couldn’t do it. All I had was, “We’ll talk about it later. I’m going to sleep.”
All right, maybe I did need Honor after all. And Gray. And possibly Dorian, who’d rung me last night while I’d been asleep, and whom I hadn’t rung back.
For a woman who’d craved nothing more than an orderly, disciplined life, I was making some bizarre choices lately.
Maybe Iris would like to switch houses. Wherever she lived. I could become a hermit. Sounded good.
40
Expectations
Gray
It was close to seven when I drove home after another day with too much to do. We weren’t falling behind any further, but we weren’t catching up, either. I thought again about promoting Robbie, the lead carpenter on the music studio building, to the foreman job, and once again decided the answer was “no.” He was a very good carpenter. Good enough with the other blokes on his crew, too, though a bit too fond of his own way. He didn’t get on well with the other trades, though, no getting around that. I needed to take Angus, one of the electricians, on in that role instead, get him trained up for it slowly. He was only twenty-five or so, and the older fellas would resent it, but it was no different than a rugby captaincy. Sometimes the skipper was a younger fella. You listened to him anyway, if he was the right man for the job. Possibly with a boot up the arse from the coach to help you along, which I could supply.
And, yes, I should’ve been grooming Angus sooner, a lesson I was learning the hard way. I had come up with the bright idea of offering a sizable bonus to anybody who brought in a mate who was hiring material and lasted three months, and that looked like it might relieve some of the immediate pressure. I’d also been in contact with the trades union in Auckland, and I was looking forward to hearing Hayden’s plans for that. Always a bit delicate, poaching on the other fella’s turf. Poaching in Aussie, now … that was an idea. Heaps of Maori and Islander boys working on the Gold Coast over there, across the Ditch, in the heat and humidity and missing the homeland. Maybe …
There were cars in the drive, so I set the problems aside. My mum’s car, and another I didn’t recognize, an elderly Nissan sedan. Not the white ute Gilead had driven, so I didn’t get too fussed. I climbed out instead, let Xena out, and thought about my plan for the evening. I wasn’t sure it would work, but it was what I had to offer in the few hours between now and when Daisy would be heading back to work.
I didn’t even bother with my house, because I could hear the noise from the yurt well before I knocked on the door. Music. Laughter. Chat. The door was opened to me by Iris, which was a bit of a surprise. I blinked and said, “Hi.”
“Hi,” she said. “I came to dinner. If you don’t like it, that’s your loss.”
“Which part?” I asked. “The dinner, or that you came?”
“Both,” she said. “Not much meat in it. I’m sure that won’t be good enough.”
I smiled. Iris had that effect on me. “Yeh,” I told her, “I’ll probably hate it, but no worries. You can despise me for it, eh. Win-win.”
She snorted, which was Iris’s version of a laugh, and said, “I didn’t dress up, either.”
She was, in fact, wearing a skirt, which was a first. I said, “No? Looks like it to me. You look quite nice.”
“Better than you, anyway,” she said. “Came straight from work, eh.”
“Yeh,” I said, “and I’m going to miss the next bit of the party, too. Got a date with Daisy.” Who was right there to see, standing at the end of the kitchen island, dressed in her little running shorts and cropped top, doing some quad stretches.
That had been my date idea. I’d thought pretty hard about it, in the snatches of time I’d had to do it, and had come up with this. I hoped it was right. I said, “Hey,” and she said, “Hey,” back, and smiled. Pretty bloody radiantly. High, swinging ponytail, strong thighs, curve of waist, pretty breasts, trim ankles in little white socks. Everything I wanted to see.
She said, “Dorian and Chelsea came to dinner to see the girls. Iris and Oriana are cooking it, and everybody’s promised to save some for us.” She lowered