Her steps slowed.How incredibly thoughtful.She hadn’t asked him to prepare lunch.It warmed her heart.She kissed him and asked, “Did you find anything?”
“The lake trail is still there.I told Josh.”
Hope filled her.“Good.Maybe he can find a clue at the lake.”
Ethan nodded, but his sceptical expression told her that he doubted it.
Something had to lead back to whoever was doing this.She wouldn’t let them win.
After lunch they moved to the burnt public side of the garden.The smell of smoke lingered, and Chelsea braced herself as she walked through the hedge.
Blackened grass everywhere.Her chest tightened and she swallowed hard.It would regrow.Fire was a trigger for a lot of native plants to bloom.This might all be a great blessing.
She almost convinced herself.She took the main path, pointing details out to Barry.The Japanese pagoda was a smouldering mess, but the fire had stopped short of the native garden.The area around the dry harbour lake had all been burnt, but the metal structure of the Sydney Harbour Bridge replica remained intact.
Cupid was covered in blackened ash, but the pruned rose bushes looked intact.
The peppermint grove with the hammock underneath had avoided damage.
It could have been so much worse.Some of the tension lifted from her.Most of the damage had been to the lawn, and the overgrown garden beds they would have had to weed anyway.She smiled.Johann would be annoyed.
“Might be good to keep an eye out when I get started,” Barry said.“Just in case there are any embers underneath that I uncover by mowing or blowing.”
“I’ll do that,” Chelsea said.“You get your things, and I’ll film the video footage I need before you start.”
Ethan stepped back under a peppermint to watch while she did her pieces to camera.She did half a dozen, taking in different parts of the garden, wanting to make sure she had something suitable.
“I’m done.”
Barry and his colleague carried the equipment through the hedges, and two four-wheel drives pulled into her driveway, one black and one white.She shaded her eyes as five very fit men got out, each scanning the area as if by habit.The last person to get out was a short woman who wrapped her arm around a stocky man with a well-trimmed beard who was slightly shorter than the others.Ethan pushed away from the tree with a grin.
“They’re early.”
His teammates.A bundle of nerves swept over her.These were the men who meant the most to Ethan.
What if they didn’t like her, or think she was good enough for him?No one except Ethan and her mother had ever thought she was good enough.
She brushed a stray hair behind her ear.
Ethan held a hand out to her.“Come on.I’ll introduce you.”
“Ah, why don’t you show them to the cabins and I’ll join you later?”
He frowned.“What’s wrong?”
She waved a hand.“I should take more shots.I don’t want to get in the way of your reunion.”
Ethan stepped closer, pulling her into his arms.“Why are you nervous?”
Honesty.That’s what she’d wanted from Ethan and so she had to give him the same.“They’re your brothers, Ethan.They may not like me.”
“They will love you, because I love you.They’ll be thrilled we’re back together.”
She stepped back.He’d said the ‘L’ word.
How could he drop it so casually into the conversation?This wasn’t the right time.She hadn’t figured out everything yet.She couldn’t rush this.Not this time.
There was too much at stake.
