Just for Fun (31 page)

“You know, though, there’s one more thing this room needs,”
he told the two of them seriously after a moment. “Hang on a tick, and I’ll get
it.”

Zack gazed longingly at the distinctive black Champions bag
Nic brought back with him. “That’s the real bag!” he told Nic. “From the shop.
What’s in it?”

“The real deal,” Nic promised. “Something you may need, this
weekend. Because when you shift house, you know, people give you a housewarming
present. Reckon this is your bedwarming present.” He handed the bag to Zack.
“Open it and see.”

Zack dropped to the floor, opened the big bag. “
Wow
,”
he breathed, pulling out the set of All Black pajamas. “Can I put them on now?”
he implored of his mother.

“I don’t see why not,” she smiled. “Wear them home, if you
like. Because it’s time for bath, and bed.”

Zack pulled off his clothes impatiently, tugged on the new
pajamas. “I fit them!” he told Nic excitedly. “Mum doesn’t have to roll! And
they have tags on!”

“Yeh, mate.” Nic cleared his throat. “And they look
awesome.”

“Thank you,” Emma told him quietly as Zack ran to examine
himself in the bathroom mirror.

“Got an ABs jersey for him too,” Nic said. “For him to wear
Saturday night, when we all go to the match.”

She hugged him. “He’s going to love that so much. How did
you know what size he was, though?”

“I had a squiz at some of his gear when we were at the
bach,” he confessed. “Been wanting to get him those pajamas for a fair few
weeks now. This seemed like the right time.”

“Sorry,” Emma said on Friday evening when Nic was once
again opening the door to the two of them. “I know we’re really late. I hope
you’re not too starved.”

“What happened?” he asked.

“Hard day at work. I’ll tell you later, OK?”

He nodded, hefted her roller bag. “Whoosh. What d’you have
in here, bricks? It’s only two days.”

“If it’s too heavy,” she said with a flash of spirit, “I’ll
carry it myself. You want me to look nice, don’t you? That doesn’t happen by
accident, you know. Curling iron, shoes . . . it all adds up.”

He laughed. “I think I can still shift it. Come up with me.
We can see how Zack’s getting on, then you can help me put dinner together.
Only the very best for you. All ready-prepared by somebody else.”

“Whew,” Nic said once Zack was safely in bed, and he and
Emma were in the lounge again. “Alone at last.”

It had taken awhile. Zack had been unable to decide on the
upper or lower bunk, until Nic had hit on the proposal to spend tonight on the
bottom, and Saturday on the top. “Then you can decide scientifically,” he told
Zack seriously.

“Getting both sets of sheets dirty,” Emma protested.

Nic scoffed at that. “What, Graham’s going to come to spend
the night, and say, ‘Oh, Zack! These sheets have been
used,
I can tell!
How will I ever, ever sleep in such
filth?’”
He made his voice high,
slapped both hands to his face in mock horror, and had Zack helpless with
giggles.

“We’re boys,” Nic finished with a grin at Emma. “We don’t
care too much if our bed’s had a prior occupant or not.”

Now the two of them were finally sitting on one of the big
leather couches, the gas fireplace making a cozy display, and sharing the
second half of a bottle of wine that, Nic had insisted, was necessary for their
“housewarming party.” Emma was already a little tipsy, feeling relaxed for the
first time all day as she snuggled with him. She thought lazily about working
on the sweater she had started for Reka’s baby, but couldn’t be bothered.
Besides, she’d probably lose the pattern.

“So what happened today?” Nic asked her. “In your hard day
at work?”

She sighed. “I almost hate to tell you. I wish I handled
this stuff better. Why do I let myself get so
upset?
Why can’t I just
say what a guy would say?”

“What would a guy say?” Nic asked in confusion. “About
what?”

“You know. Eff you.”

“Can’t even say the word, eh,” he said, rubbing the back of
her neck. “You’re such a girly girl. I think you’d better tell me, though.
Explain why you’d be swearing at somebody. If you were a bloke, that is.”

“Roger called me over,” Emma said reluctantly. “He was with
Aaron, one of the project managers. There’d been a problem with some of the
drawings. An important spec change that hadn’t made it onto the final version,
they said. But it wasn’t my
fault.
I didn’t think it was at the time,
but I couldn’t think of how to prove it. And I got all flustered. Because Roger
didn’t give me a chance. He just laid into me. Going on about how I’d made the
company look bad, made Aaron look bad. He was saying things like, “This is a
very serious error. I have no choice but to write you up for this.”

And then I went back and checked,” she said, tears filling
her eyes, “what I’d been given. And that—that change—wasn’t on there. I went
back over there, tried to explain. And Aaron insisted he’d told me, and Roger
was standing there
berating
me, for everyone to hear.”

She lost the battle with the tears, couldn’t stop them from
spilling down her cheeks. “I just felt so . . . so small. I couldn’t think of
the right thing to say. And Roger was loving it, I could tell. I was so
angry
.
I wanted to scream at him. I wanted so much to walk out. To quit right there.”

Nic pulled her into his lap, wrapped his arms around her as
she finally let the tears go that she’d been holding back all day. It was such
a relief to be held, to be comforted, that, perversely, it made her cry all the
harder. He didn’t try to talk to her, just reached for the tissue box, then
held her against his chest until she was cried out, and was blowing her nose
and wiping her eyes.

“Feel better?” he asked. She nodded shakily, took a deep, shuddering
breath and blew her nose again. Grabbed another wad of tissues and tried in
vain to blot some of the moisture from his T-shirt where she’d soaked it.

“Why
don’t
you tell that Roger to go fuck himself?”
Nic asked. “See, I can say the word. Bet you could too, if you practiced
enough.”

“Want me to practice on you?” she asked with a watery smile,
pulling back to look at him.

He laughed. “Nah. But maybe you
should
quit, have you
thought of that?”

She sighed, rested her cheek against his chest again as he
continued to stroke her hair. “Every single day. But I can’t. I need my job,
and Roger knows it. He knows I won’t quit, unfortunately.”

“I thought you were talking to the people at Hannah’s place.
Have you heard back from them?”

She shook her head. “I had the interview, and they’re
interested in hiring me, but they need to get their new line going first. The
kids’ line,” she reminded him. “Probably November, they said. I don’t want to
look for a new job, if this is a real possibility. Because it’s exactly what I
want. I just have to hold on till then, that’s all.”

“I’m surprised you’ve held on this long, if it’s been this
bad.”

“It’s only been the past year that it’s been this bad. Just
since Roger. At first, I thought he’d get over it. That he was just proving he
was my boss. Showing me he was in charge. I thought if I didn’t challenge him,
he’d settle down.”

“Not if he’s a bully,” Nic said with certainty. “That just
makes them push more, if they think they can get away with it. You have to push
back, with that type.”

“Yeah,” she sighed. “I figured that out, a little too late.”
She reached for her wineglass, took a sip and handed it to him. “Finish this,
will you? I’m already a little drunk. That’s probably why I cried.”

He took it from her and obliged. “Wish I could go in there
and talk to him,” he said with frustration. “I’d like to sort him out.”

She snuggled up against him. “Like you did with Ryan?” she
asked, listening to his heart beating under her cheek. She felt his start of
surprise and smiled with satisfaction. “You thought I wouldn’t find out about
that, huh? Not too hard to figure out. Suddenly he was avoiding me like the
plague. And then I heard, third-hand, that somebody’d seen you talking to him
outside the office, that next day.”

“Yeh,” he admitted. “I had a word.”

“Well, thanks. If you hadn’t done that, I might
really
have
had to quit. And then who knows where Zack and I would be.”

“You’d be OK,” he promised, running a hand down her back and
setting the wineglass back down on the coffee table. “I wouldn’t actually let
you starve, you know.”

“Mmm.” She nestled a little closer. “Anyway, thanks.”

“If you really want to thank me, you’ll come upstairs with
me. Because it’s bedtime, you know. And we’ve got a bit of bedwarming to do
ourselves, tonight. Got a pressie for you, too, along those lines.”

“All Black pajamas for me too?” she asked, climbing off his
lap and walking to the stairs with him, her hand in his. “Why, Nic. How
thoughtful.”

He laughed. “I’m sure you’d be adorable in them. But nah. I
went in a little different direction.”

“Better not be red and black, or crotchless either,” she
warned him.

“Why don’t you just be quiet, and let me show you what it
is?” he scolded, pulling her through the door into his big bedroom. He went to
the closet, pulled a pale blue box from the shelf, tied with a white ribbon. “Here.”
He handed it to her. “Happy bedwarming.”

She sat on the gold satin duvet cover, pulled off the bow.
Opened the box and pulled back layers of tissue to find a short gown in the
palest pearl pink silk. The bodice was made entirely of lace, and the same pale
pink lace edged the hem and the edges of the side slits. She set the box aside
and stood, holding the beautiful thing up to herself, looked into the mirrored
closet doors at the halter neck, the deep V of the neckline.

“It’s gorgeous,” she breathed. “Is this real silk? It feels
like it.”

“Meant to be,” he smiled. “How’d I do? Sorry it isn’t red
and black, or crotchless. Didn’t know that was what you were expecting.”

She wrapped her arms around him, still holding the gown.
“It’s brilliant,” she told him fervently. “It’s so pretty, and the silk feels
so luxurious
.
I just need to try it on, make sure it fits.”

“It should do. Because I had a wee look at some of your
things, too, for the size,” he confessed. “I didn’t have a clue, other than
that you’re pretty small. And they’d have thought I was pervy, standing in the
shop, holding out my hands to show how big you are.” He demonstrated tracing
her curves in the air. “But don’t let me stop you trying on your bedwarming
present. Because I’d like to see it. Though you know I’m planning to take it straight
off you again.”

“I’m going to take a shower first,” she said. “Wash my face.
Too much crying. And I want to get pretty, and put lotion on, before I wear
this.” She reached for him, kissed him again. “I’ll be back in a little while.
Then I’ll show you.”

He was waiting, sitting up in bed, bare chest brown against
the white linens, when she reappeared in her dressing gown.

“You ready for this?” she asked, her hand on the tie.

“Ready and waiting,” he assured her. Hitched himself up a
bit further, watched her take off the flowered dressing gown and lay it on a
chair.

“It fits perfectly, see?” she asked, smoothing her hand over
the silk. “And it feels wonderful.”

“You need to let me feel it too,” he said, his eyes warm
with appreciation. “But first, turn around, let me see the back.”

“Well?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at him. He’d
got out of bed, was standing behind her, pulling her against him, running his
hand down the silk.

“Felt good in the shop,” he said huskily. “But I reckon I
needed to see it on the model to get the full effect. Because you’re so damn
beautiful.”

“Too easy,” he said, leaning down to kiss the side of her
neck, beginning to pull the gown up over her thighs with one hand, the other
sliding inside the lace to cup a breast as he watched their reflection in the
mirror.

“What is?” she asked breathlessly, her eyes drifting shut.

“You. All I have to do is say something like that, and
you’re mine.”

“No.” She opened her eyes to smile tenderly at his
reflection, gave a long sigh as the gown fell to the floor in a drift of silk.
Both his hands came up now to cover her breasts, to move over her, play with
her as he watched in the mirror. When she was boneless and sighing against him,
he finally sent one big hand on a leisurely journey down her body, drifting
over her sides, her belly, before settling in at last to caress her.

“No,” she repeated breathlessly, arching back against him, barely
able to support herself as his hands continued to move. Her legs parted under
his touch, and the view in the mirror, the sight of his big hands holding her, moving
over her pale skin, was doing as much for her as she could feel it doing for
him. “All you have to do is look at me, and I’m yours.”

He groaned, pulled her with him to the bed. Lay on his back
and lifted her over him. “I keep thinking I’ve got you. Then you say something
like that, look at me the way you do. And I realize that you’ve got me.”

He pulled her down to kiss her, finally settled her over him
and began to move her, so slowly, for long minutes. Then turned her so he was
on top. Held her, caressed her. Kissed her again and again as the heat built. Brought
her up, step by slow step, watched her lose herself in him. And this time, it
was her name he groaned out, in the end.

Emma woke to the sight of the charcoal-gray walls, the
sound of the door opening.

“Morning,” Nic said, sitting next to her and carefully
setting down a steaming mug on the bedside table. “Brought you a coffee.”