The Aristocrat and the Single Mom

by Michelle Douglas

To England.

  Kate didn’t haul herself out of bed; she didn’t dress or make coffee. She didn’t see the point. She didn’t want to get up, she didn’t want to get dressed and she didn’t want coffee.

  She wanted Simon.

  She wouldn’t sleep. She hadn’t slept all night. She’d lain here and stared at the ceiling ever since Felice had tiptoed out into the garden at midnight and told her it was time to go to bed.

  Garden…bed…It hadn’t mattered then and it didn’t matter now.

  It had mattered to Felice. It would matter to Jesse. But Jesse was at his dad’s for the next few days and she’d worry about happy faces and sparkly eyes when he returned.

  She stared at the clock and watched the minutes tick over. Had Simon left Port Stephens yet? Had he asked Danny to drive down the main street of Nelson’s Bay just so he could gaze one more time at the spot where they’d first kissed?

  Or had they turned straight onto the road that led to Sydney and the airport?

  Loud banging on her front door jolted Kate awake. The clock showed it was ten twenty-six. Against all expectations, she’d fallen asleep.

  She stared at the clock and didn’t move. Simon would be through Newcastle by now and on the freeway halfway to Sydney…

  More knocking—loud and intrusive. She ignored it. Whoever it was would eventually give up and go away, leave her in peace.

  ‘Kate!’

  Paul’s shout pierced her apathy. She jerked upright on the bed. Jesse! Had something happened to Jesse? And here she was, slouching around like a limp fish feeling sorry for herself. She shot off the bed, bolted down the hallway and flung the front door open. ‘What is it?’

  Jesse and Paul both stood there grinning at her, inordinately pleased with themselves about something. She clutched the door in relief, sagging against it for a moment. ‘What are you guys doing here?’

  ‘Mum!’ Jesse stared at her, scandalised. ‘You’re still in your pyjamas.’

  ‘It’s Sunday. I’m not working.’

  Paul grinned. ‘Morning, Kate.’

  Oh, God! They hadn’t concocted some hideous cheer Kate up scheme, had they? She didn’t think she could face a picnic or ice cream sundaes or…anything. She bit back a very rude word. Paul wouldn’t do that to her, surely? He wasn’t a total numbskull, even if it would take her quite some time to forgive him for showing up at dinner last night and outing her heartbreak to all and sundry.

  ‘Can we come in?’

  She shook herself, waving her arm down the hall. ‘By all means.’

  ‘We’ve got great news, Mum!’

  ‘Great news, huh?’ She led them down the hallway to the kitchen, pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and collapsed into it. Jesse hopped from one foot to the other and she did her best not to sigh. He had way too much energy for her today. Just watching him made her want to crawl back into bed and drag the covers over her head.

  Happy face, she ordered.

  Paul set about making coffee. Instant. Ugh. But she didn’t protest. She didn’t care.

  ‘The best news in the world,’ Jesse said, nodding vigorously.

  Paul leaned against the kitchen bench, arms folded, legs crossed at the ankles and kept grinning at her as he waited for the kettle to boil.

  ‘The best news, huh?’ She tried to inject enthusiasm into her voice. She’d played this game before. She knew her role. ‘Let me guess—you got tickets to the twenty-twenty cricket match in Sydney?’

  Jesse shook his head. Paul’s grin widened, if that were possible. ‘Thank heavens,’ she murmured under her breath, because she couldn’t think of a single excuse that would get her out of attending that.

  ‘Okay, then…the characters from Sesame Street are having a show in town?’

  Jesse rolled his eyes. ‘I’m too old for that now, Mum.’

  Ooh, that’s right.

  He started bouncing again. ‘What’s the one thing you want most in the world?’

  Simon.

  But she couldn’t have him. She wouldn’t say his name out loud either. She couldn’t. But she couldn’t think of a single thing to say instead. Jesse glared at her expectantly. ‘Um…’ She moistened her lips and glanced across at Paul for help.

  ‘Go on, tell her,’ Paul said to Jesse, obviously taking pity on her.

  Jesse lunged forward to grab her arm and pump it up and down. ‘We can go to England to live, Mum. We can! Honest we can!’

  She stared from Jesse to Paul. He leant his forearms on the breakfast bar, hands lightly clasped, and spoke directly to her. ‘You and I have sacrificed a lot of opportunities over the years for Jesse. I haven’t regretted a single one of them. I love our son.’

  She nodded. ‘I know.’ And suddenly she knew that Paul planned to suggest what she’d never have the strength to offer—that Jesse live with her for six months of the year in England, and then with him in Australia for the other six. She couldn’t do it. She would not live without her son for six months of every year.

  Jesse beamed at her. Her heart stretched so tight she thought it might snap.

  ‘You know that in the last few years I’ve taken on a certain amount of freelance work from overseas.’

  She gazed at Paul blankly, shrugged, then nodded. ‘Uh-huh.’ Paul was a graphic designer—a good one.

  ‘Well…since then I’ve been offered positions with several of Europe’s leading design firms.’

  It took a moment for his words to collide with her grey matter. She blinked when they did, and straightened. Her heart started to thump.

  ‘Naturally I turned them down. I wasn’t moving away from Jesse.’

  The pounding increased. ‘But?’ It was near impossible to push that one little word out of a throat that had tightened with suspense. And hope.

  ‘After Jesse and I left here last night, I emailed two of the London-based firms to see if their offers still stood.’

  ‘And…?’ Her ribs contracted so hard around her lungs she couldn’t utter a word longer than a single syllable. Even then it came out on a gasp.

  ‘Half an hour ago I heard back from my first choice.’ He straightened, opening his arms wide. ‘The offer still stands. They want me on board asap.’

  Kate’s jaw hit the floor. He wasn’t a numbskull but an angel, a fairy godmother! She leapt up, then didn’t know what to do. Jesse flung his arms around her waist so she hugged him.

  He tilted his head back to grin at her, his whole face alight with excitement. ‘Cool, huh?’

  Oh, yes—very, very cool!

  In the next instant, although she did her best to ignore it, cold hard reality set in, dousing her excitement as she forced herself to assess Paul’s offer rationally. ‘This is asking an awful lot of you, Paul.’ Her shoulders sagged. It was asking too much. She didn’t want to say the words, but she forced them out. ‘I couldn’t possibly accept this kind of sacrifice. I—’

  ‘Sacrifice?’ Paul snorted. ‘Kate, this is the kind of job I’ve always dreamed about.’

  He meant it? The excitement shining in his face matched Jesse’s, belying any notion she might have that he was making a sacrifice.

  He meant it!

  He shrugged. ‘It does mean longer commute times than we currently have with Jesse. I understand the Holm estate is an hour and a half from the centre of London. It won’t be a two-minute dash up the road from house to house any more. But…’

  ‘But?’ she echoed, hardly able to take it all in.

  ‘And,’ he added, pointing a finger at her, ‘I want a big say in where Jesse goes to school.’

  ‘Of course, you always have thus far, haven’t you?’

  His face broke out into a grin. ‘Then let’s do it. Let’s move halfway around the world.’

  Kate suddenly realised exactly what it took to make her eyes sparkly again. She had a feeling all of her sparkled. She leant down until she was eye to eye with Jesse before she sparkled right off the Richter scale. ‘Are you sure you want to move away from the ba
y, Jesse? There won’t be much swimming or fishing in England.’

  ‘Yes, there will. Felice told me about the indoor swimming pool and there’s a stream and a dam with fish in them.’

  There was? Jesse knew more about their prospective new home than she did.

  ‘And there’s a tree-house and lambs I’ll be allowed to feed and Dad said he’d take me to a test match at Lords and that there’ll be heaps and heaps of cricket teams for me to play in.’

  Kate started to laugh—right down in her heart laughter. ‘I take it that’s a yes, then?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘Woo hoo!’

  She and Jesse proceeded to perform a very noisy victory dance all through the kitchen. Until Kate snapped to.

  She grabbed Paul’s arm to check his wristwatch. ‘We have to go. Now!’ She started herding him and Jesse to the front door. ‘Simon’s plane leaves in less than five hours and we have to tell him!’

  ‘Kate—’ Paul stopped her before she could race out of the front door ‘—I am not taking you to the airport…’

  Her face fell.

  ‘…in your pyjamas,’ he finished.

  She looked down at herself, groaned and stamped a foot. She covered Jesse’s ears. ‘Bugger!’

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘Sorry.’ Why hadn’t she forced herself up, got changed, had coffee?

  ‘I’ll go get changed. Coffee—’ she pushed Paul back towards the kitchen ‘—go make. You—’ she pointed at Jesse ‘—find travel mugs, a Thermos, anything.’ Then she bolted for her bedroom.

  Paul sent Kate a wry glance. ‘That is not going to make the car go any faster, Kate.’

  ‘Sorry.’ She tried to make herself sit back in the seat, hands in her lap instead of pressing against the dashboard, but too much energy zinged through her for stillness. ‘Can’t you…like, do something?’ she burst out.

  ‘I’m open to suggestions.’

  ‘Don’t you know a short cut to the airport?’ she demanded. Preferably one that didn’t involve so much traffic.

  In the next instant she shook her head. ‘No, no. It’s always a really bad idea to take a short cut to the airport.’

  ‘It is. Now relax; we’ll be there soon.’

  Relax? How could she relax? First there’d been an accident on the freeway that had held them up for an hour, and now this endless traffic had them crawling at a snail’s pace. What if Simon had already passed through customs and security? This mad dash would all be for nothing.

  ‘Why don’t you call Simon’s mobile?’

  She twisted her hands together. ‘I…um…don’t know his number.’

  Paul glanced at her, his lips twitched and then he burst out laughing. ‘You’re prepared to move halfway around the world to be with the guy, but you don’t know his cell number?’

  ‘Something like that,’ she mumbled.

  ‘Try Danny or Felice’s phones.’

  She already had. ‘Felice’s is switched off and Danny isn’t answering.’ She suspected he’d left it at home.

  She twisted around to glance at the back seat. Jesse stirred. His eyes opened and in the next instant he shot bolt upright. ‘Are we there yet?’

  She grinned at the way his face lit up. ‘Close.’

  ‘Very close,’ Paul said, turning into the airport car park. ‘We’re here.’

  ‘Oh, God!’ Kate groaned. ‘Hurry! Hurry! Car park there. Now!’

  She pointed and Paul slid the car into the space. Kate practically fell out in her haste. She grabbed one of Jesse’s hands. Paul grabbed the other. ‘Now run!’ she ordered.

  She slid to a halt once they entered the airport proper. Good Lord, there were so many people. How on earth would she find Simon in this crush?

  ‘Check-in,’ Paul said. ‘We’ll try there first.’ He pointed to her left and she set off again at speed.

  ‘Kate!’

  ‘Felice!’ She slid to a halt again, dropping Jesse’s hand to seize Felice’s shoulders. ‘Simon,’ she croaked. ‘Where?’

  Felice’s gaze swept over Kate from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, her eyes widened, and Kate could only imagine what a sight she made. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘No time.’

  ‘Hey, sis.’

  She ignored Danny and shook Felice. ‘Where?’

  Felice grabbed her hand and dragged her through the crowd. Kate didn’t glance behind to see if Danny, Jesse and Paul followed. She knew they would.

  ‘We left him at the check-in desk. He left it to the very last minute to check in too, dawdling over so many coffees I thought he’d turn into an espresso machine.’

  ‘So he wouldn’t have made it to customs yet?’ she gasped.

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Felice dragged Kate to a halt. ‘We left him here.’

  Kate released Felice to pace the length of the barrier, searching for the familiar dark head with its too-short hair and shoulders broad enough to carry the weight of the world. She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from calling his name. She suspected she was acting enough of a loony as it was.

  Then she saw him. He stepped forward towards the counter, suitcase in one hand, documentation in the other and Kate’s tongue stuck fast to the roof of her mouth.

  He wore a suit. He had a briefcase tucked against his side. He looked every inch the lord and something shivered inside her as her confidence slipped. Surely a single mother with a rowdy child would be a liability to him, not—

  ‘Simon!’

  Felice’s shrill scream rang around the entire check-in point, momentarily deafening Kate.

  ‘Ow.’ Kate glared at her and covered her nearest ear. When she turned back, though, she saw that Felice’s shout had achieved its objective. Every head had swung around towards them.

  Everybody’s—including Simon’s.

  Oh, Lord. He blinked. She gulped and swallowed, mouthed, ‘Hi,’ gave a tiny wave, because she had to do something, however inadequate. She didn’t know what else to say. Or do. After Felice’s shout, the airport seemed suddenly and eerily quiet.

  He shifted his weight to the balls of his feet. The check-in clerk snatched up his documentation. Tiredness swept across his face. ‘So you’ve come to see me off after all,’ he called out when she didn’t add anything to her initial greeting.

  He looked so unfamiliar, so impeccably correct in his suit. And tie. She’d grown so used to seeing him in board shorts and T-shirts, chinos and polo shirts, that she’d forgotten—Simon Morton-Blake was the seventh Lord of Holm. What on earth would the seventh Lord of Holm want with her?

  Then he smiled and he was just Simon. The sun came out and she knew she was still his princess. She threw her head back and laughed for the sheer joy of it. She moved around the barrier until she was as close as she could be to him and the check-in desk, but still too many bodies separated them. She swooshed the people with her hands, glaring at them until they moved to one side or the other, or at least as far as the barriers would let them, giving her a clear line of sight to Simon.

  ‘Simon—’

  She didn’t know if she wanted to laugh or cry.

  ‘Simon, we can come to England to live—me and Jesse!’ She shouted the words out in much the same fashion as Jesse had to her only hours ago.

  Simon frowned. Kate wondered if her words had come out coherently or if they’d only made sense in her head.

  He went to move towards her when the check-in clerk snapped, ‘If you move away from the counter, sir, you will have to go to the back of the line!’ She glanced at his documentation, scowled at his ticket. ‘I wouldn’t recommend that, sir. Not with the flight you’re trying to catch.’

  He hesitated, an endearing indecision flashing across his face. He pointed a trembling finger at Kate. ‘Will you repeat what you just said?’

  Her heart swelled with love for him. She understood his fear of allowing himself to hope, his fear he hadn’t heard her right the first time.

  ‘Paul has been offered
a job in London.’ She turned and found Paul and Jesse, Danny and Felice, forming a small group nearby. ‘Paul, what’s the name of the firm you’ll be working for?’

  ‘Inglewood and Baxters.’

  She turned back to Simon and repeated it. ‘You know them?’

  He nodded. He stared at her and his shoulders stiffened, then went slack as if a truck had hit him, or a thunderbolt. ‘They’re good. One of the best design groups in the world.’

  Her heart swelled even more as she saw he still hadn’t comprehended her meaning. ‘Paul has been offered his dream job and he has accepted it.’ She pulled in a breath. ‘Which means Jesse and I are moving to England.’

  She stared at him. He stared back. She waited for comprehension to dawn in those clear grey eyes of his. ‘I don’t mean right now, of course. It’ll take us a few weeks to organise everything. But soon…if that’s what you still want,’ she finished on a gulp, nerves assailing her all over again.

  ‘You’re going to come to England? To live?’

  ‘Yes!’ She shouted the word, her nerves suddenly at stretching point.

  Simon dropped his briefcase, kicked his suitcase out of the way and strode away from the counter, knocking barriers every which way.

  ‘Sir!’ the check-in clerk called. ‘Sir, your passport, your suitcase. Your ticket!’

  ‘I’m not taking that flight,’ he shot back over his shoulder, his eyes never leaving Kate’s face.

  People scattered out of his way, barriers kept falling and then he was down on his knee in front of her and she found her hands clasped in his.

  ‘Kate, you are the love of my heart. I have been dying by slow degrees today in this God-forsaken place, knowing that every minute was a minute closer to leaving you behind. Please, Kate, please…do me the very great honour of consenting to be my wife?’

  If possible, the airport became even more hushed as all within earshot turned and held a collective breath, but Kate wasn’t aware of anyone else other than the man in front of her, down on bended knee. She dropped to her knees too. They were decidedly useless and wobbly knees after that declaration. Especially when Simon insisted on steaming her up with an expression of such utter intensity she doubted whether her legs would work ever again.