Page 59 of A Kiss under the Stars
There’s a knowing smile on his face as he starts the engine.
‘My thoughts exactly, Lottie. Let’s go!’
CHAPTER THIRTY
It’s the following morning and Dylan is back.
He travelled up to Sunnybrook late last night, arriving justin time to see Liam as he was leaving. We chatted, the three of us, as if itwas a day like any other day – but I knew it wasn’t. The clock had ticked pastmidnight and today was going to be a very special day indeed.
Now, in the morning light, I’m standing at the window in thefreshly-painted kitchen-diner, butterflies in my stomach, my eyes fixed on thegate at the bottom of the drive. Dylan is standing at the open front door,waiting, and I can only imagine the riot of emotions running through him rightnow.
And then she appears in her little blue Fiat, motoringcautiously up the drive, and my heart gives an enormous thump.
They talked on the phone yesterday but this will be thefirst meeting of mother and son – the reunion that Dylan has longed for eversince he was that fifteen-year-old boy, left devastated and broken by the lossof both his parents.
She gets out of the car and pauses for a moment, smilingover at Dylan. Even from here, I can see she’s trying hard to hold it together asshe starts walking over. And then Dylan runs out and they meet in the middle,and my heart is so full, I can barely breathe.
For a moment, they look at each other – my big, ganglybrother, grown a foot taller than her during that missing decade. She’s tryingnot to cry.
Dylan reaches out, gently taking hold of her shoulders, andwhatever he says to her breaks down that final barrier and they fall into eachother’s arms, hugging as if they will never let go again...
I hurry to the bathroom to grab some tissue and blow mynose. Staring at my reflection in the mirror, I take some deep breaths to calmmyself. Dylan’s willingness to forgive and his uncomplicated, overwhelming joy attheir reunion is rubbing off on me.
I coped with losing her by trying my hardest to hate her.But it never really worked. It just turned me into a bitter and angry person. Butit’s time to consign all those destructive, negative emotions to the past.
The future is looking brighter than I ever imagined itwould.
I have my family back.
Smiling at myself in the mirror, I blink away the glisteningtears and hurry out, not wanting to miss a single moment of this happy familyreunion...
*****
Later that afternoon, Liam picks me up in his car and Itell him all about Mum arriving, and how we’ve been talking practicallynon-stop since she got here.
‘It was quite a wrench to leave them, actually,’ I admit.‘But I wouldn’t miss this for the world.’
Paused at some traffic lights, he pulls on the handbrake, turnsand smiles at me.
‘What?’ I look at him teasingly.
‘Nothing.’ He shrugs. ‘You make me happy, that’s all. I’m soglad we met, Lottie Fanshawe.’
A lovely warm feeling rises up inside me and my heartflutters madly. ‘Well, that’s good, Liam Westerbrook. Because I feel exactlythe same.’
He grins. ‘Even the sledgehammer didn’t put me off. I thinkI knew straight away that there was something special about you.’
‘I hated you for being right about checking it was a load-bearingwall to avert possible disaster.’
‘I know you did. That was our very first argument.’
Chuckling, I look into his smiling dark eyes and I can’tquite believe how lucky I am to have this amazing man in my life. He’s not onlygorgeous, he’s someone I can really talk to... someone who genuinelycares about me and who can make me laugh so hard sometimes that it actually hurts.
And incredibly, he seems to feel exactly the same way aboutme.
I lean over to kiss him. Then a loud honk of a horn behindus alerts us to the green light.
Laughing, we zoom off, destination the post-natal ward atthe hospital.
