‘Hey, it’s your birthday. Happy birthday, Abs.’
‘Thank you for my gift.’ I reached for my pendant.
‘Back where it belongs.’ He kissed my temple. ‘Wait, do you even have room for me? The girls are here too.’
‘You can sleep with me.’
‘In your bed? Abbey, are you sure? Will Ella be okay with that?’
‘You’re going to be around. Right? You are never going to run away from me again. And you are going to tell me you love me every single day. Right, Nick?’
‘I am making a set of Nick and Abbey rules. Each one of those is going on it.’
I nodded, kissing his cheek. ‘Well, then you can sleep in my bed. We might as well get everyone used to it in one fell swoop.’
‘Promise me you will always tell me when I annoy you.’
‘I promise.’ I kissed him again, smiling into his mouth. ‘You are fucking annoying. I could not love you more, though.’
‘I love you too, Abs.’
Nick
Peace is not just a feeling, or an ideal, or a place. It can also be a person and a life. Peace is Abbey and the life we are going to build together.
I lay there in the dark of her bedroom – it’s still too early to call it our room, but I hope that day is not far away. I was fighting off sleep just so I could watch her breath rise and fall evenly. She was snoring lightly, a beautiful sound to my ears – all of Abbey’s sounds are beautiful – and one of her arms was draped over me. She was possessive in her sleep. No matter how hot I got, she would find me in the bed, forcing me to acclimatise to her.
I had this stupid grin that I could not get off my face and I felt … light and unburdened. It was an unfamiliar feeling, and it made me a little anxious, as if I’d lost or forgotten something.
The curtains were fluttering behind me. She likes the window open, even in the dead of winter.
I don’t think this house will be big enough for us, nor will my apartment. I want a house where our whole family can be. But we’ll talk about that when we sort out everything else.
I am a lucky man. The luckiest man on earth. I cannot wait for our future, even though it scares the shit out of me.Fuck me, if that is not rather hopeful sounding. Who would have thought?
I snorted into the dark, a short laugh, which made her startle and wake.
‘You okay, Nick?’
‘Shh, beloved,’ I said, kissing her head. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you. Go back to sleep, my love.’
She snuggled closer to me, and I snuggled right back into her. It was heaven. I belonged here. Our family all under one roof. There is only peace.
I drifted off to sleep.
Epilogue
Abbey
Christmas Eve I woke up in his arms, as I had almost every night since he’d travelled back from Singapore to tell me he loved me. He was awake, scrolling on his phone. The Australian sun had made him significantly more tanned than he used to be, and his facial hair was longer than it normally was.
We were on holiday; we had just come back from London, where he had sold his house. It was panning out that we travelled there once every eight to twelve weeks, and it seemed to be working well. He had hired an Operations Manager for Hartwell Holdings and that allowed him to work from Sydney. He found a new Operations Manager for Delacqua too. Me.
Ollie and I were killing it, as usual. Nick bought flash new offices for himself across the road from our building and the three of us and Mike often took lunch together.
London had been bloody freezing this time around and I was happy to be home, but I loved the English capital at the same time. My house was now on the market too and, after we celebrated Christmas, we would pack it up and move to Nick’s apartment until our new place had renovated bathrooms and a fresh coat of paint.
It was bigger than we needed, and he’d spent more money than I approved of. He was insisting the money from the sale of my house should go into a trust account for Ella for university. She would need it, he said. She was going to be a doctor and he would not have her education put her in debt.
