Break Your Heart_A Small Town Romance Read online

  Break Your Heart

  Bounty Bay Book 5

  Tracey Alvarez

  Copyright © 2018 by Tracey Alvarez

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Break Your Heart - Tracey Alvarez -- 1st ed.

  ISBN Mobi 978-0-473-43816-6

  ISBN e-pub 978-0-473-43815-9

  Created with Vellum

  For the men and women who bravely put their lives at risk to save others on our beautiful New Zealand beaches.

  Also by Tracey Alvarez

  Stewart Island Series

  Book 1 In Too Deep (Piper & West) FREE

  Book 2 Melting Into You (Kezia & Ben)

  Book 3 Ready To Burn (Shaye & Del)

  Book 4 Christmas With You (Carly & Kip)

  Book 5 My Forever Valentine (Short Stories)

  Book 6 Playing For Fun (Holly & Ford)

  Book 7 Drawing Me In (Bree & Harley)

  Book 7.5 Kissing The Bride (Shaye & Del Wedding Story)

  Book 8 Saying I Do (MacKenna & Joe)

  Book 9 Home For Christmas

  Book 10 Bending The Rules (Tilly & Noah) Coming later in 2018

  Bounty Bay Series

  Book 1 Hide Your Heart (Lauren & Nate) FREE

  Book 2 Know Your Heart (Savannah & Glen)

  Book 3 Teach Your Heart (Gracie & Owen)

  Book 4 Mend Your Heart (Natalie & Isaac)

  Book 5 Break Your Heart (Vanessa & Sam)

  Single Titles

  Quake

  Contents

  Welcome to New Zealand!

  Glossary of Maori Words

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Connect

  About the Author

  Welcome to New Zealand!

  Land of Lord of the Rings and the All Blacks rugby team, breathtaking landscapes, and laid-back friendly people who refer to ourselves as ‘Kiwis.’ I hope you’ll enjoy your visit with me as we travel to the subtropical Far North of New Zealand. This area of the North Island is close to my heart, as is the Maori culture.

  So, kia ora and happy reading!

  Glossary of Maori Words

  These are simplified for the sake of brevity.

  aroha – love

  hangi – traditional New Zealand Māori method of cooking food using heated rocks buried in a pit oven

  heihei – chicken

  heahea – stupid, foolish

  hongi – to press noses in greeting

  iwi – extended kinship/tribe/group, a large group of people with common ancestry

  kai – food

  ka pai – good

  kauri – native tree

  kia ora – greeting

  kōrero – to talk, speak or address

  kumara – sweet potato

  mana – a person or place or object’s prestige/charisma/authority/status ~ an important part of Māori culture.

  manawa – heart

  matua – father/uncle/parent, a respectful address

  nono – backside, bum

  pōrangi – crazy, insane.

  tangi – rites for the dead, funeral

  tēnā koe – thank you

  tō waha – shut up

  wāhine – woman

  whakairo – Māori carving

  whakamā – embarrassed/ashamed

  whānau – family

  whare – house/building

  To hear the pronunciation of some of these words, check out this online Māori Dictionary!

  http://maoridictionary.co.nz/

  Chapter 1

  Sam Ngata had ten days, seven hours, and twenty-two minutes to find himself a woman to settle down with.

  He sat in his brother’s office, staring morosely at the phone base, and tapped its handset against his forehead.

  Thunk-thunk-thunk.

  It didn’t help erase the past five-minute conversation ping-ponging around in his brain. He swiveled on his chair to face the black leather couch where his older brother, Isaac, lay stretched out, hands linked behind his head.

  “So what did he say?” Isaac asked as Sam dropped the handset back into its cradle.

  Isaac had dragged Sam out of his workshop, and away from the slab of forty-five-thousand-year-old swamp kauri that he’d been turning into a one-of-a-kind dining table, to his office where Sam was told to sit down, stop bitching, and say, “Yes, sir, no sir, three bags full, sir,” when the bigwig hotel mogul from Texas called.

  Sam enjoyed his brother telling him what to do about the same amount he enjoyed having a splinter jammed under his thumbnail. But in this case—the case of sealing a potential multimillion-dollar deal for their business, Kauri Whare—Sam had sat down, ceased bitching, and accepted the phone when it was passed to him.

  He folded his arms and sent Isaac the stink eye. “It’s more what you said to him, mate.”

  “What did I say?” Isaac crossed his ankles. “I’ve practically cotton-wool wrapped this whole deal with Gregory Wright from beginning to end.”

  “You told him we were a close-knit family business.”

  “We are, dipshit. The two of us, Uncle Manu, your guys out in the workshop.” Isaac lifted his fist off his stomach and counted off his fingers until he ran out of them. “The staff here in retail—everyone at Kauri Whare is related one way or another.”

  “That’s not what he thought you meant by family—not after you must’ve talked his ear off about you and Nat shacking up together.”

  The dopey-ass smile his brother got whenever his fiancée’s name was mentioned spread across Isaac’s face. “Can’t help it if I’m eager to spend the rest of my life with the woman of my dreams.”

  “That’s just puke-inducing, little Miss Sunshine.” And certifiably insane. “But thanks to you, Gregory leaped to the wild conclusion that I’ve also got a significant other.”

  Isaac’s forehead crumpled. “What kind of significant other? A girlfriend?”

  “Worse.”

  Isaac kicked his feet off the couch and sat bolt upright. “Worse than a girlfriend? He couldn’t mean—”

  Isaac had been called onto the showroom floor while Sam had been talking to Gregory and missed the guts of their conversation.

  “He thought you had a serious girlfriend?” Isaac asked.

  “Yeah.” Sam blew out a sigh and swiveled back to the desk, dropping his head into his hands. “Dipshit liar that I am, I let it ride. Then he started going on about the importance of family and how a married couple made a more stable foundation for investment—or some crap like that. My brain zoned out at that point until s
uddenly the old guy’s telling me I should put a ring on it—”

  “Whoa.” Isaac jerked back. “Was he serious?”

  “Laughing, but pretty damn serious underneath. My tongue just fell out of my mouth and hit the floor, but the old guy must’ve interpreted the sound as agreement.”

  “A small lie of omission isn’t the end of the world.” Isaac stood and paced the length of his office, the ever-present hitch in his gait thanks to the near fatal accident he’d survived fraying Sam’s nerves even more. His brother’s injuries were a great reminder that small lies could be the end of your world if loving someone made you vulnerable.

  Isaac stopped behind the chair and flicked Sam’s ear—the big brother equivalent of a sympathetic back pat. “He’ll have forgotten this serious girlfriend shit by the time the two of us convince him to sign the contract.”

  A contract for Kauri Whare to supply unique handcrafted wooden sculptures and furniture to Wright’s chain of boutique hotels throughout Texas and the Midwest.

  Sam and his Uncle Manu had built the business from the ground up. They’d started with only Sam’s little workshop—which had once been Manu’s—and expanded into a building that boasted a huge showroom which sold their famous kauri products, a small café for customers, and offices for staff.

  “He won’t forget.” Sam swatted away Isaac’s hand when his brother went to repeat the ear flick. “Because the company lawyer, who happens to be Gregory’s eldest son, Eric, and his wife, Julia, are flying from Australia in ten days’ time to meet us.”

  Isaac’s jaw sagged.

  “They’ve been in Sydney for the past month and since they’re already down under, according to Gregory, they’re going to check us out while we play hosts for a week.”

  “And the contract?” Isaac asked.

  “Will be drawn up at the end of the week if the son is satisfied.”

  “Holy shit.”

  “Exactly.”

  Sam scrubbed a palm down his unshaven jaw then tilted the office chair back to study the ceiling. “The last thing the old guy said was he’s looking forward to some photos of the three happy couples touring Bounty Bay.”

  “Meaning the Wrights, me and Nat, and you and your imaginary serious girlfriend?”

  “Apparently, I’ll have a fiancée by then since I have nine fucking days to pop the question.”

  Isaac crinkled his nose and squinted at him. “Too late to untell that lie?”

  “To a man whose hotel slogan is ‘for an honest night’s sleep’?” Sam’s voice rose half a whole octave on the last sentence. “That’ll have him canceling Junior’s trip to New Zealand in a blink of an eye.”

  Isaac gave him The Look. The one that said suck it up, buttercup, and put whānau first. This contract could secure the future of every member of the Ngata family who worked for them. They’d all worked hard and sacrificed to make Kauri Whare what it was, and with their new expansion which contained three more retail spaces, it was even more important than ever to add to the business’s financial security.

  “Then we’d better find a woman who’s prepared to put a ring on it for a week until that contract’s a done deal,” Isaac said.

  This time Sam let his head drop onto his brother’s desk. He thunked it against the wood, and then again for good measure. Sure, no problem. How hard could it be to find a woman who didn’t mind having a temporary ring on her finger?

  Just because he was the favorite child didn’t mean he could be late for his parents’ Sunday lunch—or worse, not show up at all. Shattered limbs and road rash were preferable to death by Ariana Ngata’s stare if one of her three kids, or multiple foster kids, dared pull a no-show to the traditional family meal.

  Sam gunned the Harley’s V-twin engine just for the simple pleasure of hearing its throaty response, and narrowed his eyes against the warm salt-scented breeze that whipped around his face. Yeah, his ma would also kill him if she knew he was headed to the family lunch sans bike helmet and leathers.

  Normally he wasn’t an idiot—though Isaac and their little sister, Tui, would disagree—but a summer’s day in Bounty Bay begged for the wind in his hair and the sun on his bare arms. The country road leading to the Ngata farm was just ahead and Sam leaned into the turn, his lips curving in delight at the way the big bike handled it.

  Simple pleasures, that was at the core of it—at the core of him. The rush from riding his bike or catching a wave on his board, the feel of kauri coming alive under his palms, the yeasty taste of a cool beer with whānau and friends. A woman warming his bed.

  The thought of a woman, in his bed or out of it, was like a bug flying into his mouth while helmetless. Shit. Eight days to find a serious girlfriend, real or imagined. He chuckled with little humor at the idea of a real, actual girlfriend. Of monotony and responsibility and ‘baby, where have you been?’ if he’d decided on a spontaneous surf session for a couple of hours.

  Yeah, nah, as the Kiwi saying went.

  He guided the bike to the locked farm gate and eased to a halt. After unlocking it, driving through, and relocking it—the gate installed thanks to the paparazzi scum who wouldn’t leave former All Black star rugby hero Isaac alone—Sam jammed on his helmet and rumbled slowly up the driveway to the farmhouse. No sense in picking a fight with his ma when she was already stressing about this whole Wright deal. And did it make a bit of difference that both he and Isaac had told her it was all under control?

  He snorted, spotting his brother’s massive black SUV parked in front of the house. Not a damn bit. Ngata women were a force to be reckoned with—as demonstrated by Tui’s Ducati leaning on its kickstand next to his Uncle Manu’s shitty old Toyota ute. The fights she and their ma had had over that bike. He grinned at his bratty sister, still standing by her bike, shaking her long dark hair out from under a hot-pink safety helmet.

  “Kia ora,” Tui called as he killed the Harley’s engine and climbed off. “Tempting road rash again, I see.” She peeled off her black leather jacket and draped it over the bike seat.

  “Kiss-ass.”

  Tui sauntered over and rose on the toes of her boots to kiss his cheek. “Twenty bucks and I don’t tell Ma you rode here without a helmet.”

  “Extortionist.” He gave her a quick one-armed hug.

  “One of my many talents.” She hugged him back fiercely before stepping away to eye him critically.

  “What?” He scrunched up his nose and glanced down at himself, expecting to see the T-shirt he’d grabbed off the floor had stains on it or the zipper of his cargo shorts had popped open. Nope. His shirt was clean. Ish. And his favorite khaki shorts were zipped up tight. “Ma says our presence is required, not that we’re presentable.”

  “You didn’t have to take that quite so literally.” She shot a glance over his shoulder, where, now that the Harley was silent, they could hear voices drifting over from the back patio.

  A stunning summer’s day in Bounty Bay could only mean one thing for Sunday lunch. Sam’s nose twitched. “Barbecue!”

  His stomach rumbled but Tui grabbed his forearm before he could lunge in the direction of the delicious smells rising from his dad’s grill.

  “Wait a minute.” She brushed her hand over his shoulder and a sprinkling of sawdust drifted off his shirt. “Guess you must’ve been keeping to the speed limit at least, since the wind didn’t blow all of this off.” She moved around behind him and smacked her palm on his upper back. “There. That’s better. C’mon.”

  Before he could ask why the sudden interest in the state of today’s T-shirt, she ducked around him and headed down the side of the house. He followed, led by his nose, already pushing aside the worries of the week in expectation of chilling out with the whānau.

  In the paddocks surrounding the farmhouse, horses grazed under the spreading branches of macrocarpa trees. His brother’s horse, Richie, stood at the fence, eyeballing Sam in the hopes that he had an apple tucked into his shorts pocket. Behind the horses and the paddocks that were
still lush and green even though they hadn’t had much rain in the past week, rose endless hills of bush. Kauri, totara, rimu, and other native trees covered most of the five hundred acres of Ngata land, which stretched from here in Bounty Bay and over hills to a normally inaccessible section of beach. Ngata cattle roamed free range in those hills, and as a kid, he and Isaac and Tui would ride horses with their dad to fix boundary fences and muster the cows when needed. Nowadays, Isaac mostly went alone with their dad unless an extra hand was needed.

  Speaking of Dad—Sam rounded the corner of the house, spotting Pete behind his massive barbecue. His dad looked up, tongs in one hand, beer in the other, and raised his bottle in greeting. Beside him, Uncle Manu—his dad’s brother—smirked at him with an eyebrow twitch of a hello. His attention was momentarily drawn away from the barbecue to the clusters of outdoor couches and seats facing the impressive view of the distant beach.

  Ma was holding court in her usual position at the head of a massive outdoor table groaning under the weight of salads, fresh rēwena bread, and foil-wrapped baked potatoes. Next to her sat a dark-haired woman with sparkling brown eyes and a killer smile. Affection rippled through him. He hadn’t seen Wikitoria Hunter since last Christmas. Complicatedly related to him on his mother’s side, the Ngata siblings simply referred to Tori, as everyone called her, as just another cousin.

  Next to Tori, who spotted him and waved, was one of Tui’s friends, a pale, freckly redhead in a yellow dress. The woman clutched a glass of white wine to her chest as if it were a lifeline. Amanda? Anna? Angela? Sam racked his brain for her name but came up blank. He remembered she worked in the pharmacy in town and blushed the same color as pohutukawa blossoms on the rare occasions he’d bought condoms there instead of at the grocery store. This wasn’t helpful intel, but it probably explained why she was now staring at his sister with a quiet desperation he was clueless to interpret.