His Christmas Pearl

by Renée Dahlia

  ‘Your reaction yesterday is totally understandable.’ Zoe had that hangdog apologetic look on her face again—the one that made him want to growl.

  ‘I guess so. It was a long time ago.’

  ‘I imagine that grief doesn’t really disappear though. You lost your family that day.’

  Kiet didn’t want to talk about it. His parents had worked so hard in this business to create a decent life for them all, and now he’d failed them. He paced to the sink and started cleaning up.

  ‘Do you want some help?’ Zoe collected up the plates from the table and brought them over to him.

  ‘No. You’ve already done enough.’ He meant the cooking, but she looked at him as if he’d kicked her.

  ‘I left my phone in the car. I’m going to get it now.’ Zoe walked out of his kitchen and he stared at her, guilt swirling in his gut, all mixed up with his self-inflicted hangover. What a bloody mess.

  ***

  He finished the dishes and hung the tea towel on the stove to dry. Zoe still hadn’t come back. He should probably go and see if she was alright. Besides, he would need to clean up the crash, get that tree off the driveway before tomorrow. A transporter was due. This was their busiest time of year—Christmas, Boxing Day, New Year’s, and then a short break before the mad rush of everyone wanting aphrodisiacs for Valentine’s Day.

  ‘Hey, Kiet. Want a hand with the tree?’

  ‘Yeah, thanks, Sam.’ This was where Kiet should probably apologise to his brother for sniping at him. He opened his mouth to begin, but Sam jumped in first.

  ‘Um, can I ask you something?’

  ‘Sure. Anything.’ Except how he felt about Zoe, because he had no good answer to that. It was just lust and gratitude, or something. Wasn’t it?

  ‘Do I really need to grow up?’

  ‘I don’t know, mate. What does that even mean?’

  ‘Elizabeth …’ Her name on his brother’s lips made Kiet want to punch something. ‘Well, she reckons I need to grow up, and then you said the same thing.’

  ‘That’s why you broke up?’ Kiet frowned. Didn’t Sam know that she’d been stealing from petty cash? Not that Kiet had any proof, but he knew they were missing money, and he couldn’t figure out where else it would be disappearing from.

  ‘Yes. She said it was sad that my mother died when I was a teen, but she wasn’t going to fill the role of mother for me. That I need to grow up before I can treat a woman equally. She said I’m too needy.’

  Kiet grumbled, ‘Sounds like an excuse to me.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I hate to tell you this, but she was stealing from us. I almost had proof, and now she’s made an excuse to piss off and leave. It has nothing to do with you. Just slimy excuses, I reckon. Come on, let’s chop up this tree so the transporter can turn up tomorrow.’

  Kiet walked outside and shook out his gumboots before putting them on. He paced to the tool shed to grab a chainsaw. Time to get to work. He always thought better when he was doing something and destroying the tree sounded like the perfect therapy for his problems.

  Chapter 5

  Zoe’s hands stung and her back ached, but a sense of satisfaction infused her limbs. She wasn’t used to all this work. A whole morning spent being useful, carrying small logs and stacking them up along the edge of the driveway. Eventually the fallen gum tree was sliced up by Kiet and Sam, and a mountain of wood piled alongside the fence. They’d used the cleanest forklift she’d ever seen to shift the bigger sections. Her heart ached for the two brothers as they coped with their parent’s death by being ultra-careful with the machine that replaced the exploded one. She admired their bravery in even being able to look at a forklift without crying.

  Her car sat alone in the driveway, the front all smashed in. Poor Betty. She’d have to ring the insurance company when they re-opened the offices after the holiday period and figure out what to do next. This wasn’t exactly how she’d expected to spend the day, and she certainly hadn’t expected to feel this sense of achievement. Not after the drama of yesterday’s crash. And the revelation about the accident that changed Kiet’s life. Sam’s life too. She’d spent most of the day pushing away the guilty feeling that she should have known. It didn’t matter that the school was big enough that she hadn’t known every kid in her year—small town or not, there was a large region of farms whose kids all came to the school on various buses. Her dad had been part of the town community, and she should have known. Working helped distract her from her own guilt. Would she ever be free from this need to strive towards a perfect goodness that she could never meet?

  ‘I’ll grab the tractor and tow the car to the shed. Get it out of the way.’ Kiet stood beside the pile of wood, sweat and sawdust sticking to his shirt. He’d pushed up the sleeves of his shirt and his muscles stood out. The tattoo she’d spied on Christmas Day peeked out from under his sleeve, and Zoe had spent hours trying not to stare at it. She wanted to know what it was. The tattoo taunted her. Shifting in and out of view as Kiet used the chainsaw. She didn’t know anyone who had a tattoo—what a boring sheltered life she’d led.

  ‘You’re a good sport. I bet this isn’t how you expected to spend Boxing Day?’ Sam clapped Zoe on the shoulder as they put the final log on the pile.

  ‘It’s my car. My mess.’ She stopped herself before she blurted out the truth: What else would I be doing on Boxing Day? Sitting alone in her flat watching telly or telling random people not to do those annoying quizzes on the internet. Didn’t they know they were giving away all their security details? She particularly hated the ones that were obviously phishing for bank security questions—your rapper name is the name of the street you first lived on and your mother’s maiden name. It was so obvious.

  ‘Why the big frown?’ Kiet appeared next to Sam, glaring at Sam’s hand resting on her shoulder. Was he jealous of his own brother? But Sam was only being friendly, wasn’t he? Sam dropped his hand and tucked it behind his back. ‘Just thinking.’

  ‘That’ll get you in trouble you know.’ Kiet smiled.

  ‘What? Thinking?’ Zoe scratched her head. Her hair was already messy after the morning’s work, falling out of the ponytail she’d tied it back into. She’d rinsed all the product she’d used yesterday out of her hair in the shower this morning, but it really needed a decent wash to properly re-condition it. ‘I wonder what being in trouble would feel like?’

  ‘I don’t know if you want that. It wouldn’t suit you.’

  ‘How do you know what suits me? You’ve known me for how long—half a day? Maybe I’m not always the nice one who drives people home and cooks them breakfast. Maybe this is my secret Christmas side that comes out once a year. And then I’ll go back to my normal life. Of getting tattoos, and drug-taking, or …’ She didn’t even know what she would do if she was going to break some serious rules. She could barely make herself drive through a yellow light. She liked rules, hence her decision to be an accountant where the numbers lined up and followed the rules.

  ‘Drug-taking?’ Kiet barked out a hard laugh. ‘I bet you couldn’t even name a drug, let alone do some.’

  She folded her arms. ‘I’m not totally innocent.’

  ‘Are you sure? Because I quite like the way you see the good in everything.’

  ‘I don’t know how I gave you this impression?’

  ‘You are here, aren’t you? No one else at that party was going to drive me home. At best, they’d let me pass out on the couch and make my own way home later. Some of them wouldn’t care if I slept it off in my car.’

  ‘You don’t need to sound so cynical, Kiet. Those people are my friends,’ Sam said.

  ‘Next you’ll be saying that I should have more friends.’

  ‘You don’t have friends?’ Zoe gasped and covered her mouth. She hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

  Kiet glared at her. ‘Of course I have friends. My life isn’t just me and a bunch of filter feeders.’

  ‘Damn it, Kiet. Being cynical is my job.
What is the matter?’ Sam growled.

  ‘Where have you been in the last couple of years? Oh, that’s right. Sleeping with the person who stole from us. I’m done with people who only spend time with us because they want something.’

  Sam’s eyebrows knitted together. ‘You don’t have any evidence.’

  ‘Neither do you, and she had access to the petty cash.’

  ‘So does everyone.’

  Zoe’s pulse raced as the brothers argued. She stepped between them, holding up both hands, palms towards them.

  ‘Wait. Run me through your petty cash system.’ She could figure this out for them and find the missing money. She missed the thrill of forensic accounting—not the toxic workplace—just finding the answers among the rows of numbers. Working for Xander and juggling funds across his various projects was a different type of thrill, a more consistent one than the puzzle of forensics.

  ‘Why? I’ve already been scammed by one pretty woman, and here you are, another one wanting to get access to my accounts.’ Kiet crossed his arms over his chest. His pose should be threatening, but she could almost feel the hurt coming off him in waves.

  ‘I don’t want access to your accounts, just the list of transactions. Let me help. I have the skills you need.’ Zoe shrugged lightly. She glanced over at Sam who nodded vigorously.

  ‘Kiet. It can’t hurt to get a second opinion. We both know the yields have been great over the last three seasons, and yet, there is no spare cash. I don’t think Elizabeth took it—there isn’t that much in petty cash.’

  ‘Half our business is in cash sales.’ Kiet didn’t budge.

  ‘True. We really ought to have done something about that as soon as we suspected money was going missing.’

  ‘Says you. You were too busy being led around by your dick.’ Kiet flashed a glare in Zoe’s direction and a cool shiver raced across the back of her neck. Did he think she was … No, that didn’t make any sense.

  ‘Take care, Kiet.’ Sam turned away from his brother and his frown disappeared. ‘Zoe, do you really think you could help us?’

  Chapter 6

  ‘I can do more than help you. I spent five years working in Sydney for a forensic accounting firm. I’ll find your money.’ Zoe could feel the old pull of a difficult problem. She’d loved that part of her job in the city. If it’d just been about her and the puzzles, she would still be there.

  ‘Forensic accounting? Like dead bodies?’ Kiet dropped his hands to his sides, his tense stance loosening up. Sam scoffed and Kiet flicked him a glance.

  ‘It’s okay. I know its odd terminology—forensic isn’t about gruesome murders or what not. It means to use logic or science to solve a problem, usually a crime.’ Zoe had explained her job to people many times. They usually started out telling her how fascinating her job sounded, pulled in by the possibility that she solved murders, but their eyes glazed over as she started talking about the detailed reality of it. The answers were always found in the missing details, the lines of data she should be seeing but didn’t.

  ‘Kiet, it’s kind of like science, but for money.’ Sam’s voice held a note of disdain, and Kiet pulled a face. Zoe wanted to know what their shared looks meant.

  ‘Science and numbers, all of that stuff, was never my strength. If it was, we wouldn’t be here with someone stealing from us.’

  ‘I feel bad about it too. I’m a scientist and I didn’t notice. At all.’ Sam’s face fell.

  ‘Do you two bicker like this all the time?’ Zoe had a much gentler relationship with Jade.

  ‘This isn’t bickering. This is how we solve all our problems, isn’t it?’ Sam glanced at Kiet but he didn’t seem to notice. He was staring out over the water, his eyes narrowed.

  ‘One thing.’ Kiet turned to face her, ignoring his brother’s comment. She would have called it teasing, except there was no joy underneath his words. ‘Why do you want to help us?’

  Zoe swallowed. She didn’t want to blurt out that she wanted to spend more time with him. That he made her nervous but in a good way—a way she wanted to explore as she learned how to be braver and less, well, pious. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach.

  ‘Why do I want to help you? It’s not really about you, it’s about the puzzle.’ It was only half a lie—this was about the puzzle. And him.

  ‘My problems aren’t some cute jigsaw for you to play with.’

  ‘You don’t have to say yes. It’s just that I’m here. You’ve helped me with the car, and I’m really good at figuring out financial frauds.’ Zoe bit back an exasperated sigh. Why wouldn’t he let her help?

  ‘Fraud. This is definitely fraud. That money is somewhere.’ Kiet thumped his fist against his thigh. Zoe nodded; there would be a trail and she’d find it. Kiet was so convinced someone was stealing from the business, but she knew from experience that the missing funds could be something as simple as poor business practices. If he thought Elizabeth was stealing from petty cash, and if half their customers paid in cash, then it also made sense that they paid for goods and services in cash, and maybe their record-keeping wasn’t crash hot. They could easily be spending more than they assumed they were. She sighed. She’d find out soon enough—if they let her.

  ‘How about we move the car and have some lunch first? I need to bring in tomorrow’s shipment, and are you going to help me pack it?’ Sam asked.

  ‘I am quite hungry.’ Zoe’s stomach grumbled at the mention of food. This morning’s work was more exercise than she’d done in ages. ‘How about I cook something while you two deal with Betty?’

  ‘Betty?’ Kiet’s dimple flashed.

  Zoe’s cheeks heated. ‘My car. She’s called Betty.’

  ‘Banged Up Betty. Poor old girl.’ Kiet grabbed some rope from the forklift and lay down on the driveway in front of her car. Zoe couldn’t think of her as Betty anymore, not while she sat sad and broken on the driveway.

  ‘Um, I’ll leave it in your capable hands and sort out some lunch?’

  ‘Sure. Sam, can you pass me the end of the rope?’

  ***

  Bloody Sam and his trusting nature. Kiet knew he needed help with the business, but he couldn’t bring himself to trust … anyone. He’d told Zoe that he trusted their accountant. Why shouldn’t he? Mr Andersen had been the accountant for the oyster farm for over thirty years, before Kiet was even born, and he didn’t have access to their bank account anyway. Logically it made sense to trust him. But why hadn’t he taken this problem to him when he’d first noticed? Kiet hated doing the books—and he’d procrastinated for too long. But the problems seemed to be getting worse: the disparity between what he thought they should have and what they actually had was growing. But everything Zoe said made sense. Until today he’d never worried that Sam had a fancy university degree because they’d both made a solid team on the farm. Kiet had always worked here, taking over by necessity when … Anyway, Sam had done an aquaculture degree and his skills allowed them to save money by growing their own seed. He’d put in place a bunch of systems that had meant fewer losses and more consistency across each season. It’d taken a while for all Sam’s ideas to turn into a benefit, and that’s why this financial problem ate at Kiet. They should be making a decent profit now—yields were up, losses were down, but the finances were still too tight. They were still on the bones of their arses, still struggling to earn enough to make a decent living. The old house needed work; Kiet had fixed the plumbing issues himself, but there were a ton of little jobs that he could never find the time to do, like the rot in the window of his bedroom. Elizabeth had been good at the start, doing all their communications with clients and slowly growing their client list. It’d been a stretch to employ her. And it sure as heck hadn’t paid off. So much for trying to expand the business and give Sam a decent future.

  Sam parked the forklift, and Kiet jumped out of Betty. He couldn’t imagine naming a car, yet it suited Zoe. Just like her ridiculous Christmas earrings yesterday.

  ‘You should give her a g
o. I know you have issues trusting people, especially since what Nok did, but …’ Trust Sam to bring their runaway eldest sister into this. As if his problems with people stemmed from Nok’s bad choices.

  ‘Nok? Seriously. She didn’t even come to Mum and Pa’s funeral. We haven’t heard from her for—’ Kiet did a calculation, ‘—nearly twenty years.’ Nok was five years older than him and had left home when she was fifteen and he was only ten.

  ‘Aren’t you curious about what happened to her?’

  Kiet wanted to hug Sam. He’d lost so much. It shouldn’t be a surprise that he’d fallen for Elizabeth’s charms. It had been nice having a woman around the house—even Kiet could admit there were some parts that had been good for them both, but at what cost? They’d nearly lost the business because of her. If they had one bad season, they’d be broke. And every oyster farmer knew that it didn’t take much to lose an entire crop; anything that polluted the river system upstream from them would affect their oysters. It took three years to grow Sydney Rock Oysters from seed to a harvestable size, and something as simple as silted waters from an inland flood would destroy everything. Several seasons of work gone in one moment. They might be able save some of their spat, and some of the ones that were almost harvestable size, if they had enough warning. Disaster always hovered on the horizon.

  ‘I hope Nok is doing well. I don’t know why she hasn’t been back to the farm.’ Kiet had always wondered why she’d left, and why she never came home. Once the farm had enough in the bank to cope with a bad season, he’d try to find her.

  ‘Maybe she doesn’t want to be found.’ Sam echoed Kiet’s thoughts, but the way Sam looked so bloody sad as he said it really tugged at Kiet’s heartstrings. ‘I don’t really remember her. My own sister. She is the reason I’m named “three”.’ Sam meant three in Thai. Kiet’s name carried a bigger burden, meaning honourable. Nok meant bird, and maybe their parents understood her need to fly away when they gave her the name. He wished she would come home, just for a visit.