Chapter Nineteen
Two days later Nate stuck his head around the door of the Whangarei house. “That’s the tools sorted,” he said to Claire. “A sweep-out and the garage is done.” She was sitting on the wooden floor in the living room, taping up the last of the boxes destined for the bach. Only the furniture going into storage remained and the movers would pick it up this afternoon.
She started almost guiltily and picked up the tape. “Oops,” she said. “You caught me slacking off.”
“It’s been a long morning.” He hesitated. From the kitchen came the bang of a cupboard door where Ellie was scrubbing out shelves. Even from here, he could smell the cleaning products. “You okay?”
“Fine,” she reassured him, pulling tape along the box. “I’ve been moving on for a while.” There were dents in the carpet from the coffee table, pinholes in the wall left by the picture hooks and a couple of scuff marks on the skirting board from a ball or skateboard. A good house, a family house.
“Still, it can’t be easy leaving a place you and Steve lavished so much DIY on,” Nate said. It had become a standing joke in the unit, the Langfords spent years renovating.
As he’d hoped, Claire laughed. “And it only took fifteen years to knock into shape.”
“Lewis, take that dratted ball outside!” Ellie’s raised voice wafted from the kitchen. “I’ve just washed that cupboard door.”
“It was an accident!”
Claire pushed to her feet and picked up the taped box. “Time for an intervention.”
“Let’s take a break,” Nate suggested. “We’ve been working all morning.”
“Good idea, there’s a picnic hamper in the car.”
“I’ll get it. Here, give me that.” He took the box from her. “Get some fresh air.”
Smiling, she touched his arm. “Thanks.” There was an understanding between them now, a quiet and considerate tenderness. Physical awareness was still there, but it was muted, patient, waiting for the right time. This period was a deep breath between the past and the future. Steve was forefront on both their minds, but gently.
Nate felt like a man woken from a coma—tentative, stretching limbs, unable to believe his luck. He was waiting for a relapse into guilt. It didn’t come. Quietly, he accustomed himself to peace while Claire mourned Steve again. For now, being near was enough.
While Claire unpacked lunch on a blanket under the apple tree, Nate competed with Lewis to see who could bounce a soccer ball on their knee the longest. Lewis was winning hands down.
“Twenty-seven, twenty-eight…” The ball angled off the grinning teenager’s knee and landed in a rosebush.
“Don’t destroy the garden,” Ellie scolded from the rug. “They’re not your plants anymore.” She was fragile this morning.
“Man,” Lewis muttered, “I can’t do anything right today.”
Nate rescued the ball from the rosebush. “Let’s shoot basketball hoops instead.”
“What, so I can whip your ass in something else?”
“Lewie, watch your language,” called his grandmother.
Scowling, Lewis opened his mouth for a retort, but Nate forestalled him. “Ellie, you were a good netballer, weren’t you?” Steve had once told him his mother had played competitively. “What was your position again?”
She looked over from the picnic rug, shading her face with one hand. “Goal shoot.”
“Come help me teach your grandson a lesson.”
“Heavens, Nathan, I can’t leap around a basketball hoop now. Not with my knees.”
“You can’t move with the ball in netball, is that correct?”
She nodded. “Once you’re in possession you have to ground one foot.”
“So we’ll set a mark and shoot from a stationary position.”
“I don’t think so,” she said doubtfully. But she was tempted, he could tell.
“Go ahead, Ellie,” Claire encouraged. “I’ll finish getting lunch ready.”
She glanced at her grandson who was trying not to laugh and a glint came into her eyes. “What do you think, sweetie, can an old lady play?”
“If she wants to.” Lewis shrugged, obviously humoring her.
Nate shared a conspirator’s grin with Claire. Steve’s competitive gene hadn’t come from his dad.
“Set the distance, Ellie,” he said, and threw her the ball.
She took her time to settle on a distance some four feet away from the goal then marked it with a branch snapped from a hydrangea.
Nate resisted the temptation to tease her about that. Ellie bounced the ball a few times, assessing its weight.
Then she raised her arms, stretching one leg behind for balance, as gracefully as a dancer, her gaze intent as she gauged the distance to the hoop.
Curiosity raised Lewis’s brows.
Ellie launched the ball—it fell short by a foot. “Damn it!”
“Language, Nana!”
“I’m out of practice.”
They gave her five shots to warm up and then she took them both to the cleaners, winning with a score of eleven from twelve hoops. By the end of the competition, everyone was having fun. A light mood that lasted through lunch.
Nate was in the hall, returning from dumping a load of boxes in the car when Claire called his name.
He turned. In three quick steps she walked over to him. Before he could register her intent, she stood on tiptoe and brushed a kiss against his mouth. “Thanks,” she said, and walked on to the kitchen with the picnic remnants.
Nate stood rooted, his mouth still processing the sensation of their first kiss, warm and fervent. Promising so much more. Then he caught sight of Ellie standing in the living room doorway with a box, her eyes full of dismay.
Nate held his composure. “You want me to stow that in the car?” he said.
She looked down at the box as if she’d forgotten she was carrying it.
“It’s not heavy,” she said, “but there are another two in the living room. If you could carry those?”
“Sure.” He moved past her, unable to talk about this. It was too uncertain, too new. She waited for him and they walked to the car together.
“When are you heading back to L.A.?” she blurted as he stacked the boxes in the station wagon’s trunk.
Nate met her gaze calmly. It was natural for her to feel this way. “I haven’t confirmed a flight yet,” he said. “I figured I’d reassess after the weekend.” Lewis was staying with Ellie tonight while Nate and Claire attended Jo’s celebratory dinner. It would be the first occasion since Lewis had come home that they’d be alone together.
The same thought must have occurred to Ellie because she frowned. “I’m very fond of you, Nathan.”
He braced himself.
“My daughter-in-law has experienced a lot of change over recent months—working to launch a new business, giving up her job, moving to the bach. And that’s on the back of the very hard time Lewis gave us, all on top of Steve’s death.” Her gaze returned to his. “All that has taken a toll on her, though she’d deny it. I don’t think Claire realizes how vulnerable she still is.” Ellie paused, as if searching for the right words. “She’s severing another major tie today. Sometimes you jump into things to distract yourself from the gap. It’s so difficult, you see, after losing the love of your life as we’ve done.” Her expression softened as she laid a hand on his forearm. “You’ve been a good friend to Claire, Nathan. I hope you’ll accept my advice in the intended spirit.”
“You two are close,” he said. “You’re looking out for her.”
“Steve would want me to.”
He nodded. “He would.”
She searched his face, and then, satisfied, returned to the packing. Nate stood by the car another minute. The house was in a well-established suburb and the street was overhung with flowering cherries. In mid-October their frilly pink blossoms shed like confetti on footpaths and verges, extraordinarily pretty.
Absently, he caught a petal as it fell, then dropped it and pulled his cell out of his jeans pocket. “Jules, I need the trust stuff ready for signing first thing Monday morning. And no excuses this time. Incidentally, don’t tell Claire I lost my job. I’m cool with it and you know she’ll only feel guilty.” Which hopefully would guilt Jules into keeping his secret. She was as protective of Claire as he was. Nate’s second call was to Air New Zealand. “I’d like to book a flight for Monday night.”
“Zander rang,” he told Claire later. “If I’m not airborne within forty-eight hours I’ll lose my job.” He was old friends with guilt and told the white lie easily. Even when it broke his newly healed heart all over again.
* * *
You rushed things with that kiss. Clearly Nate isn’t ready. Give him some space.
Claire repeated that mantra constantly the rest of the day, but common sense did nothing to dispel the sense of hurt, even betrayal, she felt. Fair enough if Nate had to return to L.A., but did he have to be so anxious to leave?
As she showered for the celebration dinner that evening, she reminded herself that Nate didn’t owe her anything. He’d made no move toward a romantic relationship. This new closeness was all to do with bonding over Steve and anything else was in her head.
Some stubborn inner voice insisted it wasn’t, but Claire shut that down with logic and the blow-dryer. From the moment she’d kissed him, Nate had become aloof and uncommunicative. On the two occasions they’d been left alone, he found some pretext to leave.
It hurt.
Wrapped in a towel, she left the bathroom, crossed the deck and went inside the bach. Nate had been nowhere in sight when she returned from dropping Lewis at his grandmother’s—hiding out on Heaven Sent probably—though their ride was due in thirty minutes and the boat had no shower connected.
In her bedroom, she opened the dresser drawer, grimaced at the sexy robe Ellie had given her and pushed it aside to find underwear.
Boohooing and feeling rejected wouldn’t change the fact that Nate wasn’t ready. Neither would a confrontation. The very worst thing she could do was to start coming across as needy.
From her closet, she pulled a red dress, the one she’d bought for her leaving function at work, the one that heralded the advent of Captain Claire, bold, bright and fearless.
It was better this way.
Briskly, she zipped up the dress and started applying makeup, using the mirror above the dresser. She could concentrate on establishing her business and Nate would have time to settle his thinking—miss her, hopefully. And after a couple of months she’d go get him.
Maybe.
If she had the courage.
If he sent the right signals.
If he didn’t take a lover in the meantime.
Claire realized her shoulders had slumped and straightened them, picking up the eyelash curler Ellie had foisted on her. “Stop panicking,” she admonished her reflection. “You haven’t given up on him. You’re just giving him space.” Ugh, that tweeniespeak. Claire screwed up her nose. She was thirty-four, for heaven’s sake. She shouldn’t have to deal with this crap.
Scowling, she darkened her lashes with mascara, made her eyes mysterious and smoky, and chose her most luscious lipstick. That would show him.
Lack of recent practice meant she smudged it. With an expletive, Claire scrubbed off the excess and reapplied it. Who was she kidding? She’d never been good at flirty games. So she’d quietly assess the situation over the next couple of months, and decide her move from there. Carefully, she blotted the excess lipstick with a tissue. She didn’t have to be Braveheart tonight.
Only Monday, when she said goodbye.
* * *
Nate left it as late as possible to arrive at the bach to shower and change, tapping on the patio door as he passed to let Claire know he’d arrived. The bathroom was still steamy from her shower, the mirror fogged and the air fragrant with feminine potions.
He showered quickly, and then dressed in dark pants and an open-necked white shirt, topped with a dark gray jacket. Styling himself came automatically now, but as he shaved using the small bathroom mirror, slightly mottled with age, he wondered what Zander would make of him.
It occurred to him he’d miss the bastard—despite Zee’s faults, they’d been mates. Zander would miss Nate more because the rocker had so few real friends. But he also knew that asking for his job back would be tantamount to posting a Kick Me sign on his butt. Anyway it didn’t matter. Nate’s professional reputation was sound; he’d have no difficulty picking up another A-lister. The thought depressed him.
Mentally bracing himself, he entered the bach. Claire was standing in the middle of the living room inserting gold hoop earrings. She blinked when she saw him. “Wow,” she said lightly. “It’s not hard to get the Hollywood shine. You look gor…very smart.”
He remembered to close the slider. “So do you.”
Understatement. Her scoop-necked dress was an overlay of chiffon tiers over a silk sheath, sleeveless and very sexy in traffic-light red.
Red for stop, Nate reminded himself, but he couldn’t tear his eyes off her. One shoulder of the dress had a tie feature and as he stared, she twisted it into a chiffony bow. Like a present just waiting to be unwrapped.
Setting his jaw, Nate checked his watch and then walked to the window looking for headlights. “You’ll get cold without a coat.”
“I have a pashmina shawl.”
It was winter-white silk and cashmere, nothing provocative about it. His brain threw up an image of it wrapped around her naked body. Nate stared out the window, desperate for headlights. “So we’re meeting Jules at the restaurant?”
“Uh-huh.” Behind him, Claire squirted on perfume, an Oriental fragrance, sensual and spicy, entirely in keeping with the red dress.
Briefly he closed his eyes and when he opened them a double-cab behemoth of an ute was bumping over the grass. His white charger tooted.
“They’re here, let’s go.” He turned around.
“Are we okay, Nate?” There was something in her quiet directness that made him realize he’d hurt her.
“Sure we are.” He smiled reassuringly. Of course this was tough—the right path always was. “If I’ve been distracted, it’s because I’m thinking of all that needs doing when I get home.” He used the word deliberately, though L.A. had never felt like home to him.
It worked. Claire stopped searching his eyes and dropped her own. “It’ll be fun going on tour,” she said lightly. “Berlin first, isn’t it?” She picked up her bag, a glittering beaded thing that matched her strappy stilettos. “How exciting.”
“Yes.” His spirits heavy, he opened the ranchslider and stood aside to let her pass. “I’m looking forward to it.”
If the conversation got any more stilted they could build a pole house on it. As she walked by, another scented tendril tangled around his senses. Grimly, he followed her to the ute.
The powerful engine was idling and as they approached, the front passenger door opened and Jo climbed out, dressed in an emerald-green dress that suited her red hair. The two women met in an emotional embrace. “I’m so happy for you,” Claire said.
Over her shoulder, Dan’s bride smiled at him. “Hi, Nate.” He hadn’t attended her wedding, but there was nothing but warm affection in her hazel eyes.
“Hey,” he said awkwardly, and hugged her, lifting her off the ground a few inches. “Great news, Jo.”
“It hasn’t sunk in yet,” she confessed as he put her down. “But I’m sure champagne will help. I should warn you, we’ve already started drinking—” she lowered her voice “—to calm our nerves.”
Puzzled, Nate looked toward the ute. Dan’s little sister waved through the driver’s window. “Our hugs will have to wait,” Viv called, pushing a strand of shoulder-length brown hair out of her eyes. “I can’t get out or Dan will hijack the driving. You two are in the back with Ross.” Nate hadn’t seen Viv since her twin’s wedding years ago, but Dan had regaled the unit with terrible-twin stories for years, so he knew her as living, breathing dynamite.
“Dan and I are riding shotgun,” Jo said, and giggled.
“You have been drinking,” Claire commented. “You’re not a giggler.”
“It’s nervous hysteria.” Jo giggled again.
“Jocelyn Swann Jansen!” Viv warned. “Sisterly solidarity, remember?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Winking at Nate, Jo climbed into the front next to her husband. Dan winced as his sister shoved the gear stick into his thigh.
“Why you have to drive a manual is beyond me,” she said, graunching the gears. Her brother groaned.
Ross slung an arm across the back of the seat, behind Claire. “You’re doing great, honey,” he reassured his fiancee. “These overpriced imports are always tough drives.”
Across Claire, Nate stared at him. Ross was anal about driving.
“You’re as rusty as hell, sis,” Dan complained in the front.
“All the more reason to get practice in while I’m home,” she answered cheerfully. “Just remind me to stay on the right side of the road.”
“You mean left,” everyone chorused in unison.
“She meant the correct side of the road,” Ross clarified. “Sheesh, will you all relax! You might want to take your foot off the accelerator a tad here, babe. We’re coming up to a T-intersection.”
“It’s so hard to see without streetlights,” Viv commented. “Oh, wait, I’ve got my lights on low beam.” She flicked a switch on the dash. “That’s better.”
“Okay, that does it,” Dan said. “Pull over, I’m driving. Do your refresher in daylight.”
“Stay where you are, honey,” advised Ross. “Jo gave me shit for years about being a sexist pig when it came to women drivers. I want to make Bridezilla happy.”
“You’re all heart, Ice-cream.” Jo glanced over to the backseat, her dark red curls bouncing with every bump in the road. She grinned at Ross. “Hey, Viv, Vanity Fair had an article about the benefits of a long engagement. Remind me to show it to you.”
“On the other hand, Viv,” Ross said to his love, “we don’t want you overtiring yourself trying to keep left and right straight. I’ve got big plans for our first-night reunion.”
“We’ve talked about this, Ice.” Dan twisted his head to complain. “No sexy talk with my sister while I’m within hearing.”
“Okay, Shep.”
Dan faced forward again and Ross leaned forward to caress Viv’s neck. Ice was a guy who needed to be behind the wheel in every endeavor, yet here he was completely relaxed, trusting this madcap woman to carry them safely through a pitch-black night. Nate shook his head in disbelief and beside him, Claire laughed softly.
“Told you things had changed,” she murmured.
He found himself laughing, too.
He loved these people. Dan glanced behind to grin at him, then tightened his arm around his wife’s shoulders. Jo leaned into him. These two had been friends all their lives, a shift in perception and now they were married.
Nate was conscious of the sweet curves of Claire’s body pressed against his side. If he slung his arm across the back of the seat there’d be more room, but that was an intimacy he couldn’t indulge.
Ellie was right. This woman was still vulnerable. Just because confession had cleansed his soul didn’t mean he’d earned a green light to pursue his buddy’s widow. She needed more time to get over the emotional aftermath.
“Are cows an issue on country roads?” Viv said. “I see a shape looming ahead…. Oh, it’s okay, it’s a tree.” She negotiated another sharp bend, sending Claire sliding into him, all soft femininity and seductive fragrance. Inwardly, Nate groaned as he double-checked their seat belts. Monday couldn’t come soon enough.