Just Not Mine (12 page)

“Hi.” Hugh smiled at Josie as she stood outside on his porch, dressed down in
skinny black trousers and a purple jersey and still looking pretty bloody fantastic. “Come on in.”

“Nice haircut,
by the way,” she told him as she did.

“Thanks
.”

“You kept the beard, though,” she said.

“Yeh.” He ran his hand over his jaw. “After some thought. Should I have shaved it?”

“Mmm, I don’t think so,” she said. “If you’re asking me. Manly, isn’t it.”

“Not too manly? he asked. “Rough?”

“No.
Or if it is …” She smiled into his eyes. “That’s not so bad. Chloe will like it, I’m sure.”

Right. Chloe. “Come on in,” he realized he should say.

“This is nice,” she exclaimed as she followed him through the broad rimu-floored passage with its paneled walls that ran, in true villa style, straight back to the end of the house.

“You’ve never been here?” he asked in surprise.

“Just for a minute, when your aunt was here. That’s my ulterior motive tonight,” she said cheerily, “get some ideas for how I want my place to look when it’s done, or restored, I should say. If they’d had the sense to leave well enough alone, it’d be cake. Those DIY projects you mentioned, though.” She gave an expressive shudder. “Brr.”

He’d felt awkward about this, about having her babysit while he went out with somebody else, with her friend. Clearly,
though, he was the only one who’d felt that way. “Kids are in the back,” he said. “Early dinner.”

“Oh, I don’t get to cook?” she asked, and actually sounded disappointed.

“Only so much I was willing to ask of you,” he said.

“You can ask,” she said
, and he looked down at her, his eyes met hers, and it was another of those electric moments, or was that just him? Because as always, she looked away first, made a little gesture towards the back of the house, and he led the way into the kitchen, having another talk with himself along the way.

“Oh,” she said when they reached it. “This is
nice.”

Hugh looked around. He guessed it was. White
glass-fronted cabinets gleaming with rich paint, pale-yellow walls with glossy white trim, folding glass doors running the entire width of the back wall opening into the garden, onto the wooden deck where the kids were sitting.

“Josie!” Charlie hopped up, came over for a cuddle.

“I was just looking at your mum’s beautiful kitchen,” Josie told him. “I can see that she loved to cook, just like you said. But then, she was French.”

“Yeh, she cooked better than Hugh,” Amelia said, poking
disconsolately at her dinner. “She cooked better than anybody. But,” she added fairly, “Auntie Cora cooks better than Hugh too. And June’s mum cooks better than Hugh.”

“We made this dinner together,” Hugh pointed out. “So if anything’s lacking, it’s on
all of us.”

“Shepherd’s pie?” Josie asked, looking at the pan. “Moving up, I’d say, mince and potatoes. Looks yum. Got some carrots in there too, I see. Bonus points for nutrition.”

“Not
that
yum,” Amelia said.

“Have some,” Hugh urged Josie. “If you think you can risk it. You can tell us how to improve for next time.”

“I don’t—” she began, then smiled ruefully.

“Let me guess. You don’t eat shepherd’s pie.”

“Well, no. Mince and potatoes? No.”

“You can’t eat
potatoes?”
Charlie asked. “Are you allergic? A kid in my class is allergic to peanuts, but I never heard of anybody being allergic to potatoes. You need to be careful, though, if you’re allergic.”

“I’m not allergic,” she assured him. “Just can’t eat potatoes. Make me chubby, eh. But I’ll have a wee taste of your pie all the same, give the two of you some pointers if I can. That way, the next time you make shepherd’s pie with Hugh, you
can put him right, show him up.”

“Was your mum a good cook too?” Charlie asked. “Like ours?”

“A very good cook. Not French, nothing flash. But she can turn out dinner for ten on two burners, and make it look easy and taste better.”

“Is she alive?” Charlie asked.
“Or did she die?”

“She’s al
ive,” Josie said, looking a little taken aback.

“
That’s good,” Charlie said. “So she can still cook for you and give you cuddles and things.”

She gave him a cuddle of her own, and Hugh thought she might have teared up a bit. “I hope she s
tays alive a long, long time,” she said. “Because you’re right, she gives awesome cuddles.”

“Then i
f you had kids,” Charlie said, “you’d know how to cuddle too.”

She didn’t say anything, just held on a moment more, and Hugh had definitely been right about the tears. He realized, too, that neither of the kids ever came to him for cuddles, not these days, not for years, and that he hadn’t thought of offering them.

His own mum had never been much of a one for cuddling, though. Always in motion, always on the phone or at the computer, or both, talking and planning, flapping a hand at him to wait, not to interrupt until she’d worked out measurements, coaxed a reluctant client to abandon the “darling” idea she’d found in some magazine, then throwing a dinner together for the two of them before rushing off again. She’d been a fine mum, had done the right things, cared the way a mum should, but she hadn’t been much of a cuddler, and she still wasn’t.

And neither had his dad been, at least not with him, not as far as his sketchy memory could recall from the early years.
He’d mellowed with his marriage to the much younger, effervescent Juliette. A woman who, Hugh realized, Chloe resembled more than a little. No wonder the kids wanted him to date her.

The doorbell rang, and he hustled back through the house,
opened the door to find Chloe. Looking, yes, pretty similar to Juliette, elegant in a green-and-white print wrap dress, a chubby toddler on one hip, a heavy-looking bag slung across the other shoulder, both of them seeming like too much weight for her slim frame.

“Hi,” he said, stepping back to let her in. “Let me take that from you,” he offered, reaching for the bag. “Everyone’s on the patio. And
introduce me, please,” he added belatedly.

“This is Zavy,” she said. “Xavier.”

“Hi, Zavy,” Hugh said. The boy looked at him unblinkingly out of big brown eyes and clung to his mother, and as a buttering-up tactic, Hugh thought, that hadn’t gone too well.

“Here we are,” he said,
taking them out back and seeing Zavy’s solemn face light up, his arms go out for Josie. She had the knack, no question.

“Bag’s over here,” Hugh said,
setting it down near the wall. Nappies, he guessed.

“It’s got his blanket in it,” Chloe told Josie. “And a toy or two. He’s already in his
jammies. But sorry,” she caught herself with a laugh. “You can see that.”

“Hi, Zavy!” Amelia said chirpily to the boy. “You get to
play with us tonight! And you get to sleep in my bed! Won’t that be fun?”

“He’s got plenty of minders tonight, doesn’t he?” Chloe asked her. “
She knows him because I bring him to the studio sometimes with me,” she explained to Hugh. “In a pinch. Got a pen in the corner. He’s not much of a one for fussing, luckily.”

“How about if Charlie and I clean up here,” Josie suggested, “and you and Zavy can check out his toys
, Amelia? Then we can all watch a film. I rented a couple for us to choose from, and I predict some heated negotiations ahead.”

“No princesses,” Charlie said immediately. “And no kissing. Amelia always wants to watch ones with kissing. Lame as.”

“I do
not,”
Amelia said. “You just think that because they have adult themes that you aren’t mature enough for.”

“Wait a minute,” Hugh said. “Adult themes? No adult themes.”

“I think she means young adult themes,” Josie said with a smile, “which can occasionally include a kiss or two. But no worries, Charlie. No kissing in these, or if there is, only at the end, and I’ll alert you if it’s looking dodgy, give you a chance to make a timely dash for the toilet.”

“Sounds like the entertainment options will be pretty good,” Chloe said. “Maybe we should just
stay here, Hugh.”

He realized that he’d got distracted. He was meant to be kick-starting his love life, not having cozy family time, however appealing that suddenly and unreasonably sounded. He was meant to be concentrating on
Chloe.
He reminded himself to do just that for the rest of the evening.

He managed it pretty well, in the end.
He’d booked them in at Five Forty in Takapuna, close enough to home and her son to keep her comfortable, flash enough to make it look like he was trying. He’d chosen snapper for his meal, because he could eat it with one hand and still look reasonably civilized, had ordered their best white wine, had asked her more questions about her life.

“Josie and I were best of friends at school,” she said, which he already knew. “Even though she boarded and I didn’t. I took her home, lots of weekends, because she’s a home sort of person, and I knew she was lonely
. Although of course she’d never have said, and you’d never have known.”

“A good actress even then, eh,” he said.

“Always a good front,” she agreed. “That’s Josie. If she’s hurting, you don’t know it. When my partner left me while I was pregnant with Zavy, that was a hard time for her too. She’d come over and spend the night with me, leave in the morning, and I’d realize that she’d never said anything about herself, and that I’d never asked. Of course, I was such a wreck at the time, between the hormones and the studio and the stress and all, I was in a fog.”

“It was a hard time for her?” Hugh asked. “Why?”

“Oh.” Chloe looked a little taken aback. “Just some things she was going through herself at the time.”

What kinds of things? Hugh wondered. Chloe was right, Josie never seemed fussed. He should turn the conversation back to Chloe, though. He was just trying to think of a smooth way to do it when he heard the voice at his elbow.

“Another wounded warrior on the town.”

He turned around, the smile already on his face, because it was Hemi Ranapia, and he had company.

“Fancy meeting you here,” Hemi’s partner Reka said, and Hugh stood to give her a kiss, nod his hello to Kevin McNicholl, balancing on his crutches in the confined space of the little restaurant, his booted foot stuck out in front of him.

Reka was studying him
—and Chloe—with interest, and Hugh made introductions. “Just get here?” he asked.

“Nah, just finished, mate,” Hemi said. “
Around the back, on the patio. Our usual wild night. Taking Kevvie out, because I took him along to the gym with me yesterday and he was looking like I needed to do something, stop him talking to the walls.”

“
Join us, why don’t you,” Hugh said. “We’ve got a good bit more wine here that needs finishing off, could get another few glasses.” He lifted a hand for the waiter and asked for them.

Reka looked at him speculatively. “For a minute, then,” she decided, and Hemi and Hugh adjusted chairs, pulled the tab
le out to allow Kevin to get himself and his boot in.

Chloe gave Kevin an assessing look. “I recognized Hemi straight away, so I’m going to guess that
you’re a rugby player as well, and that that’s the source of that injury.”

“My sad fate,” he said with his cheerful grin. “Hemi and Hugh look like footy players, and I look like
the farmer I ought to be, ginger hair and all.”

“I didn’t say that,” she protested, laughing.

“Don’t let the false modesty fool you,” Hemi said. “Kevvie saves all his flash for the paddock, that’s all. Scored some pretty spectacular tries during the Championship. Had a hat trick against the Wallabies a couple months ago, in fact. He’d be on the Tour along with Hugh here if they hadn’t been left behind to mend their broken bits.”

“Perils of the game,” Reka said. “I have to admit, I always enjoyed the injury breaks. I did,” she protested at Hemi’s
indignant snort. “Only way I got to see you. Now,” she sighed, “I wonder what I was thinking. Always underfoot, now you’ve retired.”

“Too right,” Hemi said
. “Looking after the kids, doing the cooking. Bloody nightmare.”

“That
looks like it was a pretty bad injury, though,” Chloe told Kevin. “If you’re still on crutches, because it seems like Hugh’s had his hand in that cast for a few weeks. Haven’t you?” she asked him.

“Yeh,” he said. “We both copped it in the last match of the Championship, three weeks ago now.”

“
You’re right,” Kevin told Chloe, “feels like I’ve been in this boot for a good while. Hemi and Reka took pity on me tonight, because it was true, I was going stir-crazy at home. Not being able to drive, it’s the worst, eh.” He looked appraisingly at Hugh’s hand. “You driving with that? Bit of a menace, aren’t you?”