Chapter One #2
Midnight is an exclusive business club and resort run by the Midnight Circle—a consortium of wealthy business people headed by Oliver Huxley, who had the idea of using the proceeds of the club to support local charities.
We’ve all worked hard to make the club a success, and to ensure it’s seen as honorable and respectable.
I’m going to have that word engraved on my fucking tombstone. Here lies Kingi Davis. Tried to be respectable. Failed spectacularly.
The three of them say their goodbyes and head off to their various cars.
I pause on the steps, reluctant to go back to the office.
It’s been raining the past few days, but today is a beautiful, blustery autumn May day.
Even though it’s too late for mountaineering, as there are fewer daylight hours and there will be snow at higher elevations, it’s my favorite time of year.
Up here, north of Auckland, autumn is a bit of a non-event, but in the South Island—in Queenstown and Arrowtown and Dunedin and Invercargill—the trees are decked in glorious colors, and in the mornings the air will be filled with a delicious bite and the promise of winter.
I need to stretch my legs and think, so I set off toward the path that circumnavigates the site and provides a pleasant kilometer walk. I’m wearing my suit jacket but it’s too nice for a coat, and I slide my hands into the pockets of my suit trousers and enjoy the feel of the sun on my face.
The path runs along the front of the site, past the car park, not far from the private beach, then follows the river that eventually leads up to the Waiora healing pool and waterfall. Before it gets there, though, it turns away and curves gracefully around the back of the site.
Here we’ve had the grounds landscaped to provide a stunning set of Japanese-style gardens, designed to inspire peaceful contemplation.
Stepping-stone walkways wind between numerous vignettes that can’t be viewed all at once.
There are small wooden pavilions, pagoda pillars, a bridge over a small stream, and a pond full of colorful goldfish.
Bamboo shoots are interwoven to form latticework that separates each scene.
It’s beautifully done and has earned the Midnight Club an Earth Star from the New Zealand Gardens Trust for sustainability.
At the back of the site, the ground rises to provide a natural windbreak. At the moment it consists of mown grass, but the landscaping firm we employ is working on converting that to a series of terraces with flower beds to provide a splash of color.
The firm’s employees usually work weekdays, so I’m surprised to see someone halfway up one of the slopes, hard at work in khaki trousers and a pair of mud-coated walking boots.
I slow as I approach. The person has their back to me, and is bent over, busy shoveling earth into a wheelbarrow halfway up one of the slopes.
Judging by the shapely ass, it’s a woman.
Even though she’s bent over, I can tell she’s small and slender, but she has surprisingly big boobs.
I wouldn’t be a red-blooded man if I missed the bounce of her breasts beneath her light-green sweatshirt as she digs the shovel into the wet earth. Wow.
As she lifts the shovel of earth into the wheelbarrow, she turns to reveal her face in profile, along with her long red ponytail, and I realize who it is.
“Morning,” I say.
“Oh!” She spins around in shock… and that turns out to be her undoing. Her boots are sunk deep into the wet earth, and they refuse to move. She loses her balance, and her arms flail as she starts to fall back.
“Shit.” I rush forward, grab one of her hands, and yank her forward.
The only trouble is that I forget my own strength sometimes, and I pull her so hard she stumbles forward and falls against me.
It knocks me off balance, and I step back, knocking into a heavy bucketful of soil.
I slip, lose my footing, and fall onto my ass with her half on top of me, right in the middle of a pile of freshly dug wet earth.
She looks down at me, and we stare at each other in astonishment for about six seconds.
Then we both burst out laughing.
“I think our audition for the Clumsiest Human Olympics went well, don’t you?” she teases, pushing up onto an elbow.
“It was rather spectacular. I’d say we’re up for the silver medal, minimum.” I’m lying on my back in the mud. Jesus, my poor suit. I’m absolutely covered.
I look up into her big green eyes. “Hey you.”
“Hey.” She smiles.
I’ve known Francesca Ross since I was about eight years old and Chessie, as everyone calls her, was six.
Her father is Joe Ross, the owner of Ross Gardens, a company that offers landscaping services as well as general lawn and garden maintenance.
He’s been my father’s gardener for twenty years, and he used to bring Chessie and her brother, Mark, to the house to play with me and my sister Marama while he mowed the lawns and trimmed the hedges.
We climbed trees together, went down to our private beach and swam in the sea, played cricket in the sand, and generally had the perfect Kiwi childhood, right up until I went to boarding school at the age of twelve.
As the years went by, we saw less and less of each other.
My life became about rugby trials, studying for exams, and working hard to get through the bronze, silver, and gold levels of the Duke of Edinburgh Award, with all that involved, while Chessie went to the local high school and stayed close to home.
We did meet up occasionally during our vacations though.
One hot Christmas, we bumped into each other at a summer garden party at my friend Orson’s house.
The adults drank champagne on the deck while the youngsters went swimming in the pool.
I was seventeen, she was fifteen. We’d known each other for a long time, and I’d always thought of her as a kid, my friend’s little sis, but that day she was wearing a bikini (clearly I have a weakness for women who wear them), and for the first time I noticed her maturing figure, and just how grown up she’d become.
We splashed each other in the pool, flirted, and teased, and then as it was growing dark, ended up finding a quiet spot behind the garage where I finally kissed her.
Unfortunately, my father had gone to his car to retrieve something, and he bumped right into us.
He just cracked a joke, and Chessie walked off hurriedly, more than a little embarrassed.
But when she’d gone, he gave me a scornful look and said, “Really? You can do better than that, boy.” When I got back to the party, I found her and tried to apologize, but she laughed it off and said it was only a bit of fun, and walked away. And that was the end of that.
It wasn’t as if I took my dad’s advice to heart.
We just ended up in different social circles.
At eighteen she chose not to go to university and went straight into her father’s gardening business, whereas my career skyrocketed, and I’ve ended up mixing with the rich and famous.
Over the past couple of years I’ve seen her a few times, and we’ve smiled and exchanged pleasantries, but that has been the extent of our communication.
The last time I spoke to her, she wore braces. Now, when she smiles at me, she reveals a line of attractive, straight white teeth.
The women I’m used to mixing with are, overall, very wealthy.
Their hair is professionally highlighted, straightened, and styled, they have long fake fingernails, they tan their skin on a sunbed, they wear heavy foundation, false eyelashes, and outline their lips so they look like Barbie dolls, and their clothing bears designer labels and is always of that season’s fashion.
Chessie’s green top bears a faded picture of Ridley Scott’s Alien, her trousers are torn, her nails are short and have dirt beneath them, her long red hair is naturally wavy, and she’s clearly not wearing any makeup, because her skin is covered in freckles.
She smells of the autumn air rather than expensive, cloying perfume. She’s the classic girl-next-door.
We’ve been staring at each other for a little longer than is necessary, and she finally drops her gaze before saying, “Oh Kingi, your suit, I’m so sorry.”
I look down at the mud-soaked shirt and trousers, and shrug. “Eh, the dry cleaners’ll sort it out.”
She pushes up, then groans as she also discovers she’s coated in mud from her ribs all the way down. “Jeez, look at the state of us.”
I get to my feet and extend a hand to pull her up, a little more gently this time, so she just bumps against me.
“I’ve got a change of clothes in the car,” she says, “although I think it might be better if I sit on a black bag, drive home, and shower first. This clay is so sticky.” She attempts to peel a clod off her elbow.
“Come back to Midnight,” I say. “You can change there.”
Her eyes widen. “Oh goodness, I couldn’t walk through the club looking like this.”
“You won’t have to. We’ll go back to my suite. We can even take the back stairs if you’d rather.”
She hesitates, looking down at her mud-covered arm, and her hands that are now stained a rich red-brown. “Ahhh…”
“Come on. Let’s put your gear away first.”
She doesn’t argue as I collect the shovel and bucket. After tipping the earth out of the wheelbarrow, she places smaller tools into it, then wheels it beside me as I head off to the large garden shed.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” I ask. “I didn’t think you worked Saturdays.”
“I don’t, normally.” She tucks a stray strand of her hair behind her ear, leaving a long smudge of earth across her cheek.
“So…”
“I’m trying to help Dad out.”
It’s only then that I remember that Joe Ross suffered a heart attack a few weeks ago, and he’s currently in hospital following a quadruple heart bypass operation. “Shit, I’m sorry, I forgot. How is he?”
She steers the wheelbarrow off the main path toward the shed. “He’s had a few complications. Something called Post-Pericardiotomy Syndrome. He has a fever and chest pain. They’re giving him drugs, but he’s developed an infection in the surgical wound, and…”
She stops by the shed, takes the tools over to an outdoor tap, and starts rinsing them off. I join her, cleaning the spade free of mud with my hands. I glance at her, wondering why she hasn’t finished her sentence. Her lips are pressed tightly together. I think she’s trying not to cry.
I don’t say anything, pretending I haven’t noticed, but I take the bucket from her and clean it, rinse the tools, wipe down the wheelbarrow, and place all the tools in their right places inside, leaving her to wash her hands and gather herself.
When I’m done, I take the key from her and lock up the shed, then hand it back to her.
My jacket and shirt are filthy. I take both off, then run a cleanish part of the shirt sleeve under the tap. Straightening, I turn to her and wipe the cloth across her cheek, removing the streak of mud.
“Kinda pointless,” she whispers, her eyes turning glassy. “But thank you.”
I smile. “I think a change of clothes, a hot coffee, and one of our special double chocolate muffins is necessary right now.”
“Oh, that sounds like heaven.”
“Come on. I smell like a farmyard. I really, really need a shower.”