Rising Stars & It Started With… Collections. Кейт Хьюит
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avoid, and we’ll see how I go with Harry…’
‘You could have told me!’
‘I tried,’ Dominic said. ‘You didn’t want to discuss it—remember? I’ll be back on Monday and we can talk properly then.’ He looked at his watch. ‘I’m going to have to get going soon. This is one plane I can’t miss.’
She lay in bed and stared up at the ceiling, tried to take in what he was saying. A month…
A month to get to know Harry, to see how they went, and then…She was happy, happier than she had ever felt possible, but it felt like a test. Then he turned around and maybe she should compromise too.
‘I could ask Mum and Dad to come over.’ She was torn. ‘If you want me to come tonight…’
‘I think Harry needs a couple of nights in his new bed, don’t you?’
And she was so glad that he understood.
‘I have to get back.’ He smiled. ‘Would it wake Harry if I had a shower?’
‘Don’t worry about that.’ And she had a moment of panic, because Harry was being golden and sleeping now, but what about at two a.m. when he decided to wake up, what about when it was six p.m. and her mother hadn’t picked him up from crèche? How would Dominic deal with those situations? She wasn’t sure she was ready for this, not convinced she was up to exposing her heart just to have Dominic change his mind. ‘I’ll get you some towels.’
‘Could you pass my trousers?’ he asked as she climbed out of bed. ‘Oh, and can you get out my phone?’ He snapped his fingers as she trawled through his pockets, which was something Bridgette decided they would work on. Sexy Spaniard he may be, and in a rush for his brother’s party perhaps, but she didn’t answer to finger snaps. ‘I can’t find it and don’t snap your fingers again,’ she warned him. ‘Hold on, here it is.’ Except it wasn’t his phone. Instead she pulled out a little black box.
‘That’s what I meant.’ He grinned. ‘So, aren’t you going to open it?’
Bridgette was honestly confused. She opened the box and there was a ring. A ring that looked as if they were talking about a whole lot more than a month.
‘I thought we were going to take some time…’
‘We are,’ Dominic said. ‘To get to know all the stuff and to work things out, but, compatible or not, there’s no arguing from me.’ He pulled her over to the bed. ‘I love you.’ He looked at her and to this point he still didn’t know. ‘And I hope that you love me?’
She had to think for a moment, because she had held on so firmly to her heart that she hadn’t allowed herself to go there. And now she did. She looked at the man who was certainly the only man who could have taken her to his home that first night. She really was lousy at one-night stands, because she knew deep down she had loved him even then.
‘If I say it,’ she said, ‘you can’t change your mind.’
‘I won’t.’ That much he knew. She was funny and kind and terribly disorganised too—there was nothing he might have thought he needed on his list for the perfect wife, but she was everything that was now required.
‘How do you know?’ she asked.
‘I’m not sure…’ Dominic mused. ‘Chemistry, I guess,’ he said.
‘And Chris?’ she said as he pulled her back to bed and put his ring on her finger. She realised the magnitude of what he was giving up.
‘He’ll be fine.’ Dominic had thought about it a lot and was sure, because of something Tony had said. He should have thanked Tony, not the other way around, for far better a full plate than an empty one. He didn’t want to be like his father, hitting golf balls into the sky at weekends, a perfect girlfriend waiting at home, with not a single problem. ‘I’ll go up at least once a month and he can come here some weekends. If I’m working you might have to…’ He looked at her and she nodded.
‘Of course.’
‘We’ll get there,’ he said. ‘You’re it and I know you’ll do just fine without me, but better with me.’ He looked at eyes that weren’t so guarded, eyes that no longer reflected hurt, and it felt very nice to be with someone you knew, but not quite, someone you would happily spend a lifetime knowing some more. ‘And I’m certainly better with you.’
‘Hey!’ There was a very loud shout from down the hall. ‘Hey!’ came the voice again.
‘Oh, no.’ Bridgette lay back on the pillow as Harry completely broke the moment. ‘Those bloody grommets. It’s as if he’s suddenly found his voice.’
Harry had found his voice and he knew how to use it! ‘Hey,’ Harry shouted again from behind his closed door. It was a sort of mixture between ‘Harry’ and ‘Hello’ and ‘Have you forgotten me?’
‘I’ll get him.’ Bridgette peeled back the sheet, liking the big sparkle on her finger as she did so.
‘If you say you love me, I’ll go and get him,’ Dominic said, and pulled on his trousers, deciding he had to be at least half-respectable as he walked in on the little guy.
‘If you go and it doesn’t make you change your mind—’ Bridgette grinned, knowing what he would find ‘—I’ll say it then.’
It was the longest walk of his life.
He’d just put a ring on a woman’s finger. Shouldn’t they be sipping champagne, booking a restaurant, hell, in some five-star hotel having sex, not getting up to a baby?
But with him and Bridgette it was all just a little bit back to front and he’d better get used to the idea.
He pushed open the door.
‘Hey!’ Angry eyes met him, and so did the smell. Angry eyes asked him how dared he take so long, leave him sitting in this new bed that he wasn’t sure how to get out of?
‘This isn’t how it’s supposed to be, Harry,’ Dominic said, because surely it should be a sweet, cherubic baby sitting there smiling at him, but it was an angry Harry with a full nappy. The newly engaged Dominic had to change the first nappy in his life and, yes, it was shocking, a real baptism of fire!
‘Think of all the cruises I won’t be going on,’ Dominic said as he tried to work out all the tabs, ‘all the sheer irresponsibility I’m missing…’
‘Hey!’ Harry said, liking his clean bottom and new word.
‘Hey,’ Dominic answered
And then he picked him up.
A bare chest, a toddler who was still a baby and a mass of curls against his chin, and it was inevitable—he didn’t just love Bridgette, he loved Harry too. For the second time in twenty minutes he handed over his heart and it was terrifying.
He would never tell, but he thought he was crying. Maybe he was because Harry’s fat hands were patting his cheeks. He could never tell Bridgette that he was terrified too.
That the phone might ring.
That there might be a knock on the door.
That Courtney might come back.
That this little guy might have to be returned too soon.
‘I’ll make this work.’ He looked into the little grey eyes that had always been wary and saw the trust in them now. ‘I will make this work,’ Dominic said again, and his commitment was as solid as the diamond he had placed on Bridgette’s finger—his promise to Harry would cut glass if it had to, it was that strong. ‘It will all be okay.’
He walked back into the bedroom with a sweet-smelling Harry and did a double-take as he saw his previously sexy fiancée in bright orange flannelette pyjama bottoms and a T-shirt.
‘Don’t want him