “That can be the best way,” he informed Hugh. �
�Get the experts’ opinion. May not be who you’re thinking.”

  “He should marry Josie,” Charlie said. “She’d be the best.”

  “Who’s Josie?” Hugh asked. “I don’t know any Josie.”

  “She’s Miss Chloe’s friend. You know, Miss Chloe, Amelia’s dance teacher.”

  “I know who Miss Chloe is,” Hugh protested. “And a dance teacher might be all right.” Miss Chloe would be all right, in fact. More than all right. And she taught kids. That could be the sweet, motherly thing right there.

  Charlie considered. “I don’t think she’s a dance teacher herself,” he said fairly. “I think she’s too big. And she’s all … sort of soft-looking. I don’t think she could be a dancer.”

  Hugh was getting the picture. Probably looked like the backside of a bus.

  “But she has such a pretty face,” Will said. “And a great personality, eh.”

  “Yeh. She has the kind of face I like. Kind of friendly and smiley,” Charlie said. “Sort of jolly.”

  Definitely the backside of a bus.

  Koti came back out onto the deck, his baby daughter wrapped in a blanket in his arms, only an unhappy little face and a halo of black curls visible. She was fussing a bit, gnawing on one tiny fist.

  “Can you finish up?” Koti asked Finn. “I need to take her to Kate. Anika’s still asleep,” he told Hemi. “Clearly, you train them better than I do.”

  “No worries,” Finn said, transferring an eye fillet to a platter. “We’ll do our best to save you a steak, though I’m not making any promises.”

  Kate chose that moment to turn up again, however. “Good to go,” she informed her husband. “Oh. Maia wake up? Talk about timing. Just when we’re sitting down to eat, as usual.”

  “All changed and ready for you,” Koti said.

  “Time to head on back with the rest of the kids, Charlie,” Hugh said. He knew he should say something else, something positive, but he couldn’t think what.

  “I’ll come with you,” Kate said. “I need to take this little monster back and feed her. That’s the only way I ever manage to pry her away from Koti, she’s such a Daddy’s girl. I can’t imagine what she’ll be like when she’s five.”