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A snicker or two went up from the class. The three women in the class, in particular, smiled warmly at the boy. Jun glanced anxiously over at Po, but seeing that he was really doing no harm trying the moves, she let it go. The grumbling man next to Kai, however, didn’t like it.
“Can’t concentrate with that kid interrupting,” he groused. Kai was pretty sure what he meant was he couldn’t concentrate on her ass with the kid nearby. He was willing to guess that the idea of her as a mom didn’t factor into whatever perverted fantasy the jerk liked to concoct during class.
Kai shushed him, annoyed.
The man frowned in return but fell silent.
“We’ll now move on to Ball in the Mountain. Move those arms,” Jun said. “Feel it building your Chi. This is a great exercise for making a stronger mind.”
Po mimicked the same move, stretching his hands in a circular motion forward, but he overexaggerated it and toppled over, like a puppy with oversize paws. Po, fine, bounced back up grinning, ready to start again.
“Honestly, if you can’t control your kid...” the grumpy man said, very loudly this time as he shook his head in disapproval. He seemed to miss the fact that no one else in the class appeared to agree with him. A few shot him dirty looks. “I can’t focus on these moves with him bouncing around like an idiot. Someone needs to teach that kid to be still!”
Kai wanted to teach the man how to be still and quiet. Jun heard his remarks, and her face turned beet red. She sent a worried glance at Po, but honestly, the boy wasn’t doing any harm. The man was overreacting.
Jun transitioned the class into another pose, and this time Po decided to do his own headstand and rolled over in the sand.
Next to Kai, the irritated man bellowed, “If nobody is going to tell that kid to sit down, I’ll do it.”
Jun’s head popped up in alarm. She was already on the move to intercept the angry man from getting to Po, but Kai was there first. He put a hand on the man’s chest.
“Hey, the kid’s not hurting anybody,” Kai said, stopping the man’s progress cold. Jun, who’d hurried to Po’s side, stood still, a protective arm around her son.
“He’s a distraction,” the man growled, dark eyes flashing.
“You’re a distraction,” Kai corrected. “Why don’t you quiet down?”
Murmurs and agreeing nods swept the class.
They were the focus of attention now, and Kai could feel everyone’s gaze on them, even as some tried to continue the motions. Jun just stared, speechless.
The man, clearly not used to being called on his grumbling, glared at Kai. “I’m not going to be quiet. I’m going to get the goddamn class I paid for, a class without kids.”
A few gasps went up from the class at the language.
Jun rushed, too late, to cover Po’s little ears.
“Either quiet down or leave.” Kai wasn’t going to back down. He wasn’t the kind of man who went looking for a fight, but he’d been pushed into plenty of corners by surfers defending turf on various beaches all over the world. Bullies were the same, no matter their age or nationality: you either stood up to them, or you let them walk over you. And Kai had never backed down from a bully, not once in his life.
“I’m not going to have my afternoon ruined by some stupid fuckin’ kid!” he roared, pointing at the little boy, whose bottom lip quivered as his eyes filled with tears threatening to spill.
“Hey!” Jun’s voice was like steel, her eyes glinting fiercely. “You do not talk about my son that way.” Despite her small frame, she’d stalked right up to the angry man, fearless. She was an angry mama bear, protecting her cub. “And watch your language!”
Instantly, the man seemed cowed. There was something in her voice that said she wasn’t messing around. Kai admired her in that moment. What a little firecracker. Here he’d thought she’d needed rescuing, but he had a sneaking suspicion she could’ve handled this man all on her own.
“You have two choices, Mr. Hiram. You can stay in this class and behave. Or you can leave.”
“I—I...” Mr. Hiram sputtered, temporarily taken aback by Jun. “But that stupid kid!”
“You’ve made your choice. Time for you to go,” Jun said, and Kai tightened his grip on the man.
“You can’t kick me out. I paid for this class!” the man sputtered.
Kai dug his wallet out of his back pocket and pulled out a hundred-dollar bill. He tucked the money in the man’s shirt pocket.
“Consider it refunded.”
“But...” If he was hoping for a reprieve from Jun, he wouldn’t get one.
Jun just pointed her finger to the parking lot and gave Mr. Hiram a look that would melt a weaker man. “Let’s go.” Kai swept his hands forward.
Mr. Hiram looked as though he was going to dig in his heels.
“Stupid bitch,” he muttered under his breath.
“What did you say?” Jun was livid now. So was Kai. She stepped over, as if she planned to do something about it, but Kai wasn’t going to let that happen. He was filled with a protective kind of fury. “That’s it.” Kai grabbed the man’s arm and with one quick move twisted it up behind his back.
“Ow,” he cried. Kai steadily marched the man, arm still behind his back, up the beach and to the parking lot.
Once near the asphalt, Kai stopped. “You can go home either with or without a broken arm.” He twisted the man’s arm harder and Hiram squealed. “Which one is it going to be?”
“Without,” he ground out.
Kai released him with a shove, and the man stumbled into the parking lot, holding his arm. Eyes full of fear, he glanced back at Kai. He scampered to his car, a rental, and got in. Kai watched while he backed up and drove away.
The class broke out in spontaneous applause as Kai made his way back to them. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who felt that the man needed to be shown out. Jun, her arm around a now-grinning Po, nodded once at him. Kai just shrugged—no big deal. And anyway, she’d had it covered even without his help. He had to admire her grit, especially for a woman so...seemingly delicate. But, he realized, there wasn’t anything delicate about her.
“Thank you,” she whispered to him as she squeezed his arm.
“It’s nothing,” he said. Po threw his tiny arms around Kai’s legs, his silent hug saying more than Jun ever could.
“Come on, now, sweetie,” she said, pulling Po back. “Time we finish the class.” Po went back to his bucket and shovel, happily digging in the sand, and Jun moved to the front of the class.
“Well, I’m sorry for that, everyone,” she said, addressing the others. “I guess Mr. Hiram kind of missed the point of using Tai Chi to calm his Chi.”
A murmur of laughter rippled through the class.
“Okay, let’s start again with Moving the Water,” Jun said as she swept her arms forward as if pushing air.
* * *
FORTY MINUTES LATER, after a cooldown session, as the class dispersed, gathering their towels and bags and heading back to their cars, Jun saw that Kai had stuck around. He was kneeling next to Po, helping him add another turret to his sand castle. They had their heads together. Kai talked softly to the boy, the conversation not carrying over the wind. For a second, she just stood by, watching them. Kai showed him the trick to getting the wet sand out of the bucket without crumbling the top: three hard taps to the flat side of the bucket before gently lifting. Po listened and watched carefully and then repeated everything he’d just learned. Jun marveled at her son’s attention. He rarely sat still long enough to learn tips from her, and yet here he was, soaking up Kai’s every word.
Maybe Po could use another adult in his life, someone else to help him learn about the world. Someone other than his mother or aunt. Yet as soon as the thought entered her mind, defensively, she pushed it out.
No, they were just fine on their own. Her and Po against the world. Always had been. Always would be.
Kai wasn’t someone you could depend on, she reasoned. Jun remembered the two tourists at his house and the empty beer bottles on his floor. He might have done us a favor today, but he’s not the fathering type.
“Hey, Po, time to pack up, buddy,” she said, interrupting the scene.
“Aw, Mom.” Po looked up, disappointed. “Do I have to?”
“Yes, young man. You know the rule.” She prayed he wouldn’t test her on it. Not today. Not in front of Kai.
“When you say it’s time to go, it’s time to go.” Po hung his head in defeat and shuffled his feet in the sand.
“Sandals on. Go on.” Po reluctantly went to fetch his sandals, which he’d flung off earlier near a palm tree.
“He’s a good kid,” Kai said as the two watched him sit in the sand and put his shoes on.
“Yeah, he is.” Jun knew that in her heart to be true. The biting just wasn’t him at all. He really was a sweet kid, and he minded her so well, most of the time. “Listen, thanks for what you did. With Mr. Hiram. I don’t know what made him go off like that...”
“Who knows? But it wasn’t anything. Bullies are the same wherever they are.” Kai smiled, and the air between them got suddenly heavy. Jun was aware of how close Kai was standing, his dark hair ruffled by the sea breeze, his deep eyes like a warm, familiar place that she’d visited before.
He flashed a dazzling smile and Jun felt her heart shift just a little bit. She liked it when he smiled. She liked it a little too much.
Kai cleared his throat. “Your class was...really good.” He sounded surprised, but Jun tried not to take that personally. A lot of people had misconceptions about Tai Chi, and few realized how relaxing it could be when you really put yourself into it. It could have the same centering effects of yoga, she thought, but without all the contortion.
“Listen, this may sound crazy, but I recently lost my personal trainer. I looked you up. You’ve got all kinds of classes at Island Fit. I know you know your way around weights and training, because I called the gym and checked up on you. How much would it take for you to come work for me...full-time?”
CHAPTER FIVE
JUN STOOD FROZEN to the spot. Work for Kai Brady, full-time? She stared at his warm brown puppy-dog eyes and right at that moment she almost blurted out “Yes!” before her brain suddenly caught up to her mouth. She pressed her lips together. Careful, her brain said. There’s got to be a catch.
Did she want to work for him for the job, or to be closer to that smooth, unlined face, those strong, kissable lips?
She needed to figure this out. She wasn’t used to being recruited. Every job she’d ever had, every class she’d ever started, was her own doing, brought to life with blood, sweat and tears. Nobody ever handed her opportunity, ever. She was stunned, her mind trying to work through all the implications, even as her whole body reacted to the possibility. Working full-time for Kai Brady? All the hours they’d spend in close proximity... Her heart sped up a little.
“I used to pay my last trainer six figures to clear her calendar for me. I’ll offer the same thing for you.”
Jun’s knees felt weak. Six figures! She’d never made that kind of money in her life. It would double her salary. “But I...” With that, she could afford a nanny, she thought, and much more. Her head spun.
“I don’t know...” Jun couldn’t think. It was the promise of money, but it was also Kai, standing so close to her, the hem of his thin T-shirt fluttering in the beach breeze, giving a tantalizing glimpse of his flat tanned stomach and the muscled V just below his abs. She blinked, trying to regain her senses once more. But work for Kai Brady? She’d have to quit all her jobs, Island Fit and her private classes. That would mean counting entirely on the surfer, who might hire and fire at will. Jun remembered the scene at his house. Could she even train someone like that? And what if he got mad? He’d fire her, and she’d be completely out of work and completely out of luck. She didn’t like relying on anyone, and if she took the job, she’d have to rely on Kai for...everything.
“Po doesn’t have day care. And I wouldn’t have time to find a nanny...” This would be the deal breaker, she thought. Then she wouldn’t even have to think about accepting the job. Po would be her out.
“I know.” Kai shrugged, indifferent.
“You know?”
“When we were building sand castles, Po told me that he can’t go back. Because of the biting. But I’ve got someone who could watch him while we train. My aunt is really great with kids. She raised me, like a mom, and I know she’d be happy to stay with Po. I’d need to ask her, but I bet she’ll say yes. He could be at the house while we train. You wouldn’t be far from him.”
Jun felt dizzy with possibilities. It seemed like a dream job in so many ways, except one: she really didn’t know if she could do it. Could she whip Kai into shape?
“I don’t know...”
Kai grabbed her hand. Electricity shot up her wrist. She glanced at his strong hand on hers.
“Don’t say no. Just think about it, okay? Take two days.”
Jun wanted to say no. So much about it seemed perfect, which was why a small part of her screamed, It’s too good to be true!
And yet Jun found herself nodding.
“Okay, I’ll think about it.”
* * *
“WHAT’S TO THINK ABOUT?” Jun’s sister, Kiki, said, as she picked up her toddler daughter and held her on one hip. “He’s offering day care and more money than you’ve ever made. And you’ve had a crush on him for a year.”
“I have not.” Jun crossed her arms and leaned back against her older sister’s kitchen counter in her small house near Hilo, about an hour away from Jun’s apartment. Her heart beat a little faster in her chest, making her wonder if she was telling the truth. “He saved Po’s life. I’ve just been trying to figure out how to pay him back.”
“Take the job, then,” her sister said, shrugging as she stirred chicken stir-fry in an oversize wok on the stove. She took a sip of her iced tea. “What? Afraid you’ll fall into bed with him before the first week is up?”
“Kiki!” Jun instinctively glanced at Po, worried he’d overheard, but he was out of earshot, busy playing awful music on his cousin’s baby electronic keyboard, shaped like a smiling Cheshire cat, with the ivories as teeth. He was singing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and pounding ruthlessly on the keys. His cousin, two-year-old Rose, squirmed to be let down, and so Kiki put her on the ground. She tottered around “helping” by dancing and shrieking in delight.
“Oh, come on. He can’t hear us, and even if he did, he’d have no idea what we’re talking about.” Kiki tossed an oven mitt on her countertop. “Your problem is you’ve been in mommy mode far too long. You need to think about your whole self. You’re a woman, too, not just a mommy.”
“I’ll have plenty of time to think of that later.” Jun shook her head. “Like when Po is eighteen.”
Kiki sputtered a derisive laugh. “You’ll be shriveled up and dried out by then.”
“Kiki!” Jun slapped her sister’s arm.
“You know I’m right.” Kiki bustled over to the refrigerator and pulled out ingredients for a salad. She handed the lettuce, tomatoes and carrots over to Jun, and immediately she knew it would be her turn to wash them, Kiki’s to cut. She ran the lettuce under the sink and briskly shook it out.
It was no surprise Kiki worried about how much Jun was getting laid. Kiki had always been more into going out and having fun when they were younger. She’d been the rebel who butted heads with their tiger mom for years: getting a tattoo, coming home drunk, showing up with a new boyfriend every month. Jun had been the picture-perfect daughter with the impeccable grades and dreams of going to med school, and yet, irony of ironies, Jun’s one drunken mistake ended with her pregnant at nineteen. And now Kiki was the one who’d gone to college, come out the other side a nurse and had a doting husband, the cozy house, the nice green lawn, while Jun had had to drop out of college and work odd jobs to support Po.
Jun still remembered her mother’s face when she told her she was unmarried and pregnant at nineteen. Her mother had reared back and slapped her hard across the face. If she thought about it, the blow still stung. Her tiger mom, so angry, so completely rigid about her rules, hadn’t even come to the hospital when Po was born. Jun felt her mother had abandoned her then, and when a sudden heart attack took her six months later, it was more like a formality.
“You need to stop living like a nun,” Kiki said as Jun handed her freshly washed pieces of lettuce that she broke off by hand and tossed into a waiting teak bowl. “Po needs a father. All the research says that boys with single moms are at a disadvantage. You don’t want Po to be a statistic, do you?”
The more Kiki had settled down into her white-picket-fence life, the more judgmental she’d gotten, a quality Jun liked less and less the older they both got.
“Po and I are doing just fine.”
“Is that why he got kicked out of day care?”
“Kiki.” Jun hated when her sister brought up her shortcomings, especially now, since she had so many and Kiki had so few.
Jun still couldn’t believe Kiki used to listen to punk rock, wear black lipstick and stay out all night. Now she was the spitting image of their mother, down to the way she wore her hair in a short bob. One of these days, if Kiki pushed her too far, Jun might just point that out. “Come on. That’s not fair.”
“Po needs a father. He wouldn’t be biting if he had a father.”
“You don’t know that.” Jun exhaled a long, frustrated sigh. Her sister meant well, she knew that, but she just didn’t understand. She wasn’t a single mom, and she probably would never be one. It was easy for her to backseat-drive when she had a loving husband with a good job who spoiled her at every turn. Kiki didn’t know what it felt like to be on her own, worrying about paying her bills or frantically finding last-minute child care. How could Jun realistically date when she had no one to watch Po? And even if she did, somehow she thought it was selfish to take time away from her boy chasing after a man who probably would only disappoint them later.
“Jun, I’m sorry. I just... I just hate to see you unhappy.” Kiki paused, wiping her hands on a tea towel. “Kai Brady is rich, he’s handsome and he sounds like he’s into you.”
“No.” Jun shook her head furiously, thinking of yesterday when she had rung his bell and he didn’t even remember her. Not to mention, she couldn’t compete with the leggy blondes he seemed to prefer. “That’s not why he wants to hire me.”
“It’s not?”
“I think it’s for Po.” Jun had it all figured out. Kai seemed to like Po for some reason, like maybe he was one of those rich celebrities who every now and again decided to adopt a stray.
“Great! He’s dad material, then.”
Jun felt panic in her throat. A party-happy millionaire was not good dad material.
“No. You don’t get it. I don’t think he’s got it in him to commit to Po...or anything. Surfing is his life, extreme surfing at that, and even that’s something he puts aside to party. Besides, if I take this job, I’ll have to quit my others, and what if he fires me after one month? Then what?”
“Then you and Po come live with us. We just finished the guest room.”
“Kiki...”
“I mean it. Opportunities like this don’t come along any old time, Jun. You’ve got to take them when you can.”
Jun sighed as she washed the tomatoes beneath the tap. “Even if I take the job, I’m not sure I can train him. He doesn’t want to be trained.”
“Is that what the hesitation is about? You know what Mom always said about training people.” Kiki began slicing the tomatoes Jun had placed on her cutting board.
Jun smiled at the memory of their no-nonsense, sugar-coat-nothing mother. “‘In a contest of wills, the laziest one loses.’”
“See? All you have to do is work harder than he does, which doesn’t sound like it would be too difficult. Why don’t you channel Mom and see if you can’t whip that surfer into shape?”
Jun imagined what her mother might do to Kai if she’d been assigned the job of getting him in shape for a surf competition. She’d crush him in one week flat.
“You did it before when you worked at CrossFit two years ago. Didn’t they have a name for you there?” Kiki asked.
“The Terminator,” Jun said, and laughed a little. She had been a tough trainer then. It had been one of her first classes, and she’d maybe overcompensated for nerves by being extra tough on everyone. But the nickname had stuck until she’d transferred over to Island Fit and discovered Tai Chi, yoga and a more Zen approach to fitness.
“See? You’ve already got this in the bag. Plus, I know you have a thing for surfers. What was his name? John?”
“James.” Jun thought about the year in high school she’d spent following around James McAlister, the towheaded surfer whom she’d had a crush on. Nothing had ever happened. James never even knew she existed, really, but she had learned how to surf. Still, she wasn’t anywhere near Kai’s caliber.
“I don’t have a thing for surfers.” Jun saw Kai’s inviting dark eyes once more in her mind’s eye. Or did she?
“Okay, then, well, you owe Kai a debt. You know how Mom felt about debt.”
The woman had paid cash for everything and had never owned a single credit card. If a neighbor brought her a basket of fruit, she’d somehow turn it into a full meal, which she’d return the following day. Jun knew herself well enough to know that her staunch independence came directly from her mother. She knew she couldn’t turn Kai down. She owed him.
So why did working for him fill her with dread? Why did repaying a debt feel as though somehow she would just be asking for more? Because she had a sinking feeling that Kai was so far into self-destruct mode that she might not be able to help him. What if she tried and failed?
“It’s not how I wanted to repay the debt,” Jun said. “Besides, how is it being repaid if he’s paying me to do it?”
“You want to take the job for free, that’s your business, but he’s asking you for help. You know you can’t turn him down.”
Jun knew her sister spoke the truth. Yet, as she thought about his devilishly charming smile and the way his dark eyes suggested he knew just how much he got under her skin, she really wished she could.
“He told me to think about it for two days.”
“So?”
“So I’m going to take two days to think about it.”
CHAPTER SIX
KAI SAT OUTSIDE Island Fit in his open-top Jeep, the warm tropical sun beaming down on his wavy dark hair. His golden-brown skin didn’t need more of a tan, but it was a crime to put the fabric top up and shut out the beautiful Hawaiian weather.
It had been two days and change since the Tai Chi lesson on the beach, when he’d offered Jun a job. He’d not heard a word from her. He had to admit, he’d expected a call that same day. The fact that she hadn’t jumped on the opportunity made him wonder if he was losing his charm. Women rarely told him no. Hell, he hadn’t even found a woman who’d told him maybe in a very long time. He’d been the recipient of so many enthusiastic yeses, so many women who threw themselves at him, that he’d forgotten what it was like to actually chase someone.
Personally or professionally.
Not many people on the Big Island had the kind of money he did, and those who didn’t succumb to his smile usually rolled over when he opened up his checkbook.
Jun, clearly, was different. But why? He wanted to find out.
It had been a while since he’d cared enough about a woman to get out of bed before noon. Here it was, eight in the morning, and he was sitting outside the gym, watching Jun move about inside. He didn’t know what it was about her. Maybe the grounded confidence she wore easily, like a second skin?
He might have saved her from a rude client on the beach, but part of him thought she would’ve handled it just fine on her own. He’d never met someone so completely independent, someone who had herself together the way she did. He used to be like her, before the tsunami. He remembered feeling as if he could tackle any challenge, surf any wave, no matter how big. But now he wasn’t sure he could even get out of the bed in the morning. He wanted a little bit of Jun’s certainty, a little of her glue to hold himself together.