‘How are they? Are they really mad at me?’
‘No,’ he replied quickly giving me a frown. ‘They were too busy kicking my arse trying to get me to call you. Even Dad said if you’d moved on I’d brought it on myself by being so stubborn. They miss you.’
‘I miss them,’ I smiled with a nod. When I’d turned my iPhone on this morning and couldn’t believe the number of messages that I’d had from Robert and Sofia, let alone Gabe. I’d deleted them all. What was done was done, we were moving forward. ‘I’ll send them a message tonight. How’s Ava?’
‘Adorable,’ he smiled, with a really happy twinkle in his eyes. ‘She was one of the things that kept me going out there. You wouldn’t believe how much she’s grown since you last saw her in January. Her eyes have changed colour, they’re a deep brown now.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, and she loves to smile and bounce. She absolutely loves it when you bounce her or throw her in the air and she has such a cute giggle. She’s been trying to get up on her hands and knees to crawl, but keeps flopping down on to her stomach, which really pisses her off,’ he laughed. ‘She calls Dad and Sofia, Dada and Mama and even tries my name, but I’m just Ga at the moment. She’s really inquisitive and hates being ignored. I have pictures and videos on my phone, I’ll show you when we have lunch.’
‘I can’t believe how much I’ve missed in a just few months of not seeing her,’ I sighed.
‘You’ll see them soon. They were so excited to hear that we were going on a date.’
‘Mum and Gerry were too,’ I laughed. ‘So what about Uni, did you pass?’
‘I got a second, which I was really pleased with, all things considered. You?’
‘A first,’ I mumbled, feeling embarrassed.
‘Seriously?’ he exclaimed as he shot me a look. ‘That’s amazing. Wow. I can’t … after everything you went through? God … Mia, I’m so proud of you.’
‘Thank you.’
‘I’ve got me a hot wife with brains,’ he chuckled and I slapped his thigh. How could this feel so natural? To have just slipped back into being so relaxed with each other, laughing and joking? Like the last month had never happened?
‘What did you do about your swimming coaching?’
‘I had to give it up while I’ve been based in New York,’ he sighed. ‘I might see if I can help out now and then when I’m home, or maybe find a children’s weekend class to teach. I miss it.’
‘You’d be great doing that,’ I smiled.
‘Thanks.’
We parked up at the stately home we’d last been to when we were trying to fix up Doug and Lexi. Gabe automatically reached for my hand, I quickly took it and he clasped it tightly with a smile. We took the forest route again as we tried to catch up on the rest of the things that we’d missed over the last four weeks. Gabe suddenly stopped and looked at me.
‘What?’ I asked as I looked up at him. He towered over me as I was just in my flat boots.
‘I can’t wait any longer, I keep looking at your lips, remembering how they tasted. I’m going to kiss you and if you don’t want me to, you’d better run and hide, damn fast,’ he growled, then yanked me to him without even giving me a chance to consider running. Not that I would have. I’d been desperately thinking of a way to bring it up myself, I wanted it too. I felt myself go lightheaded as his lips parted and he lowered his head to find my eager mouth. I’d expected tentative, gentle, tender and shy kisses. I got violent, aggressive and possessive kisses that blew the top of my head off. A hand anchored my back, the other firmly clasping the nape of my neck in a reassuring familiar way. Our tongues danced as if they’d been practicing together their whole lives and had never been apart. I reached up and put my arms around his neck as I felt myself sagging. This was right where I was meant to be. In his arms, being devoured by him. I heard him groan as the kisses slowed. As if he’d just needed to remind me what we were, what we could be again, when it came to the passion we’d had for each other. Now though, he wanted to show me the other side of us, the romantic, caring, compassionate and tender side.
‘Gabe,’ I sighed as he worked his way around my lips, taking his time, taking away the possibility of any doubt of his feelings for me. I only hoped that he got the same in return.
‘I’m never letting you go, ever again, Mia,’ he murmured. ‘You’d better tell me right now if you have a problem with that, because I wouldn’t survive losing you again if we move forward now.’
‘You’re really willing to consider the surrogacy?’ I asked, it was the only thing holding me back, the only tiny element of worry in my mind that we couldn’t make this work again.
‘No, I’m not willing to just consider it, Mia. I want to do it. I want you healthy, happy and pain free. That’s what’s important to me now. It took me a long time to realise that, but I got there in the end. Even if we can’t have our own child through surrogacy, there’s always adoption. I’m willing to take that route, as long as you’re still by my side, I don’t care about how it happens anymore. We’d love that child as if it were our own, what else do we need?’
‘Nothing,’ I sighed as I wiped my eyes and pulled his face down to mine again.
I was heartbroken to say goodbye to him that night, as Riley picked him up to return him to the airport.
‘I’ll call you every lunchtime if I can, but definitely every night.’
‘You’d better!’ I warned. ‘Give them all my love.’
‘See you on Friday night?’
‘I’ll be waiting,’ I smiled with a nod and a tear.
‘Don’t cry. I’m finding it hard enough leaving you again.’ He grabbed me and kissed me, then quickly ran for the car.
I got home from work the following Friday to find a small package addressed to me outside the bank of letterboxes in the ground floor hall. I headed upstairs with it and let myself into Lexi’s. She was at the club and Gabe was flying home, due to land at any time. I’d come home for a quick shower, to get changed and go with him for a meal at The Golden Lotus Cantonese. I made myself a coffee, opened my parcel and found a small card tucked down the side of an item delicately covered in tissue paper. I read it and smiled.
Thank you, Tyler x
I knew what it was even before I peeled the paper back. There was solitary cupcake, with white frosting and a tiny marzipan carrot on the top. I bit into it and licked my lips, it was even better than Starbucks carrot cake. As I swallowed the remaining piece, I knew that he’d forgiven me and appreciated the gift and note. I wiped my mouth and rushed off to get ready for my date with Gabe. I’d missed him terribly and had hardly had any sleep all week, as I’d stayed up late every night for facetime chats when he got in from work.
‘Gabe,’ I laughed. ‘Where are you taking me?’ We’d been dating for six weeks’ worth of weekends and it was fast approaching his birthday and he was returning home to work from Westhampton next weekend. We’d been to the actual cinema, the theatre, had meals both out and in. Always at Lexi’s, like being in our old marital home would be too weird. We’d even sat in with her watching TV together until he crossed the hall to bed. Just normal everyday things, getting back into a relaxed relationship with no pressures.
‘Just trust me,’ he advised as he covered my eyes with a blindfold. It made me breathe a bit quicker. All we’d done so far was kiss. We’d kissed to the point that I’d ended up with an obvious stubble rash one night and him with a cut on his lip, where I’d got over excited and had bitten it in the heat of the moment. I think we both knew that it was only a matter of time until we couldn’t hold back any longer. He lowered me into his car, one hand on the top of my head to stop me bumping it on the roof and strapped me in, kissing me as he did. I heard the door slam and the engine start and we pulled out of the car park and into the traffic.
‘Gabe Austin,’ came his voice as he activated his remote speaker phone when it rang.
‘Hi Gabe, it’s Megan. I have your father on the line for you.�
��
‘Thanks Megan, put him through.’
‘Gabriel, how did it go?’
‘You’re a bit premature Dad, I only just landed. I’m not alone and we’re on speaker phone.’
‘Bugger, sorry. Hi, Mia.’
‘Hi, Robert,’ I smiled. ‘How are you? How are Sofia and Ava?’
‘We’re all wonderful thank you, and we can’t wait to see you again. Sofia’s really missed you.’
‘I’ve missed her too, all of you. It was so lovely to catch up last weekend on facetime, but I can’t wait to give Ava a cuddle.’
‘You may change your mind when you see her. She’s started having mini sulks and tantrums and throwing things. Just like Gabriel did at that age.’
‘Thanks, Dad.’
‘Give me a ring later then, son.’
‘Will do. Bye.’
‘Bye, Robert,’ I called and smiled as he hung up. ‘How did what go? And what’s premature?’ I asked.
‘Still as nosy as ever,’ Gabe chuckled. ‘Just wait and see.’
‘I can’t see anything at the moment,’ I reminded him with a playful tug on my blindfold.
‘You will, just be patient.’
My ears pricked up when the noise of traffic died down and I felt the car swing sharply left and we sat idling for a minute. We moved forward again and I heard the crunch of gravel.
‘We’re at your house?’ I exclaimed.
‘How the hell did you know that?’ he uttered.
‘Woman’s intuition,’ I giggled. ‘Why are we here?’
‘Well, that would ruin the surprise if I told you, but you may as well take the blindfold off now you’ve guessed.’
I grinned at him as I removed it and he pulled up outside the front door. He helped me out and I looked up impressed. All the windows had been repainted, along with the front door, it looked really smart. He took my hand and led us into the hall and down to the kitchen door, then hesitated and looked back at me.
‘What?’
‘I hope I’ve done the right thing,’ he replied as he opened it and ushered me through. I looked around stunned. Where I had a memory of the old kitchen diner, or the empty shell when I’d last been here, when I was pregnant, now it was complete. There was a new fitted kitchen, the same as the one we’d chosen for the apartment and I recognised the tiles and appliances. It was laid out exactly how we had planned when I’d last been, right next to the bi-fold doors. I looked down to find a solid oak floor running all the way through to Robert’s old lounge, where all the plastering was finished and painted white, ready for personal touches to be added.
‘It looks amazing, so much bigger.’
‘I want you to move in here with me,’ he said in a rush. I looked around at him surprised. ‘There’s too many memories in that apartment for both of us. I want us to move in here, a fresh start again. We can move some of the old furniture and pictures and stuff across if you want, or we can start totally afresh with new stuff. If you don’t like this kitchen, I’ll have it ripped out and a new one put in. Tell me what you want, it would be your home too. I just …’ he stopped as I put my fingers over his lips. He was so nervous he was babbling, like I used to.
‘I love the kitchen, I love our old furniture and accessories, I love the idea of moving in here together, rather than back there, and I love you, Gabe. Of course I want to move in with you, we’re married. I was beginning to wonder if we were going to date forever.’ I smiled as his face lit up and he grabbed my fingers and kissed them before kissing me repeatedly.
‘You mean it? You really mean it? We’re doing this again, you and me for real?’
‘Forever, Gabe.’
‘God, you’ve just made me so happy,’ he sighed as he palmed my face and just looked at me. ‘Come on, come and see the playroom and your office, the games room downstairs and the gym and dance studio.’
‘You finished it all?’
‘Yes. I pushed the contractors to finish it because I wanted you out of that apartment where so many … I didn’t want you staying there any longer than you had to. I was going to bring you here that Sunday you found Chelsea in our apartment, to tell you that it was ready and that I was happy to put ourselves down for surrogacy. I wanted it to be our family home, just like we’d always intended. If you said no, that you didn’t want me, I was going to sell it and move to New York.’
‘You were going to leave?’ I looked at him stunned.
‘I couldn’t bear the thought of seeing you all the time in the office building, we were bound to run into each other.’
‘O, Gabe,’ I sighed and put my arms around him and held him tightly. ‘I can’t bear to think how close we came to losing each other, for good.’
‘Me neither, but that’s behind us,’ he replied as he wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. ‘How would you feel if we moved in for Christmas Eve, for your birthday and our wedding anniversary and invited our parents and Lexi and Doug over for Christmas?’
‘Ok, I have a couple of issues with that train of thought,’ I laughed.
‘What?’ he protested as we stayed clinging to each other.
‘First, I don’t want to be unpacking boxes on Christmas Eve, I’d like to move in a bit earlier.’
‘How much earlier?’
‘I’m thinking pretty much as soon as you can organise a removal company.’
‘Seriously?’ he gasped.
‘Seriously. I want this, Gabe. I miss you, I miss going to sleep with you, I miss waking up with you and I also miss sex with you. I have a feeling that you’re holding off until we do move in, so I want to do it soon, without visitors staying. They’re welcome at Christmas, but I’d just like it to be you and me again for a while.’
‘Hmmm, from what I remember you’re not the quietest when you come.’
‘I’m not,’ I giggled. ‘Which means that I don’t want our parents listening in, thank you very much.’
‘You’re happy for me to get on the case then? Sort a moving in date?’
‘Yes, and when we’re in we can talk about colours and extra stuff we might need. I don’t want to delay it.’
‘I love you,’ he sighed and kissed me again. ‘Leave it with me then, I’ll get it sorted as soon as possible.’
‘Great. And family gathering at Christmas is a wonderful idea, but what about Sarah? You can’t invite Doug and not Sarah.’
‘You haven’t heard?’
‘Heard what?’ I pulled my head back to look at him.
‘He left her.
‘What?’ I gasped.
‘He realised that he was being unfair, that she was his second choice and she deserved better. He’s moved back in with his parents for now. I promised him if we were moving in here, he could move into our apartment and pay rent.’
‘O my God. Does this mean he still wants Lexi?’
‘He still loves her,’ Gabe shrugged. ‘But I think he needs a bit of time to get over Sarah and to find out if he still has a shot with Lexi. He knows he screwed up badly.’
‘Yes, well the four of us have each mastered the art of screwing up badly, haven’t we?’ I replied with a shake of my head.
‘We certainly have,’ he laughed. ‘You know, sometimes I forget with everything that the four of us have been through, that we’re still young kids really.’
‘Me too,’ I nodded. We were all still only twenty-two. ‘It’s your birthday soon. What would you like to do?’
‘Move in with you. This is my birthday present, Mia. Having you back, nothing would have made me happier.’
‘I love you,’ I sighed as my eyes filled up.
‘Not as much as I love you,’ he replied sincerely.
We spent Saturday measuring up for any additional furniture we’d need for the house, along with new curtains, and then headed over to AT&F for him to show me the office he’d selected. He’d had a choice of two, Robert’s large corner office, which was always kept empty for when he was working from West
hampton, or a marginally smaller office, next door, with one huge glass wall overlooking the city.
‘Why have you picked the smaller one?’ I asked, surprised.
‘Because exactly three floors up, right above this one, is my wife’s office and I like the idea of her being on top of me every day,’ he winked making me laugh.
‘I’d better be the only one on top of you. Do I get a say in the choice of your PA?’
‘No, sorry already been chosen. Alex, tall, dark, seriously fit body and eager to please.’
‘I hate her already,’ I pouted.
‘Good job Alex is a man then,’ he laughed as he grabbed me and spun me around and kissed me.
‘You tease. Maybe I need to get myself an Alex, or maybe a Dick. I’m often in need of a handy Dick during the day.’
‘Then it’s a very good job I’m only three floors down. I’m fit enough to run up those stairs on my lunch break and give you my Dick’s undivided attention for half an hour every day.’
‘I’d need Dick all over the office,’ I warned. ‘There’s many work surfaces that haven’t been fully utilised. I’m a very demanding boss.’
‘Hmmm, I’m sure he’s more than up to the challenge,’ he grinned.
‘Then he’s hired,’ I giggled and kissed him again.
Starting Again
‘Lexi!’ I howled as she pinned me down on my bed and tickled me. ‘I’ll be sick, I’ve eaten too much.’
‘I have to get you back. I can’t believe that you’re leaving me tomorrow. Again. Like it wasn’t bad enough first time around, now you won’t even be across the hall,’ she moaned.
‘I’m fifteen minutes away. We’ll see each other at work, you can come over for movie Tuesdays and stay the night and we can still go out. Nothing will ever separate us, Lexi. Gabe may be the male love of my life, but you’re the female one.’
‘I am?’ she sighed as she looked at me all touched. I nodded and she started crying. ‘Damn it, Mia. I’m all emosh again and I swore I wouldn’t be. I hate you,’ she mumbled as she wiped her eyes on her sleeve. I took advantage and tipped her off me onto the other side of the bed and tickled her ribs in turn.
Infinite Love (The Austin Series) Page 42
