In His Good Hands (4 page)

He glanced at his watch. Nearly 6:00 p.m. He needed to get Tegan from his parents’ house, where she was helping babysit his brother Ryan’s little girl.

He left the reception desk to poke his head into the weight room, where Mark was wiping down the seats and handles of the machines. “I’m taking off now,” he told him. “I’ll be back in an hour or so. I’ll close tonight.”

“Sure thing, Brett.” Mark lifted the bottle of spray cleaner. “Catch you later.”

On his way to his parents’ he stopped off at home to pick up a glass coffee table he had no use for. When he’d split from Amber she’d kept the mansion on the Yarra River and bought all new furniture, giving him the old pieces. He knew his mum and dad would be thrilled to get a nearly new coffee table in perfect condition.

A half hour later he pulled into the gravel driveway of the seventies timber cottage where he had grown up. The ramshackle building, added onto in hodgepodge fashion as the family grew, was tucked in an old subdivision of Summerside. The backyard was big enough for a chicken coop, a veggie garden and, when Brett was a kid, for him and his brothers, Ryan and Tom, to chuck around a football. In his big earning years Brett had tried to buy his parents a newer house, but they’d wanted to stay where they had space for the grandkids to play. From the sounds of laughter over the fence, Tegan and little Charlotte were bouncing on the trampoline.

His dad opened the front door, big and bluff as ever. Hal’s graying hair still held traces of blond and his shoulders were as wide as his son’s. “Hey, Brett.” He feinted a karate chop.

Brett parried, only to find himself gripped in a headlock. He hooked a leg around his father’s ankle and got him off balance long enough to break away. Hal immediately twisted his arm up his back with an evil chuckle.

“Uncle!” Brett cried, knowing that otherwise this could go on for twenty minutes or more. Hal released him and he shook his shoulders to relax them. “Geez, Dad, when are you going to take up golf?”

“Golf is for sissies. Mary!” Hal bellowed down the hall. “Brett’s here.”

His mum, short and slight, limped forward slowly, hampered by her prosthetic leg. Brett went to meet her, picking her up and enveloping her in a bear hug.

“Let me go,” she cried, flustered and laughing, pushing back her curly auburn hair. After she was safely set back down, she said, “Are you and Tegan staying for dinner?”

“I have to get back to the gym in an hour. I’m just dropping off that coffee table we talked about. Dad, want to give me a hand?”

Hal followed him out to the car and helped him unhook the bungee cord holding down the trunk of the Mercedes. “How’s it going at the gym?”

“I got the loan. In thirty days the business will be mine.” Brett slid one end of the thick glass out of the trunk over the padding, steadying it so his father could grab hold. When Hal had removed the glass, Brett bent his knees and hefted the marble base, grunting under its weight.

“And the bad news?” Hal asked, somehow hearing it in the tone of Brett’s voice. He balanced the heavy piece of glass on his hip and crunched over the gravel to the front door.

“It’s all good.” Brett shifted the marble to get a stronger grip, then went sideways into the house. “Where do you want this?”

“Over here.” Mary waved him to a spot in the cozy living room in front of the his-and-hers recliners in worn brown Naugahyde.

“Brett’s got himself a fitness center,” Hal told his wife.

“That’s wonderful.” She motioned them a little farther to the right. “Not too close to the fireplace.”

Brett lowered the base, then helped position the glass top. Merlin, the fluffy gray cat, came to inspect the new addition to his home. Mary hunted up a cloth and a bottle of window cleaner.

“I’ll go find Tegan,” Hal said, leaving his wife to do the final touches.

“Thank you, Brett. This table is lovely.” Mary began to polish the glass top. “Doesn’t that girl who tutored you in math in high school work in the loans department? I’ll bet it helped that you knew her.”

Brett picked up Merlin and stroked him until he purred. “Oddly enough, needing math tutorials was no recommendation for a business loan in Renita’s eyes.”

“Renita, that’s her name.” His mum straightened, pressing a hand to the small of her back. “But what do you mean, no recommendation. Didn’t you get what you wanted?”

Somehow his mother always managed to coax information from him that he couldn’t tell his father. “Not the full loan,” he said flatly. “I can buy the gym but not refurbish it.”

Hal came through the door from the kitchen. “The girls are coming in now.”

“Tell your father,” Mary said to Brett. She took a potted African violet off the windowsill and placed it in the center of the table.

Hal glanced from her to Brett. “What is it?”

Brett groaned. “Don’t, Mum….”

“Brett’s got a problem with the bank. They won’t give him enough money. Can we help?”

“No, I’ll be fine,” Brett said firmly. His parents’ meager savings would see them through retirement as long as nothing unexpected came up. He didn’t like asking for help from anyone, and he definitely wouldn’t take it from his folks, who had so little to spare.

“Have you talked to Ryan or Tom?” Mary asked.

“No, and I’m not going to. They both have families and expenses of their own.”

“What about taking in a silent partner?” Hal suggested. “One of your old footy mates.”

Brett rubbed his jaw. It wasn’t a bad idea. Some of the guys could afford to throw a couple hundred grand his way as an investment. But to ask would mean revealing his ongoing problems with Amber and his financial embarrassment. “Nah, I’ll think of something.”

Hal clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Course you will.”

“If you change your mind, you come to us,” Mary said.

“Thanks,” Brett said, knowing he never would.

“Bring Renita around for dinner sometime,” she added.

“We don’t see each other socially.”

“Not even as friends?” Mary asked. “I always thought you had a soft spot for her.”

“I don’t know why you’d think that.” He kissed his mother’s cheek. “I’ll get Tegan on my way out.”

“Stay for dinner,” Mary said. “I was expecting you to. Ryan and Emma are coming soon to pick up Charlotte.”

Tegan appeared in the doorway, cheeks flushed, her ponytail coming loose. “Please, Dad?”

Four-year-old Charlotte, her light brown curls bouncing, ran up and pressed her hands together. “Pweeze, Unca Brett?”

Brett laughed. “Okay. But I’ll have to eat and run. Renita and her father joined the gym. She’s coming in tonight for her first training session.”

Renita hated her.

She wanted to
be
her.

Mirrored walls on three sides reflected Renita’s lumpy body, mostly hidden beneath an oversize T-shirt and baggy gym shorts. She hadn’t even lifted a dumbbell and already she was perspiring, just thinking about the embarrassment of working out in front of Brett. Her vow to Lexie seemed ludicrous now. What had she been thinking?

She was going through this for her father’s sake, Renita reminded herself. Steve was counting on her. Closing her eyes, she breathed deeply and slowly, trying for some of the inner peace her mother found through meditation.

It didn’t matter how weak Renita was on the inside, as long as she appeared to be strong on the outside. Brett could be as sexy and charming as he liked. It would be like water off a duck’s back.

Renita breathed deeply one more time. Ready, she opened her eyes. Brett was nowhere in sight.

She might as well do something while she waited, so she rolled an exercise ball off its stand, glancing around to see if anyone was watching. No one was paying attention. She sat on it, crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back to do a crunch the way she’d seen on TV. Back, back…

“Hey, Renita.” Brett came through the door, clipboard in hand.

She lost her balance, sliding sideways as the ball rolled out from under her. Arms and legs flailing, she hit the floor.

“You okay?” Brett asked, offering her a helping hand.

Cheeks burning, Renita ignored it and scrambled to her feet. She promptly tripped over the wide soles of her new running shoes. “I’m f-fine.”

“We’ll get to the Swiss balls later,” he said. “First, we’ll test your fitness level—cardiovascular, strength and flexibility.”

Renita brushed off her shorts, pushed up her glasses and tightened her ponytail. “Right.”

She happened to glance in the mirror. And barely stifled a groan. Brett was a Greek god—blond hair, strong jaw, broad shoulders, tanned muscular arms and legs. Confronted by their reflections side by side, she found the facts inescapable.

He was hot. She was not.

Brett O’Connor ever begging her for a date? Not likely. She couldn’t believe she’d thought for a second she could make him want her.

“Can you give me ten push-ups?”

“Knees or toes?” she asked, as she lowered herself to the mat. Toes—
ha!
As if.

“Knees will be fine.”

She positioned her hands, took a breath and started to lower her torso to the floor.

“Keep your butt down, back straight,” Brett ordered.

A strand of hair fell in front of her glasses. Her arms wobbled. She got within a few inches of the floor and began to push herself back up, shoulder muscles straining.

One down, nine to go.

Five—her biceps started to burn. Six—her arms were shaking. Seven—her butt was high in the air—to hell with proper form. Eight—as she lowered herself, her arms gave out.

“Oof.” She fell flat on her chest and face, glasses knocked awry.

She glanced around, mortified in case anyone had seen her collapse. The only person watching was the teenage girl doing her homework in the coffee area—probably waiting for her mother or father to finish working out.

“I’ll have to work up to ten,” Renita muttered, dragging herself to her knees. Brett offered her a hand again, and she once more ignored it, using a bench to pull herself to her feet. “How am I doing? Be honest.”

“You’re not the
most
out-of-shape person I’ve trained—”

“Thank God for that.”

“But close.” There was a twinkle in his eye.

“What’s next?” she growled, hating him.

“Sit-ups. Do as many as you can in sixty seconds.”

Back down she went, clumsily dropping onto her butt, then stretching out on her back. Ah, this was nice. Restful.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Brett said.

“Oh. Right.” She linked her fingers behind her head and used her stomach muscles to pull herself up. Again and again. As the seconds ticked by she got slower and slower. Never had a minute seemed so long.

Finally Brett said, “Stop.”

She collapsed on her back and shut her eyes. “Enough.” Maybe if she played dead he would go away.

Brett crouched in front of her. “Renita? Time for the treadmill.”

She opened one eye and peered at him through fogged glasses. “It’s no use. I can’t do this. Dad’ll just have to train for the Fun Run on his own.”

“I never figured you for the type that gives up,” he said. “But if you’re that much of a wuss you’d probably stop running after a couple of blocks. That wouldn’t be much help to your father. Just as well you pack it in now, before you get Steve’s hopes up.”

She struggled to a seated position and took off her glasses, furiously polishing away the fog with her shirt hem. “I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to get me angry so it’ll stiffen my resolve. Well, even if the spirit is willing, the flesh—” she grabbed a double handful of her belly through her T-shirt “—is too damn weak.”

“Okay, I admit I was trying to use reverse psychology to motivate you,” he said. “But I learned that from you.”

“Me?” she said. “What are you talking about?”

“Trigonometry. Calculus. I wanted to throw in the towel more than once during our tutorials. You told me, sure, I could give up studying. It wouldn’t make any difference if I failed the exam, because everyone knew you didn’t need brains to play football.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember.” Amazing that she’d had the nerve to be tough with someone she worshipped.

“I want you to know that your technique worked. I could tell that you believed in me.” He laughed. “Probably the only one who did.”

“But…” She cast her mind back. “I thought you failed math.”

“I did. But I had an offer from the Collingwood football team at the end of grade eleven. My parents were going to let me sign up. I decided to finish high school instead.”

She hadn’t thought he could surprise her. He wasn’t just a footy-obsessed jock. Apparently he possessed an ounce or two of academic discipline. “I wasn’t aware of the football offer. That was gutsy of you to turn it down.”

“I may have failed math, but you did teach me something.” His gaze lifted to hers, his eyes unshuttered. “To go after what I wanted and stick to it until I got it.”