Chapter Eight
Chessie
“Where’s he taking you?” Ria wants to know.
It’s five p.m. Tuesday, and Kingi has told me he’s going to pick me up at six and take me for a meal on the mainland with his friend Orson and his girlfriend, Scarlett.
I’ve been working all day on the landscaping of the back slope at the Midnight Club, and I’m knackered.
I just hope I don’t fall asleep halfway through the meal.
I stand in front of the mirror in my bedroom, holding a dress in front of me, and survey my reflection with pursed lips. “Some restaurant called Te Moana on the waterfront.”
“Te Moana?” Ria’s eyes nearly fall out of their sockets. “Oh my God, seriously?”
I meet her gaze in the mirror. “You’ve heard of it?”
Her lips curve up. “Chessie… honestly. You’re hopeless. It’s, like, the most expensive restaurant in the city. Everyone who’s anyone goes there.”
“I don’t know why I’m going, then—I’m nobody.” I swallow hard. “I don’t want to hear it. I’m already nervous enough.” I smooth down the black, knee-length dress. “What do you think? Will this do?”
“You look like you’re going to a christening.”
“That’s good, right?”
Lisa giggles. The two of them are sitting on my bed, watching the show. “Not really. You want to wear something that makes everyone sit up and take notice.”
“I really don’t. I want something that will make me fade into the background.”
“Then that dress is perfect,” Ria says.
I stick my tongue out at her. She just grins.
“I don’t like wearing dresses,” I grumble. “I feel like a newsreader. Or a personal assistant. I’m so much more comfortable in trousers.”
“Then you should wear trousers,” Lisa says. “But not jeans. What about those navy pants you bought at Christmas?”
“These?” I pull them out of the cupboard. They’re high-waisted and tailored, and I like them a lot.
“Yeah, they look good on you.”
“In that case, you need a flashier top.” Ria gets off the bed. “Hold on.” She disappears while I pull the trousers on, then reappears with something from her own wardrobe. It’s a sleeveless top in a soft pink with small darker pink, red, and navy flowers and petal shapes. It’s really pretty.
It also has a plunging neckline.
“That looks great on you,” I tell her. “With your B cups. It won’t look so great with my pillows.”
“Just try it,” she urges.
Grumbling, I pull it on. We’re a similar size, so it fits nicely, except for the fact that it dips too far south and reveals my generous cleavage.
“Argh.” I try to pull the sides together.
“No!” She laughs and bats my hands aside, then turns me to face the mirror. “I’d kill for your boobs. You look amazing.”
“This is Kingi we’re talking about,” I remind her. “He doesn’t need encouragement to look at a girl’s tits. If anything I should be trying to distract him. I ought to wear a roll-neck sweater.”
“No, she’s right,” Lisa says. “He’s a good-looking guy and you’re supposed to be his fiancée. You have to try to look the part.”
I roll my eyes and turn back to the mirror. “All right, I’ll wear it, thank you. But maybe I should put a safety pin in the middle?”
Ria gets off the bed. “Go and get ready, before my brain explodes.”
Lisa laughs and gets up too. “Let us know if you need anything else. The bathroom’s all yours.” The two of them leave the room, closing the door behind them.
I survey my reflection and tug the two sides of the top together. They refuse to meet, though, leaving the Grand Canyon of my cleavage available for anyone to see.
Huffing a sigh, I take off my clothes, put on a robe, and go and have a shower.
By the time Kingi draws up outside the house in his Porsche, I’m ready. The girls do Paper, Scissors, Rock to establish who gets to answer the door, and a triumphant Lisa goes to answer it when he knocks.
“Hello!” she says.
“Kia ora.” He smiles at her. He’s wearing cream chinos and a maroon shirt that stretches tightly across his impressive biceps. He’s rolled up his shirt sleeves, and his Māori sleeve tattoo is clearly visible. The guy fills the doorway physically and metaphorically. Talk about larger than life.
Lisa immediately turns scarlet and loses the ability to speak.
Ria giggles and joins her at the door. “I’m Ria,” she tells him, offering her hand, “and this is Lisa.”
“Afternoon, ladies. It’s great to meet you.
” His voice is deep and resonant. He’s tidied his hair and beard, but they’re both still long.
Everything else about him screams wealth, from the car sitting like a panther on the roadside to his large expensive watch.
It’s not the first time I’ve thought of him as a modern-day Tūmatauenga, the god of war and hunting.
“I… um…” Ria looks up… and up… and up… and blushes.
“Good grief.” I usher both of them away from the door. “Stop charming my friends,” I scold him, retrieving my purse.
“I’m just standing here.”
“It’s the way you’re standing.”
“On my feet?”
I wave goodbye to them, go out, and close the door behind me. “You know perfectly well what you do to women.”
“Well it’s not intentional, and I never mean to…” His voice trails off. “Er…” He blows out a breath. He’s looking straight into my eyes, but his gaze has an odd intensity.
“Are you trying not to eye-dip me?” I ask curiously.
“Summoning every inch of willpower I own,” he replies.
I roll my eyes. “You’ll dislocate something if you carry on like that. Just look and get it over with.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” He takes my hand.
“You’re saying you’ve never looked at my boobs?”
“I always look at your boobs. I just didn’t realize they were quite so… full. That’s some cleavage you got there, girl.”
I look down at it as we walk to the car. “I wanted to wear a roll-neck sweater, but the girls wouldn’t let me.”
“Please thank them for me.”
“I will, when I’m lying on my hospital bed because you couldn’t keep your eyes on the road.”
He chuckles and opens the passenger door for me. “Give me some credit.”
I slide into the seat.
“I’ll only look when we stop at traffic lights,” he says, and closes the door, cutting off my retort.
As he walks around the car, I huff a sigh and buckle myself in. He gets in the driver’s side, closes the door, and does the same.
Then he looks at me, and we both start laughing.
“Kinda nice to be going on a date with a friend,” he says as he starts the engine.
“I know what you mean. There’s no pressure.”
“Yeah, no awkwardness.”
“I hate dating,” I grumble.
“Me too!” He turns onto the main road and heads for the ferry. “That moment where the conversation is all awkward and you’re feeling each other out.”
“On a first date? I can see what kind of girls you go out with.”
He chuckles. “You know what I mean. You don’t know what the other person is into, so you’re telling them about yourselves and trying to discover whether they like the same things you do.”
“Yeah. And then you find they like motorsport and heavy metal and they don’t like curry, and you’re, like, oh shit, this isn’t going to work.”
“I couldn’t date a girl who didn’t like curry.”
“I know! I couldn’t date a guy who didn’t like music.”
“Who the hell doesn’t like music?”
“You’d be surprised. Tamati said he was, but after I started dating him I realized he wasn’t really into it. He never understood why I always liked to have it on in the house.”
He checks his mirror, then glances at me. “You lived with him?”
“Yeah, for about a year.”
“I didn’t know that.”
I look out of the window. “It wasn’t the best decision of my life.”
“I’m sorry.”
I shrug. “It’s done now. No point in regrets.” I look across at him. He’s resting an elbow on the windowsill, with his fingers on his lips, thoughtful. He’s incredibly handsome. And he smells amazing. “People are never going to think we’re an item,” I joke.
He frowns. “Why?”
“Look at you, Kingi. You scream money and power. I’m a gardener for God’s sake. You’re lucky I’m not wearing wellies.”
“Oh yes! About that. High heels! I didn’t know you possessed any.”
“Not much call for them when you’re up to your knees in mud.”
“I guess. But it’s good you’re wearing them. It’ll make it easier to kiss you later.”
“Oh God, don’t start that again. I’m not kissing you.”
“You signed the contract.”
“Fuck.” I slide down in the seat. “I forgot about that.”
“Yeah, it’s all legal now. Tane sent you a copy of it?”
“Yes.”
“So I don’t want to hear any ‘I’m not going to do that.’”
I poke my tongue out at him. “That’s why you paid me the money straight away, isn’t it?”
“Totally.” He smiles.
“Thank you for that,” I say softly. “I didn’t expect you to do it right away.”
“I didn’t want you to worry about it. And sometimes payments take a while to go through.”
“No, it came through this morning. I opened my bank app and my balance was $100,027.43. My eyes nearly fell out of my head.”
He stares at me. “You had twenty-seven dollars and forty-three cents in your bank account before the payment turned up?”
“Yeah. A whole twenty-seven! It was a good week.” My lips curve up at the look on his face. “What?”
He returns his gaze to the road, taking the turning for the ferry, and doesn’t say anything.
“Anyway,” I continue, “I went to see my parents at lunchtime.”
“Oh… how did it go?”
I shift in the seat as I remember the moment I told them. “Mum just sat there with her mouth open. Dad cried.”
He sighs. “Babe, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay. I expected it.”
“You told them we were engaged?”
“Yeah. They remembered you. I said we’d been dating for a few months and had become really close. They bought it.”
“Really?”
“Yes, they bought that I’d agreed to marry the tall, gorgeous billionaire. Shocking, isn’t it?”
He laughs. Then he glances at me. “You think I’m gorgeous?”
“Beneath all the hair? Maybe.”
He strokes his chin. “It’s probably time I trimmed it.”
“You think?”
“You don’t like it?”
I smile. “It’s very you.”