Page 33 of The Geography of Happiness

“Thanks, but he isdefinitelynot my pup.” Terry shook his head. “Our house is crazy enough as it is.”

“Don’t pay him any mind, Terry.” I stared daggers at Gil. “The dipshit is just yanking your chain. He doesn’t get out much. We find it best to ignore him.”

Gil shoved me sideways. “Arsehole.”

Terry chuckled. “You know, this place gets more like home every day.”

Gil snorted, but a closer look at Terry told me the man was starting to fret. It was time to go.

“Right.” I clapped my hands. “I need to be on my way or I’ll be late to Hawthorne’s.”

“Hawthorne’s?” Gil perked up at the name. “Excellent. While you’re there, tell Helen I owe her for that salted caramel sauce recipe. It cooked up a treat. I popped a jar in here for you,” he told Terry, indicating the basket before looking back to me. “Can you wait a minute while I grab a couple more jars for you to give Helen, and I’ll throw in one for you.”

“Sure thing,” I answered, sounding as excited as I felt. “I’m never gonna say no to your cooking, mate.”

“Thanks. Won’t be a minute.” He headed back up the lawn at a run, which left Terry and me smiling at each other.

“Do you think he’s suspicious?” Terry asked, glancing back toward the homestead.

I snorted. “That man was born suspicious, but I don’t think he saw anything.”

Terry nodded. “That’s good.”

The comment stung a little even if he was right. “Well, I’ll be off then.” I glanced toward my ute. “Text you later?”

“Please. And I’ll see you off.” Terry fell in alongside, our arms jostling as we walked toward the ute.

I climbed into the driver’s seat, closed the door, and lowered the window. With the homestead on the other side, we were mostly hidden from view. I touched my fingers to his jaw, and he put his hand over top, holding them in place. “Don’t forget to have some fun,” I reminded him.

He smiled and turned his head to kiss my palm. “You’re very sweet.”

I groaned. “Please keep that to yourself. I have a reputation to uphold.”

He chuckled, then leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to my lips. “Goodbye, Doctor Thompson.” Then he stepped away from the ute and demurely folded his arms just as Gil returned at a jog, carrying a small cardboard box.

“Now don’t forget to keep one for yourself.” Gil slid the box onto the floor in front of the passenger seat. “And wish Connor good luck from us for his exams.”

“Will do, and thanks.” I started the ute and headed south along the drive away from the homestead, watching Terry in my rear-vision mirror all the way until the dust blocked my view.

I sighed and shook my head, wondering what the hell mess I was getting myself into, because there was no denying Terry O’Connor was going to be a problem for my heart. I’d never felt this ridiculous about another person. And in two fucking days. What the hell? And why? What was it aboutthisguy? Forty-two years old and for the first time in my life I thought I might be falling for someone. Falling for someone who was in town for all of a hot minute, lived fifteen hundred kilometres away, had a complicated-as-shit life, which should terrify me but for some reason didn’t, and at a time when I was supposed to be headed for a new job and new life in Adelaide.

Fuck me. I shoved my arm out the window and flipped the universe the bird. “You think you’re so damn funny, don’t you?”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Terry

“Pass. The. Towel.”Hannah’s serious training voice drew me out of my room and toward the open bathroom door where I stood in the shadows of the hall and smiled at the sight of my fully dressed daughter sitting on a footstool in the shower with her elbow crutches leaning against the tiled wall. Her attention was glued to Gabby who was busy dragging a towel from the heated rail over to where Hannah sat. Once it was in her hands, Hannah showered the dog with praise.

“Oh, what a good girl. What a good, good girl.” Hannah’s arms filled with shaggy golden retriever as she hugged Gabby tight. Two days working with Zach and her excitement for the programme hadn’t diminished one little bit.

Mymood, on the other hand, was suffering a rollercoaster of emotions—excitement to panic and everything in-between. Emotions I’d struggled to keep hidden from Judah when he’d called to quiz me about how things were going and interrupted a fun text exchange with Spencer that had stimulated a parade of less than PG images through my brain.

I’d had to feign some excuse and promise to call Judah back just so I could finish the conversation with Spencer, a conversation that had essentially been about nothing. I was clearly acting odd enough that Hannah had spent most of the time sending curious looks my way and trying to find out who I was texting. Since I hadn’t mentioned Spencer’s visit the day before, I’d simply told her it was a friend, which earned me a puzzled and slightly stung expression.

I didn’t blame her. I rarely kept secrets, but to Hannah’s credit, she didn’t resort to the usual teenage pout and sulk in response to me having any life she wasn’t fully aware of. I almost felt guilty, but I was kind of enjoying the idea of having something just for me in a week that was full of excitement for her. It was a week I’d been dreading, but it was turning out to be the best time I’d had in a long while.

Later that night when we’d finished dinner, I’d satisfied Judah’s curiosity, Hannah was in bed, and I called Spencer back and we talked on the phone for an hour. We told each other about our day, and he had me in fits of laughter, recounting the story of Hawthorne’s cow standing on his foot. It had taken three of them to push her off, and he was currently on his couch with an ice bag on his bruised foot and “couldn’t I pretty please just pop over and kiss it better for him?”

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