Prologue
One Afternoon in Detention
“Yo, gearhead!”
“If I make like I can’t hear you, will you go away?”
“Nope. So what’d you do to get in detention? I thought you were the Upstanding Student of the Year. Isn’t that what the shiny trophy said?”
“What’s the deal with detention? Do we just sit around?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll give you the lowdown—after you tell me what you did to land your golden-boy halo in here.”
“I helped lift and carry Mr. Boucher’s car to the other side of the school. He thought it’d been stolen.”
“Hah! That’s pretty funny. Especially since Mr. Bozo’s the reason I’m in here.”
“Yeah? What’d you do?”
“Told him to his face that he was a big bully with a small dick. He was hassling Callie about answering stuff aloud in our last class, like getting in her face and whacking his stupid ruler down on her desk. And you know Callie.”
“Shit. She okay?”
“Got the guilts because I have detention, but hey, she didn’t make me point out Mr. Bozo’s small dick. She wanted to go to the dean and explain and stuff, but I said, ‘No way, Cals. I earned this detention, and I’m gonna do it proudly.’”
“You’re all right, Jules.”
“Ugh. We are not friends, Jacob. That’s Juliet to you.”
1
Jacob Esera vs. An Aggravated Ghost in Stilettos
Jake’s big brother was getting married.
Gabriel had taken his sweet time falling for a woman, but when he had, he’d fallen hard. Charlotte Baird owned Gabe’s heart, and Gabe was not only fine with that, he reveled in it. Not surprising given how the Bishop-Esera men had grown up—in a home with parents who adored each other to this day.
Their mum kissed their dad each and every morning, rain or shine or occasional grumpiness. And while not an overly demonstrative man, their dad had never shied away from admitting that their mother was his lodestar.
As Charlotte was Gabriel’s.
“Have you seen Charlie today?” Jake asked Gabe as the six of them finished getting ready.
Gabriel, Sailor, Jake, Danny, Fox, and Harry.
Four brothers; Fox, a rock star who’d been adopted as family because his wife was best friends with Gabe’s Charlotte; and last but not least, Gabe’s best friend from his pro-athlete days—tall and quiet Harry with the big body and massive shoulders of a rugby prop. He and Gabe had stayed close even after Gabe’s injury took him out of the game. Jake had actually played alongside Harry for a year before the other man hung up his rugby boots in favor of a new career as a pilot.
“I wish,” Gabe grumbled as he put on his suit jacket, his shoulders wide and his body as muscled as when he’d played professionally. “I tried to lure her out of the apartment last night while the women were having their party, and she messaged me emojis of champagne glasses, flames, and a fireman. I’m probably going to go home to find a stripper pole in the living room.”
Jake glanced down to fix his tie. He and Charlotte had become good friends since Gabe introduced her to the family, so he was well aware that Charlotte had been teasing Gabe. Strippers weren’t Charlie’s style.
The champagne though, that was real. Jake had delivered the box himself after picking up the special order featuring not just the bubbly but bottles of blueberry and strawberry wine.
A bright blue and vivid pink respectively.
It being early morning, Charlie and her friends had been readying themselves for a champagne breakfast. Their plans for the day included manicures and pedicures and a trip to Auckland’s Sky Tower for a harnessed bungy jump. Petite Charlie had been wearing a T-shirt that said: T-Rex Tamer on the front. The back had borne a cartoon drawing of a bow-tie-sporting T. rex holding a bespectacled mouse in his arms.
The mouse had been wearing a wedding veil.
Cake and cocktails had featured heavily in the women’s post-jump plans.
When Jake checked on their hangover status this morning, he was told that everyone was functional. Apparently Charlie and the others had jumped off the Southern Hemisphere’s tallest building not once but twice. They’d been the last group of the day, and when—high on adrenaline—they’d asked the instructor if they could book another jump even though jumps were over for the day, he’d winked and taken them up for free.
None of which Jake was authorized to reveal.
While the women jumped off tall buildings, the men had gone black water rafting deep in the caves of Waitomo, finishing off the day with beers around a campfire. Included in the group had been a number of others. Those men were already in the church, acting as ushers, while the six of them stood in Sailor’s large living area, only minutes from getting into cars for the drive to the ceremony.
It was the second time in his life that Jake was to be a groomsman.
The first had been eight years ago, at Sailor’s wedding. He’d been a carefree sixteen-year-old kid then, with no awareness that his life was about to change forever in the two years to come. That kid might be long gone, to be replaced by a single dad with the sweetest little girl anyone could want, but one thing hadn’t changed: he was as happy for Gabe as he’d been for Sailor.
“So you’re leaving for your honeymoon right after the reception?” Fox said after Danny helped him knot his tie; Fox could belt out a rock anthem like nobody’s business, but he was no expert at the whole suit-and-tie business.
“Yeah.” Gabe stood in place while Harry pinned a “rose” to the lapel of his suit jacket. Fashioned from the pages of an old romance novel, the floral artwork looked ridiculously delicate against Gabriel’s stone-gray suit, but the juxtaposition worked. Just like Charlotte and Gabriel did. The last part of the men’s outfits would be the open leis of green foliage they’d wear around their necks, the ends falling on either side of their chests, a respectful nod to Gabriel’s stepfather’s culture.
“Flights to Samoa are all booked. Bags are packed and waiting in the car.” A smile creased Gabriel’s cheeks.
Jake’s phone rang into the low murmur of male voices. Glancing down, he felt his stomach clench. “I better take this. It’s Coach.”
His brothers all looked over. “Good luck,” they said in unison.
Breath tight in his lungs, Jake ducked out and into the rambling garden of Sailor and Ísa’s sprawling single-level villa. He loved his brothers but couldn’t take this call in front of them. He needed time to gather himself back together and prepare to lie through his teeth if it turned out to be bad news—no fucking way would he ruin Gabe’s wedding day.
The grass was a lush green under the winter sunlight, the vines crawling up one side of the villa dotted with small blooms of bluish-white. Camellias in blush pink glowed against the fence in the distance, behind a garden planted with winter color—Jake recognized the vibrant pansies and yellow-orange polyanthus blooms because he’d helped plant them. A child’s bike stood propped beside the garden, its frame a glossy red and the handlebars festooned with ribbons.