Zana Bell - Tempting the Negotiator

“Listen to you. You sound like a kid of eighteen instead of a man in his thirties. It’s got to happen sooner or later. You can’t float on the surface of life forever. You need to put down some roots, mate.”

Jake pulled a face. “Think I’ve been on the road too many years to settle down now.”

“No desire for a wife and a home one day?” Colin eyed him curiously.

“Yeah, I’d like them someday—just not now.”

“Spoken like a true commitment-phobe.”

“Commitment-phobe?” Jake feigned outrage. “In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m up to my bloody neck in commitments at the present.”

Colin scratched his chin, a gesture he did when pondering an interesting phenomenon in the science lab. “Hmm, but they’re all short-term, aren’t they. The boys are only with you until the championships, the book has its deadline and as for the resort, well, that’s going to be settled sooner or later. Then what? Will you stay on and see how things go for the tern?”

His tone was dispassionate; he was simply analyzing the situation from an objective point of view. But it left Jake feeling disconcerted, even a little defensive.

“I haven’t planned that far ahead,” he said with a shrug.

Colin leaned back and folded his arms. “You know what your problem is?”

“No, and I don’t want to hear it from you, either.”

His colleague smiled but continued, unperturbed. “You’re still searching for the next best thing—the perfect wave. But a surfer like you should know there’s no such thing. You’ve got to take what’s in front of you.”

“What’s in front of me,” said Jake, making a sweeping gesture, “is this bloody nightmare, and the next best thing I need is a shredder. Is there one I can use?”

Colin laughed as he got to his feet. “Yeah, there’s one in the admin block. Okay, champ, have it your way. See you in a couple of weeks.”

THE OLDER MAN’S WORDS stayed with Jake, however, and as he drove home, his thoughts were bleak. It wasn’t only his desk that was a mess, his whole life needed systems. He was already past one deadline for the book he was writing on the fairy tern. How could he tell the publishers he’d stalled with it? All his energies, he told himself, were being used up in the battle to keep the invading Americans at bay. How could a man work when his home was threatened?

Damn Rob for saddling him with the woman. It just added to Jake’s responsibilities, this need to make her fall in love with Aroha Bay. If she had eyes in her head, she’d see for herself what a travesty a holiday resort would be in such a place. The last thing in the world he needed right now was to play host to some insufferable hotshot.

As for the boys…he’d bitten off more than he could chew there. It had been a great idea at the time—just like the book had been—but the reality was considerably more difficult than he’d expected. He’d had some cool idea that it would be like a surf camp and that as long as they were focused on surfing, the rest of their lives would sort out. Instead, the house was constantly a wreck and the boys seemed to need feeding every minute of the day.

What’s more, he had a feeling that even though it was still early in the school year, they were probably not doing as well as they should. The boys never seemed to do any homework, but Jake didn’t want to harp on about assignments and tests. God, he’d sound like his old man, and Brad was always squaring up against him as it was. What was up with the kid? He pretended it was all a joke, but he never missed an opportunity to make a dig at Jake, to defy his authority.

Jake still believed that Aroha Bay was what the boys needed, but Janet, their social worker, seemed unconvinced a single male was the best guardian for them. She’d been clearly unimpressed by the state of the house the last visit, and had said she’d drop by again soon. Despite her smile, it had sounded like a threat, and he knew she’d be along any day now. He really needed to clean ASAP, stock the fridge with fresh salad, that sort of thing. That’s what she’d be looking for. He could lose the boys otherwise. As he could lose the battle for Aroha Bay and the fairy tern.

Jake hated the mere thought of losing.

As he swung down the driveway to the house, his stress levels mounted. What he really craved was a surf but instead he’d have to cook dinner and sort through some of the bills that were cluttering the table. He probably also ought to entertain the American, though how, he couldn’t imagine. Well, he could. But that image was sharply repressed.

The first thing he saw, sitting jauntily next to the sleep-out, was the car. A red convertible. Bloody typical! He might have guessed she’d get something like that. He was amazed the boys weren’t all standing around it, tongues hanging out and begging for rides. Brad would be itching to drive. Oh, man, yet another battle Jake simply didn’t need. He pulled up next to the convertible and jumped out, slamming his door. There was no sign of Sass, but music was pounding out of the house. No guesses where the boys were, then. Delicious smells wafted across the grass. Cooking? No one in the house cooked. Jake bounded up the deck steps, then stopped short in the doorway. For a second he thought he must have the wrong house. The wrong boys.

“Hi, Jake,” Paul said with one of his shy, sidelong looks that substituted as a smile. He was polishing the glass of the bay window.

“Did you bring a game home?” Mike asked. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, putting all the loose DVDs and Xbox games into the right cases and stacking them.

“We were hoping you might pick up that new racing one,” Mark added from his perch on top of the sofa, where he was cleaning the cobwebs from the corners.

“Oh, you’re home,” Brad said as he passed through the lounge, lugging a vacuum cleaner. “Did you see the car? Isn’t she a little beauty?”

“What the hell is going on?” Jake roared.

The boys all paused.

“We’re cleaning,” said Brad in a “well, duh” tone. “But you guys don’t clean. You are the worst pigs I’ve ever met. If I tell you to put something away, you act like I’m the most unreasonable brute in the world.”

Brad grinned. “Ah, but that’s because you’re a crap cook.”

Jake shot him a look.

“Sass said she’d make Mexican if we cleaned the house. It’s got to be spotless. She’s an amazing cook,” one of the twins elaborated.

“How do you know?”

“She made us Texan burgers when we came back from school this afternoon. Said her brothers were always starving when they were our age. You’ve never tasted anything like these burgers. Then she offered us a deal. She’ll cook while she stays here so long as we keep the place clean.”

Jake couldn’t begin to untangle his thoughts and feelings on hearing that. Of all the managing, bossy, conniving… As for the boys, what a bunch of mercenary turncoats. At the same time, something did smell fantastic.

“Where is she?”

“In the kitchen.”

Jake went through and there, sure enough, was Sass stirring a pot. She was humming, her back to him, and looking like every man’s fantasy in a short denim skirt and a clinging white tee. Her blond hair was pulled up in a ponytail and a big Texan belt was slung around her slender hips. She didn’t hear him come in and he took a minute to look around the kitchen. Everything had been scrubbed, polished and put away. Every surface gleamed. He didn’t know that things on the stove could smell so good, either. He was not, however, so easily bought as the boys.

“What the hell is that?”

Sass turned. “Oh, you’re back.” It was a statement of fact, not a welcome. “That’s an espresso machine.”