“What is it?” I asked, praying that I would like it, that it wouldn’t be something strange and hard to pronounce.
“Aroha Rose Te Mana,” he said. “That’s our daughter’s name. I hope.”
“Aroha,” I said. “Love. And Rose, my mother’s name. Hemi, that’s perfect. That’s beautiful.”
“This is when I ask you,” he said, “whether you want to change your name. And remind myself that it’s your choice.”
“You’d really say that?” I had to tease a little. There was too much happiness in me not to. “You really wouldn’t wage a subtle and not-so-subtle campaign to get me to change my mind?”
“Not answering that,” he said promptly. “Let’s hear it.”
“Then, yes. I want to change my name. I want to be my own person, but I want to do it with your name. I have my mother’s, because my dad took off. Aroha is going to have her dad with her all the way, though, and she’s going to have his name. And I want us all to have the same one.”
“Hope Te Mana,” he said.
Something went through me, strong and bright as silver, leaping from his hand to mine. “Hope Te Mana,” I said. “Very soon.”
It didn’t matter that Anika was still out there. She couldn’t hurt Hemi, and she couldn’t hurt me. She could take his money, but that wasn’t what we were about. That wasn’t it at all. We were so much more.
Hemi
Once again, I’d had to leave Hope behind. This time, it was harder, and it was easier. Easier because I was divorced now, and even though the specter of Anika still loomed over the company, still threatened everything I’d spent fourteen years building, it didn’t threaten Hope and me anymore. That was what Hope had done. She’d convinced me.
I could cope with anything. Coping was my life story. With anything except losing her.
It was easier, too, because it was only for a couple weeks. Then I’d be flying to Paris, and when I came home, she’d be there. That had been her promise, and Hope kept her promises.
Harder, now—“harder” was getting a photo that next week showing her belly a tiny bit bigger, and not being there to feel my baby girl under my palm or to hold her mother. “Harder” was talking to Hope on the phone in the early morning, then having to ring off and start my day without her. “Harder” was coming home to an apartment without her in it.
And tonight, on a Friday night a week after my divorce and two days before I left for Paris, I came home to an apartment with nobody in it, because Karen had gone off to the first school dance of the year.
She’d decided to get ready at her friend Mandy’s house in Brooklyn, close to school. That had sounded good to me, considering that Noah the Unfortunate Buddhist was driving her. He’d be picking her up in the Porsche Boxster his parents had given him for his eighteenth birthday, Karen had told me, and if I’d had Josh arrange some unauthorized checking of his driving record, I wasn’t going to apologize for it. Parking tickets appeared to be his specialty, though he’d had a speeding ticket a year ago as well. Which didn’t make me happy, but wasn’t enough to forbid Karen to drive with him. Unfortunately.
She was spending the night at Mandy’s as well, but I wasn’t worried about that. I’d rung up and had a chat with Mandy’s mum, and I was confident that Karen would be in good hands.
Once she got there.
At eight, I got a group text that eased my mind. A shot of Karen and Mandy in their pretty dresses, Noah and another bloke in suits, with a roomful of other students behind them. They’d made it, then. And Karen had sent that text to both Hope and me, which was good as well.
I texted back, Pretty girls. Have fun, then went back to work.
I was deep into it, part of me relishing the chance to have an entire uninterrupted evening, when my phone chimed with a text. I picked it up and glanced at the screen.
Could Charles come get me?
I was out of my chair before I’d finished reading. It was just after ten, I saw as I texted back, I’ll come. Leaving now. Where are you? Safe?
School, I read. I’m OK. I just need to come home.
City traffic had never seemed slower, but finally, I was outside Brooklyn Friends, double-parking and out onto the pavement in an instant.
I didn’t realize how worried I’d been until I saw her sitting at the top of the steps in front of the building, her arms wrapped around herself against the night air. I slowed from my near-run and said, “Eh, sweetheart.”
She stood up, not looking at me, and said, “Thanks for coming. I thought you’d send Charles. I mean, I know you were working.” Her voice was tight, not sounding like my easy-breezy Karen at all.
“Nah.” I put my arm around her and tugged her against me as we headed down the steps again. “Always happy to come get my girl. Any time.”
Her breath was a bit ragged, and I said, “Whatever happened—he’s a fool, and not worth your time or your worry.”
She gave a half-laugh and said, “You don’t even know anything about it yet.”
“Call me prejudiced. Both ways.” I popped the locks on the door, and she slid into the passenger seat. “I like you, and I don’t like him.”
I began to drive home, and she was silent for a long couple of minutes. I waited as long as I could before I said, “You can tell me, you know. I doubt I’ll be surprised. I wasn’t even surprised that you weren’t crying.”
“I want to.” There was a catch in her voice now. “But I don’t want to give him the satisfaction, you know?”
I had to smile at that. “Nobody better. Of course you don’t.”
“You can probably guess anyway. Big surprise. He wanted to have sex. We’ve been, you know, making out.”
I relaxed my hands deliberately on the steering wheel. “And when you said you didn’t want to, he said you were . . . what? A little girl?”
“Yeah. And stuck in the past, like virginity was some special thing I’d give to the right man, like it was some big deal, instead of sex being something you started doing when you were old enough, like when you were old enough to start riding a bike. Which sounds right,” she burst out, “but it doesn’t feel right, you know?”
“Why would you want to sleep with somebody who thought you were no big deal?” I still sounded calm. Somehow.
“See?” It was an explosion. “See? That’s what I said! I said—if I wasn’t special, what was the point? And he said I was scared. I’m not scared! Maybe I just want somebody to care. What’s wrong with that? And then he said I wasn’t . . . I wasn’t . . .” Her voice wobbled for the first time.
“That you weren’t that good anyway,” I said. “Not that pretty. Not that exciting. That he’d have been doing you a favor.”
“He said if I didn’t want to, we could just . . . I could just . . .” She was crying, finally. Tears of anger, and I was glad to hear them. “You know. Oral.”
“Right.” I swung into a bus zone and stopped the car. “We’re going to his house. Right now. The little bastard. I’m going to rip his head off.”
“I don’t . . .” Karen’s voice was shaking. “I just . . . I wish Hope was here. I tried to call her, but she didn’t answer, and I . . . I wish . . . I just wanted to talk to her, you know? She’s always . . . she . . .”
Her voice was breaking, and so was my heart. I said helplessly, “Eh, sweetheart. No,” reached out, and pulled her into my arms. Which was when she started to sob.
For the next few minutes, she tried to talk and kept trailing off, and I held her tight, ran my hand over her hair, said, “Shh,” and “Never mind,” and “It’s all right,” and wished I could think of something better. I wished Hope were here, too. Never more so. But she wasn’t, which meant it was down to me to harden up and do my best.
When she pulled back at last and started wiping at her face, I said, “Listen to me. Listen hard, now. You’re a beautiful girl with spirit and fire and strength that any man would want. Any man. Not any entitled boy who thinks he’s doing a girl a favor. What
I told you on the jet—that’s the truth, and you need to remember it, no matter what your body’s telling you. If he cares about you, he’s not going to push you, and if he pushes you, he doesn’t care about you. Something else, too. Nothing about having sex or not having it makes you any more or less of a woman, so there’s no point in doing it until you’re sure you’re having it with somebody who cares more about you than he does about himself. And if he’s talking about you performing on him in his car,” I finished grimly, “he doesn’t care a bit, and the only answer is to slap his face.”
“Did anybody ever slap yours? Any girl?” She was still sniffling, but she didn’t sound broken anymore.
“One woman. Your sister.”
“Oh. Wow. But I mean . . . I don’t have to say no, do I? For a guy to respect me? Why? Why shouldn’t a woman say yes?”
“She should. When she can’t stand not to have sex with that man, and she knows for sure that he’s a man she wants to have it with. When it’s her choice.”
“Because that virgin thing is dumb,” she said. “And wrong, and . . . and sexist, and everything. I still think so.”
“You can think so and still not have sex with any Noahs. That, I know. You wait. And any time you wonder if he’s the right one, you ask me.”
“Or invite him to dinner.” I thought she might be smiling a little now, even through the remains of her tears. “So you can tell me. He was kind of a jerk that night. I just didn’t want to admit that you and Hope were right.”
“No ‘kind of’ about it,” I said. “He was a jerk, full stop. You can do better, and you will. You concentrate on being awesome, and on finding somebody as awesome as you that you don’t have to make excuses for. You concentrate on making your choice.”
“Like Hope did.”
“Yeh. Exactly like Hope did.”
Silence for another moment, and then the night was split by the blast of a horn, light flooded the car, I leaped in my seat, and Karen shrieked.
I pulled out of the bus zone, ignoring the angry final hoot behind me, and Karen said, “Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you doing anything, you know, awkward.”
“Because you’re seeing me now that I’m not sixteen anymore,” I told her. “You wait. You’re going to make all kinds of right choices. You’ve already started. You’re going to have poise. You’re going to have confidence. You’re going to be a woman to reckon with. It’s going to take a strong man to match you, and you’re going to find him. You’ll see.”
Hope
On a rainy Friday afternoon more than a week after Hemi had left, I finished drying off in a shower stall at the Katikati pool, grabbed my things, and headed to my locker.
The midwife had said that I’d find myself slowing down when I reached the third trimester, but that gave me ten weeks more to feel great, and that was how I felt. I’d swum thirty laps today, in fact, which was a new record.
Swimming in the rain was exciting, too. An adventure, and for the first time in my life, adventures didn’t scare me. Maybe because I wasn’t out on the edge anymore, knowing that one push or one wrong step could send both Karen and me into the abyss. I had the luxury of enjoying a challenge. Like today. I’d be walking up the hill in the rain, but I could cope with that. And in one more week, I was going home.
I’d had a thought out there doing those laps, too. A work thought, which meant I was moving out of the now-zone and into the future-zone, and, boy, was that exciting. I could ask—
The thought left my head just like that. There was somebody sitting on a bench right smack in the middle of the room, as if she owned it. Her elegant legs were crossed at the knee, and she didn’t look dressed to swim.
Anika didn’t say anything. She just sat there with her beautiful face, her shiny hair, and her glorious figure and smiled at me. It wasn’t a sad smile like before. Or a nice one.
I made my feet move again, and I kept my voice level. “What a surprise.” I headed for my locker. She thought she could come here and intimidate me? She could think again. “Well, I guess it’s a free country.”
I nodded to Gemma and Roberta, two older ladies who often swam around the same time I did. Unfortunately, they were heading out, leaving only their curious glances behind. And leaving me alone with Viper Woman.
Deal with it. I channeled Hemi, spun the dial of my combination lock, and opened my locker. I didn’t bother to cover up with my towel, either. This woman wasn’t Hemi’s wife anymore, she had no power over me, and I wasn’t ashamed of how I looked. She had a killer body, but I had her man.
I know what you’re thinking. That’s a lovely evolved thought. No, it isn’t, but too bad. I ignored her, stuck my head into my locker, and rummaged through my bag.
I heard her voice from behind me, rich with amusement. “All this time, I’ve been wondering what on earth Hemi could see in you. Insipid little blondes aren’t much in his line, especially not when they’ve got a bit of pudge. Hemi’s never settled for less than a ten. What was he doing with a six? It was a puzzle.”
I turned around and began smoothing lotion into my skin, controlling my breathing with a pretty heroic effort. “Well, I don’t know. I guess people change, because here this six is with a three-carat rock on her finger. How’s your life going?” I could play in the Bitch Wars, too.
“But then,” Anika said, totally ignoring what I’d said, “until Ana told me, I didn’t realize you were pregnant. Oldest trick in the world, but still effective, eh. If you can find a susceptible man, that is. And there Hemi is, aching to be somebody’s hero, dying to be told he’s lovable after Mummy didn’t want him, and neither did I. Ana said none of them were impressed by you, but I don’t know that I agree. You may be more clever than they realize. If you call getting pregnant and playing the helpless card ‘clever,’ that is.”
“I don’t know how Ana would know, seeing as I’ve never met her.” I shoved back my emotion at the rest of it. Throwing a man’s vulnerability back in his face? Using his family against him?
“Oh, she’s heard reports. Let’s say I’m not the only one surprised at his choice.”
I pulled on my underwear, keeping my movements as smooth as I could manage. Hemi had told me, in one of his coaching moments, “The winner is the one who needs it less.” Well, Anika sure needed to talk to me more than I needed to talk to her, because I wouldn’t have crossed the street to have this conversation.
I let her wait, then sat on the bench, began to put on my pants, and finally said, “So you’re surprised. So what? If Hemi likes me enough to marry me, what do I care what you or his sister think?”
Another smile. “You shouldn’t. But you should care about what I can do to him. And what I can do to you, although of course”—the smile turned mocking—“you care more about Hemi than about yourself. Or should I say—you care about his money more?”
“I think you’re mixing me up with you,” I said sweetly. “And if that’s the best you’ve got, I can’t imagine why you bothered to come all this way.”
She smiled, faint and contemptuous, and I told myself, No hitting, and went back into my locker for my bra and top.
“I came because I have a present for you,” she said.
“Let me guess. An acid bath. Oh, wait. You already gave us that.” Hey. That had been good.
“Oh, darling, I’ve hardly got started.” With that, she reached into her slouchy black bag, and I froze for a second, then whirled.
My baby. That was the only thought making it through. Run.
I’d barely taken two steps when she said, her dark voice full of amusement, “Don’t be a fool. I’m more subtle than that. Besides, if you go out there topless, Katikati will be talking for weeks, and you wouldn’t want that.”
She wasn’t holding a gun, or a knife, or whatever I could have imagined. She was holding her phone, pressing and clicking, and I heard Hemi’s voice. His bedroom voice.
“Touch yourself. Because I’m touching you. Tying your ankles now, put
ting a pillow under your hips so you’re all the way open for me. All the way helpless. Ready for anything I want to do to you.”
My voice, then. A whimper, a moan. I stood there, halfway dressed, halfway to the door, listening to Hemi. And to me. And burning.
“Nice,” Anika said. “But too tame. Now, let’s see . . .” She clicked around a bit and said, “This one’s a bit better. See what you think.”
Hemi again. “I’m going to turn you over, tie you down on your stomach. Wrists and ankles, so you’re spread-eagled on the bed, and you’re already begging me to stop. Going to shove a wedge up under you, get you ready for me. And now I’m shoving that vibrator up your pretty little arse, stretching you wider and wider while you squirm and beg. Until you start to howl. Because tonight’s the night you’re going to give it to me, and I’m going to fuck it hard. I’m going to fuck it till you scream.”
My breath was coming fast. I was half-naked and vulnerable. Helpless. And Anika kept playing that . . . tape?
“How . . .” I found myself saying despite my best intentions.
Another smile, and Hemi’s voice mercifully stopped. “Did you and Hemi really think I flew all the way to New York to beg? Without a backup plan? That’s why he’ll never get as far as he thinks. He assumes everybody’s as soft as he is. He doesn’t think outside the box. Or maybe he doesn’t think outside yours. You’ve cost him his edge, and that’s just sad. He wants to live in a kinder, gentler world, but he should know better. It doesn’t exist. Getting soft means getting screwed. But then, you know all about that, don’t you? That’s your specialty.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I wasn’t horrified anymore. I was back at my locker, pulling out the rest of my clothes, dressing myself. Arming myself. “What you’re doing doesn’t have a thing to do with Hemi’s character, or with mine. It’s all about you, and it’s all about money. You planted something on him somehow, or you hacked into his computer so you could hear our calls. Whatever it was, you eavesdropped on our private conversations, and that’s illegal.”
Found (Not Quite a Billionaire Book 3) Page 23
