Found (Not Quite a Billionaire Book 3) (6 page)

He said, “Hemi. My son,” but it didn’t sound a bit like Koro. No strength to his voice, and his eyes weren’t focusing right, either.

Neither were mine, for that matter. The tears were threatening to spill, and I still didn’t trust my voice. Instead, I leaned down, pressed my forehead and nose gently to his in a hongi, breathed his breath, and thought,
Thank you, God. Thank you for my Koro.

Across from me, Karen was hugging Hope, who’d sprung to her feet. I stood upright, still holding Koro’s hand, hard and calloused from a lifetime of work. He said, his words slow and slurred, “I took a tumble in the dark. Silly old bugger.”

“Nah,” I said. “Bit clumsy, maybe, that’s all.”

“Never mind,” he said. “I’d have told you not to come, but I reckon you were glad enough of the excuse.”

“Too right I was. And no worries. I was always going to come.”

“Should’ve fallen ages ago, then,” he said, and I had to squeeze his hand again and swallow past the lump in my throat.

I looked across the bed at Hope and saw the compassion and understanding in her eyes, and the lump may have grown even bigger. She wasn’t going to be starting up with me again. Just now, she cared about Koro, she cared about Karen, and she cared about me. I could see it in her as if I could see her heart, because I could. Hope was an open book. I just hadn’t bothered to read it.

“Eh, sweetheart,” I managed, then couldn’t think of what else to say, where to go with it.

The moment stretched out until Karen heaved a sigh and said, “Could you guys just hug or something?”

“Yeh,” I said. “Yeh. We could.”

Hope came to me this time. Straight around the end of the bed and into my arms, sliding into place like my missing piece. I held her tight, lifted her off her feet, and said, “I love you.”

It wasn’t the most eloquent declaration ever, but it seemed to do the business, because she wrapped her arms around me even more tightly as I set her down, then tucked her head under my chin and laid her cheek against my chest, seeming to need to inhale me the same way I was inhaling her familiar flower scent, the softness and the strength of her. Everything I’d missed. Everything I needed most.

“Good,” Koro said. “Take the two of them and go. Tane and June are coming after work. Any minute.”

“Came to see you, didn’t I,” I said, though I hadn’t let go of Hope. “I’ll wait until they arrive, at least.”

“Nah, you won’t. I’m tired, and I want to sleep. I saw you. Go away.”

Karen laughed out loud. “Koro’s as bossy as you, Hemi. That’s awesome.”

I hesitated a moment longer, but Koro closed his eyes and said, “Ignoring you. Bring Karen tomorrow.”

I smiled, took his hand once more, and said, “We’ll be back first thing in the morning. See you then.”

After that, Karen, Hope, and I were walking out the main doors into a chilly winter evening, and I was trying to figure out what to say next.

Karen, of course, beat me to it. “Let me guess. I’m going to get dropped off to get something to eat while you and Hope talk. I’m psychic like that.”

“No,” I said. “We’ll go home and have something to eat. It’ll be good to be together.” I meant it, too. It
was
good. “And then I’ll take Hope for a bit of a walk, maybe, and a chat.”

I hadn’t seen her for nearly two weeks, and I’d been shocked when I’d held her, especially once I’d lifted her. She was wearing her familiar jeans, but they weren’t nearly as snug as they should have been. Her collarbones, too, were much too prominent under her long-sleeved white tee, although her breasts were clearly larger. All things that might have been there to notice two weeks earlier, if I’d paid more attention.

“I’m not sure what there is at Koro’s,” Hope said, confirming my suspicions. “Not for all three of us to eat.”

“We’ll stop by and pick something up, then,” I said, reaching the car and holding the door open for her. “Do a bit of cooking. What do you fancy?”

She laughed, just a breath of sound. “That sounds so normal. Sorry. I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around all this. Figuring out how to be.”

“Right now,” I said, “you don’t have to be anything. We’ll make it up as we go, eh.”

All she was able to think of to eat, once we were back in Katikati and walking the endless aisles of Countdown, was, “Potatoes. But Koro probably has potatoes. And yogurt.”

“Tummy?” I asked.

“Yeah. And I just . . .”

She trailed off, and I said, “Chicken, then.” I picked up a packet of prepared boneless chicken breasts marinated with a bit of herb. She needed protein. I didn’t have to be a doctor to know that. “I’ll cook you a potato, no worries. Some kumara as well. Vitamins.”

“You don’t have to baby me,” she said. “I’m fine. Just a little tired. It’s been a long few days.”

“If I don’t have to baby you,” I said, “I can’t think why else I’d have been put on earth.”

The minute the words were out of my mouth, I wished them back, but Karen said, “Why would you have to baby Hope?”

I looked at Hope, but all she said was, “You didn’t tell her? I would have, but I thought you should know first.”

“Tell me what?” Karen asked. “I wish somebody would tell me
something.
Hello? I’m sixteen, not ten?”

“I’m pregnant,” Hope said, and I saw her take a deep breath as if the word had scared her.

Karen was saying, “Get
out.
So
that’s
why you’ve been so weird,” but I barely heard her. I took Hope’s hand instead.

She stopped, right there in the chill of the meat aisle, looking all her questions at me, and the tenderness was squeezing my heart so hard, it nearly hurt. I said, “I’ve never told you how I’d feel about that. I should have done. I’m over the moon. I’m . . .”

I was the one who had to stop then.
Harden up, boy,
I told myself, but I couldn’t. I was choking up instead, and somehow, the tears had risen again, were waiting just behind my eyes.

Koro in hospital, and Hope growing our baby. The worst thing, and the best. All I could do was reach for her, and all she could do was come to me. I was still holding the plastic basket in one hand, but the other arm was around her, and I was kissing her hair, holding her to me, and thinking . . . I couldn’t have said what. Thinking nothing. Feeling everything.

Karen said from behind me, “Whenever you’re done, could I hug my sister? Because I’m going to be an aunt. How great is that?’

I let go of Hope and stepped away, and Hope hugged Karen, and Karen said, “I’d ask how come being pregnant meant you
left,
because that seems totally stupid to me. Not to mention why you didn’t tell me. I
would,
except it would end up with me having to go away again so you guys could have a Big Important Angsty Talk. I’m probably too old to go on the horsey ride in front of the store, and there’s nothing else to do here except read magazines about celebrities I never heard of. Plus, I’m hungry.”

Hope laughed, though I could tell her own tears weren’t far away, and said, “I’ve missed you too, sweetie. Let’s go home and cook dinner.”

We didn’t go for a walk after all that night, and we didn’t have a chat, either. We cooked a quick dinner and ate it, and Karen told Hope about her upcoming driving lessons, and Hope smiled and asked questions, and I considered mentioning Noah the Buddhist but decided it could wait until tomorrow, along with everything else. And I thought about how good it felt to eat dinner with them, and how little I’d done it back in New York.

Hope and I did the washing up, because Koro’d never taken to the idea of a dishwasher, and when we were done, Hope said, “I’m sorry, guys, but I think I’m going to have to take a shower and go to bed. Jet lag, I guess.”

“Too bad you didn’t come in Hemi’s jet,” Karen said. “Those seats fold down into beds, did you know that? It’s like being a rich person. Oh, wait. It
is
being a rich person.”

“Mm,” Hope said. She looked at me, hesitated, then said, “I don’t know if there are sheets on Karen’s bed. And I wonder . . . I hope . . .”

“Karen can take care of her own sheets,” I said, and my heart had started to hammer. “She’s sixteen, not ten, eh, Karen.”

“Yeah,” Karen said. “And I guess I’m going to go watch TV and read a book. Not that there’s anything to watch. New Zealand seriously needs to get some better channels.”

“You could just read instead,” Hope said.

“Too boring,” Karen said. “Multitasking is my life.”

When she was gone, I looked at Hope and said, “You wonder what?”

Easy, boy,
I told myself.
Don’t rush her. Don’t push her.
Even though self-control had never come harder.

“I know I left,” she said slowly. She’d been looking at the tea towel in her hands, folding and refolding it, but now, she looked straight at me. “I was right to leave. I know that, too. But I still want to sleep with you. It would feel so much better, even though I should be too tired to care. I’m too tired for sex, and I know you probably want it, and that you’re so angry at me for leaving. But from now on, I’m going to try much harder to tell you what I feel and what I need, and it seems . . .” She stopped and laughed a little, trying to make it lighter, to make herself less vulnerable, and hung the towel carefully over its rack. “It seems what I need most is to fall asleep with you holding me. So I’m asking for it.”

I had one chance here. I was going to get it right. “From now on,” I said, “I’m going to try much harder to listen. Go take your shower, baby. I’ll come hold you.”

While she was in the bathroom, I unpacked my things into the bedroom that had been the site of my most lurid teenage fantasies, not to mention some sex with Hope that had exceeded anything I could have imagined. Tonight, I was going to get none of that, and I didn’t care.

She came into the bedroom again wearing a pair of pink pajamas and looking about sixteen herself, and I didn’t kiss her, hard as it was not to do it. I was pretty sure we weren’t there yet. Instead, I said, “I need a shower myself. Now, you see, if I’d been a billionaire, I’d have one on my jet. With gold taps, eh.” Which made her laugh and lose some of the tension, and I smiled at her and said, “Five minutes.”

I normally didn’t wear anything to bed. Tonight, I did. I took the world’s fastest shower, then pulled on a pair of black sleep pants. I could hear the TV in the lounge when I came out of the bathroom, and I hesitated, then headed in there and told Karen, “Don’t stay up too late. We’ll be off to see Koro first thing in the morning.”

She looked up from her program and her book, both of which she was somehow taking in, and said, “Thanks for bringing me. I kind of needed to come, you know?”

For once, she didn’t sound stroppy. I bent and kissed her forehead. “I kind of needed you to come myself. It’s better for us all to be together.”

“Do you think you can make it up with Hope?” she asked.

“I’ll die trying.” Once again, the words were out before I could recall them. “Starting now. Good night, sweetheart. Sleep well.”

When I got back to the bedroom, the dim light on my side of the bed was the only one on, and Hope was curled up under the covers. I thought she was asleep already, but she turned when I came in and said, “I should have kissed Karen goodnight. I should have told her how glad I was to see her.”

“Never mind.” I came over to sit on the bed beside her and brushed the hair back from her cheek. “Tomorrow’s soon enough. Besides, I did it. Told her I was glad she came, and kissed her goodnight as well.”

“Oh.” She sighed under my hand. “Good.”

“Bit hard,” I guessed, “to juggle everybody. To pay enough attention to everyone you love. Koro. Karen. Me. Even the baby, eh. Could be you lose yourself a bit in all of that.”

“Now,” she said, “if you get that, why do you have to be so unreasonable?”

I laughed out loud. “Dunno. Hardwired, I reckon. We could talk about that tomorrow, maybe.”

I went around to my side, then, climbed in, switched the light off, and settled the duvet over myself. The bed was too small for two, especially when one of them was my size, but that suited me. I moved closer to Hope, and she moved back into me, and when I wrapped my arm around her from behind, she sighed again.

“That’s the best,” she said. “It’s so much warmer when you’re here.”

“For me, too,” I told her in the darkness. Her slim body was soft against mine, but her flesh was cool, and I kept my arm gentle around her.
A shield,
I told myself.
Not a prison.
“Could be that even a strong woman needs somebody to keep her warm.”

I think she slept well that night. I know I did.