Persuading Spring: A Sexy New Zealand Romance (The Four Seasons Book 4) by Serenity Woods Read Free Book Online Page A

going to be okay, even though she didn’t yet know how.
    They watched Shrek , not talking much
but laughing at the jokes and singing along to the songs, and that led into
another movie as the light gradually faded and the day came to an end. The rain
had eased off, and outside, the clouds had parted to reveal a tangerine sky.
    Bridget looked down to see that Mateo’s
eyes had closed and the boy had dozed off. She reached out and touched Aaron’s
arm, and he looked down and smiled.
    Together, the two of them got up gently,
took out the empty bowls, and then Aaron covered Mateo up.
    Bridget swallowed the last few drops of
wine in her glass. Aaron came over to where she stood by the window and held up
the bottle.
    “Seems a shame to waste it,” he said.
    She sighed and gave a little nod, and he
poured most of it into her glass and the rest into his.
    “To the future,” he said, holding his glass
up.
    The last rays of the sun fell across him,
warming his skin to a caramel color and turning his eyes to silver.
    “To the future.” She touched her glass to
his and sipped the rich, red wine. When he gestured to one of the seats at the
table, she took a chair, and he sat opposite her.
    “He’s a lovely boy,” she said, nodding
toward Mateo.
    “Yeah, he’s all right.” He grinned and
leaned back in the chair, hooking one arm over the back. He had big, strong
hands. She could imagine him handling restless animals, holding them still
until they calmed.
    “Mateo’s an unusual name,” she said. “Is
it…?”
    “Spanish. Nita’s from Barcelona—her full
name’s Juanita. She came over here on a working holiday. She was picking kiwi
fruit in the orchards in the Bay of Islands, and I bumped into her in Kerikeri.
She was beautiful, exotic—long, dark, wavy hair down to her hips, black eyes,
curvy figure. I fell for her immediately. Within six weeks, I’d proposed. A
month later, we were married.”
    “Wow.”
    “Yeah. I tend to be impulsive. I shouldn’t
say it was a mistake because she gave me Mat, and I wouldn’t be without him. So
for that I’m glad I met her. But it’s been a rocky road. She missed her home,
for a start. I understood that, but my life, my career, my family, are all
here. We went to Spain once a year, and the journey grew to be something I
dreaded. She’d be ecstatic for the weeks leading up to it—manic, almost, and
when we were there she’d be her old self—energetic, beautiful, lively. Then as
the holiday drew to an end and she was due to go back, she’d get sadder and
sadder, and angry—at me, at everyone. When we came back, she’d sink into a
depression for months. We argued about it all the time until, eventually, there
was nothing left but the bad times.”
    “I’m sorry.” He looked sad, she thought,
his shoulders slumping, the lines on his face illustrating his unhappiness.
    “It gets worse,” he said. “I moved out of
the family home in Russell, which is where my surgery is, in the Bay of
Islands. Our divorce eventually came through. I knew she didn’t like the
bay—she missed the city—but I was shocked when out of the blue she announced
she was planning to take Mateo back to Spain.”
    “Oh no. What did you do?”
    “Got the lawyers involved. Mat doesn’t want
to go, and, even though he’s young, the Lawyer for Child says he understands everything
and genuinely wants to stay here. He doesn’t like Spain—Nita tries to get him
to speak Spanish but he refuses. She thinks I’ve poisoned him against it, but I
haven’t. I’m very careful not to say anything negative about either her or
Spain in his hearing.”
    “That’s good of you. Not everyone would be
so nice about it.”
    He shrugged, and it was clear to Bridget
that he didn’t understand how he could have reacted in any other way. “We’re
waiting for them to make a decision. Unfortunately, though, they couldn’t stop
her moving to Wellington. She’s been here six months, and I fly down every
other