TWENTY-THREE
Twenty-three
Things started moving fast once Craig was given the okay to come home. Ramps had been rapidly built for the wheelchair access he would still be needing for a good while yet, and there were renovations to the bathroom and changes to the bedroom. Bel helped Emma as much as she could, taking on the painting and whatever else needed doing before Craig’s arrival. Underneath the excitement, there was an air of apprehension lingering. For Emma, Bel suspected it came from worrying over how her family was going to adapt to this new dynamic, and maybe even how their marriage would change.
Bel knew nothing would ever break the two of them up—there had never been a more perfect couple created—but life as they knew it had been shaken to its core, and things were bound to have changed.
For Bel, the apprehension came from the knowledge that she could no longer put off facing her own dilemma—what did she want to do with the rest of her life?
Her concern about giving Bert his notice had thankfully resolved itself when his son had called her, asking to terminate the lease. The fall had impacted Bert’s ability to live alone and the family had decided he should move closer to them. Bel assured his son she didn’t want him to pay out the remaining time on the lease; she was just relieved she didn’t have evict an elderly man.
She should have been happy that everything seemed to be falling into place. Her house was now vacant, which gave her somewhere to move so she could get out of Emma and Craig’s hair, but she found herself inexplicably annoyed. It felt like the universe was trying to funnel her in a certain direction when she wasn’t even sure she wanted to go that way, which made no sense at all.
‘My offer still stands. Move in here, with me,’ Dean said after they’d finished dinner and were sitting on his couch half-watching a reality show one night.
Her heart thudded a little more heavily against her ribs at his words. Part of her desperately wanted to accept, but another part of her was remembering the parallels between this situation and the Tate disaster, which she’d first seen that night at Glentoberon with her family. A flutter of panic began to rise again, dulling the excitement.
‘You don’t want to,’ he surmised after the silence stretched between them a little too long.
A small throb began to build behind her temples, and she massaged her fingers against them. ‘I’ve been putting off figuring out what I want to do ever since I got back here. Now, suddenly, there’s all this pressure to make a decision.’
‘But you’ve liked being back here?’
‘I have.’ She’d found herself seeing her hometown through new eyes and falling in love with it, maybe for the first time. Growing up in a place, you sometimes took it for granted, and never really learned to appreciate it as outsiders did. Coming back, she’d realised how special this town really was.
‘You can’t deny that these last few months, taking care of the kids and being together … it’s been good. Right?’
‘It’s been great,’ she said, smiling gently.
He gave a slight nod. ‘I don’t want that to end. I want kids of my own … with you.’ He held her gaze steadily.
She knew he did, and it scared her that, deep down, she wanted the same thing. Only …
‘No,’ she blurted nervously. She shifted on the couch and moved away, getting to her feet. ‘I can’t. I don’t know anything about being a mother.’ All of a sudden, everything felt claustrophobic, like the walls were beginning to close in.
She saw confusion slide over his face. He stood up and opened his hands, palms up, inviting her to explain. ‘You’ve been awesome with those kids. You’d make an amazing mum. We made a great team.’
‘But it wasn’t real ,’ she stressed. Just like her stupid manifesting list of her perfect man hadn’t been real. ‘We were just playing happy families. It wasn’t reality. Before all this happened, I was starting to live my own life. I had a business that was flourishing, that I’d been working hard to build.’
‘You can still have your business. You said it yourself, you can work from anywhere.’
‘You don’t get it. I’m back where I started. I was supposed to leave and do something with my life … but here I am, back in Wessex.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with Wessex. Coming back doesn’t mean you’ve failed.’
‘It doesn’t mean I’ve succeeded either.’
Dean stepped back. ‘I’m sorry this town isn’t enough for you. That I’m not enough for you.’
His words hit her with unexpected force, but not enough to make her take back what she’d said. She wasn’t even sure what it was she was feeling—her emotions were jumbled and chaotic. She needed some space and time to try to sort through them. ‘I can’t do this right now.’
‘Okay,’ he said, sounding almost defeated, which made her feel even sadder. ‘Let me know when you can.’ It was impossible to miss the sarcasm, but she knew that underneath it he was hurt.
Bel blinked rapidly as she stared through the beams of her headlights on the narrow road back towards Emma’s. Everything was unravelling.
Craig’s welcome home was set to be as heartwarming as a welcome home could get. The kids had slaved for days over a huge W ELCOME HOME , D ADDY banner and enough cards to put a Hallmark display to shame. The chook pen had had its final coat of paint and was ready for its grand unveiling. Emma had returned to Sydney two days earlier to bring him home, and the house was alive with anticipation.
It had been three days since Bel had seen Dean and so far nothing had been resolved. Part of her wanted to call him and say yes to all his crazy ideas—yes, she wanted to move in with him and yes, she wanted to have his babies—but another part kept throwing up reminders of her past mistakes, the disasters that had resulted from listening to her heart instead of her head. All those stupid giddy feelings she’d had with Tate and the way she’d been so sure he was the manifested man of her dreams. What an idiot . She couldn’t trust those kinds of emotions when making a life-altering decision. This was too important to mess up.
Bel heard Jack barking at an approaching vehicle and knew even before the kids’ announcement that Dean had arrived. Although she’d braced herself to see him, her pulse still gave a little leap of excitement when he appeared at the front door. Proof of how much she let her hormones influence her judgement, she tried to tell herself. Still, a rush of sadness flooded through her when he looked at her before quickly turning away and beginning to play with the kids.
When the next car pulled up, everything the kids had been practising for the big surprise was forgotten. Instead, all four of them ran outside, down the new ramp Dean had built, and circled the car like a school of excited sharks.
Emma and Bel had taken them to see their dad after he’d been transferred to rehab and, as children did, they had absorbed it all with beguiling innocence. Not afraid to ask the questions adults probably wouldn’t pose up front, the kids had quickly and completely accepted that this was still their dad and got on with their business. The only thing they really cared about was the fact they missed their father. And now he was finally home.
It was both sobering and heart-wrenching to watch the kids taking in this new version of their dad at home, where he’d always been so capable and strong. They’d been talking about this moment ever since the accident, and Emma had been preparing them the last few weeks for when Daddy would come home and how different things were going to be, but nothing could truly prepare them.
Bel watched as Emma went to the back of the car to retrieve the stowed wheelchair, which Dean effortlessly lifted out, setting it up under Emma’s instructions and bringing it to his friend’s door.
Craig positioned himself carefully, with Dean supporting the chair, and slid from the car to the chair smoothly, if a little slowly. He declined Dean’s offer to push, taking over with a smile for his kids, who, after a brief hesitation, were jumping around the chair excitedly, wanting a ride.
‘Come on, you lot,’ Emma said, gathering them to her with a smile. ‘Give Dad some room and let him catch his breath.’
‘Can we have a go later, Daddy?’ Ivy asked. In typical kid fashion, they didn’t see the chair as an intrusion, but as another form of transportation they could master, like a quad or a farm bike.
Craig chuckled. ‘Sure, kiddo. Later,’ he said with a gentle smile.
It was almost like old times. Craig was maybe a little quieter than he used to be, and his speech was noticeably slower, but he looked better than when Bel had last seen him, on the visit with the kids. He looked healthier, his body having gradually recovered from its initial deterioration. He seemed happy to be home. She knew from Emma he’d suffered terribly with bouts of depression, but he’d worked through that and come out the other side a lot more positive than Bel had been expecting. She was glad she could move back to Gran’s, at least until she figured out what she wanted to do. The family needed their own space to reconnect and adjust to their new life.
Her gaze turned to Dean and she gave a small sigh, which Emma heard, thanks to her uncanny ability to always appear at the most inconvenient time.
‘What’s going on with you and Dean?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Sure. That’s why he’s moping about over there and you’re on the other side of the room, looking like you just lost your best friend.’
‘He wasn’t thrilled about me moving back into Gran’s.’
‘How come?’
‘He wanted me to move in with him.’
‘And why aren’t you?’
‘Because I … don’t know if that’s what I want to do.’
‘You two have been practically inseparable ever since you got back. Why would you have to think about it?’
‘Maybe I want to do something else other than settle down and have kids.’
‘He wants to have kids with you?’
‘Would you keep your voice down?’ Bel said with a scowl.
‘And you need to think about it?’ Emma continued, doubtfully.
‘Emma, I came home right when everything was beginning to take off. I want to keep making a career for myself. I never planned to come back and get married and have a bunch of kids.’
‘You might not have planned it, but is it really so bad that it could be an option?’
‘It’s not bad,’ Bel started, then made a frustrated sound in her throat. ‘I just don’t want to be pressured into making a decision like that. He surprised me.’
‘But you are thinking about it?’ Emma probed.
‘I don’t know,’ Bel snapped, then felt bad. ‘I don’t want to end up in another situation like the one I was in with Tate. Like I don’t have any control.’ Why couldn’t anyone else understand this? ‘I need some space to figure out my options.’
‘I get that you might be worried, I do, honestly. But Dean is not Tate.’
‘I know,’ Bel conceded wearily. ‘It’s the situation, not the guy, that feels the same.’
‘You aren’t the person you were back then either. You were wishing for something exciting to happen in your life and Tate suddenly appeared and you ran with it. You aren’t like that now.’
‘What if I still want adventure and excitement?’
Emma gave a small smile. ‘I don’t think you’d be lacking in excitement being around Dean every day. I’ve seen how you light up when he walks in the room, and I know I’ve never seen that man happier in the whole time I’ve known him. Sometimes, the excitement and adventure are found in the little everyday things. You just have to know where to look for them.’
Bel thought over Emma’s words as she left the party early, saying her goodbyes and slipping out without speaking to Dean. Yes, she felt like a coward, but she’d barely slept and she was definitely not in possession of the kind of emotional fortitude she’d be needing when she spoke to him again.
Bel had been cleaning since coming back from the welcome-home party and it was now dark. The beauty of having rented the house out furnished was that nothing had needed to be stored, other than her personal items, which she’d kept in the shed. After a bit of a clean, everything felt like home again. Only … not quite. Even home, despite looking the same, didn’t feel quite the same. Like it too had somehow moved on and changed in some infinitesimal way.
She put down the last box she’d carried in from the shed and opened it to find the remaining bits and pieces from her bedroom. After a brief hesitation, she removed the pink and gold hardcover journal that sat on top. She ran her fingers across the beautifully embossed cover and felt a strange tingle moving through her fingers. Opening the book, she found the torn-out page and let out a fatalistic sigh at the title: ‘My Soulmate List’.
It had been nearly two years since she’d sat down to write her list, pouring her heart into that one desperate wish to find her soulmate. What a disaster that had turned out to be.
Against her better judgement, she allowed her gaze to skim over the handwritten list, bracing for the disappointment to emerge. At first glance, the requests she’d made seemed simple enough … even if she’d had the fictional character of Jax Lexington in mind when she’d written them out. Only she hadn’t gotten Jax; instead, she’d gotten Tate. After allowing a brief interlude of self-pity, though, Bel felt an unexpected calmness settle around her.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as she sat in thoughtful reflection, and she reviewed the list once more, a lot more slowly this time. Her heart began being in a weird, out-of-kilter rhythm.
Brave. Tate hadn’t done anything that could be called bravery. Jax could parachute from a plane and rescue a socialite heiress from a kidnapper in South America. Pretty extreme. And yet, there was Dean, snake handling and willingly putting himself in danger—being part of the RFS and SES to help others in need? That was brave.
Chiselled jaw. It had been one of the first things she’d noticed about Tate, but an image of Dean’s strong jawline, emphasised by the sexy stubble he now preferred, flashed through her mind.
Intelligent . Tate had obviously come from a good school and he had a degree in management. Listening to him explain his job, though, had bored her silly within minutes, while listening to Dean talk about farming and how technical the whole thing was nowadays had really impressed her.
Someone who understands me . Tate didn’t have a clue about what made her tick, not even with all the time they’d spent together. Not once had he ever asked what was important to her, what she was passionate about. But she and Dean had talked about their dreams for hours. She knew that he wanted to expand his crops within the next few seasons and was excited to experiment with regen farming. He knew about her love of reading and how important books had always been to her, and how much she valued her newfound independence with her business.
Loves excitement … hero qualities . Tate had played the chivalrous hero at the cocktail party, saving her from an embarrassing wardrobe malfunction, but when it came to real hero qualities, there hadn’t been many of those. Dean, on the other hand, was a man who was out on the front line when his community needed him. The guy had committed break and enter to return a rooster to the museum … for her. It didn’t get much more exciting than that. He really had been not only her hero but a hero to the kids as well, building the chook pen of their dreams, stepping in to be the father figure they’d needed while their own had been fighting to regain his life. Not to mention helping her bake biscuits …
Handsome . Tate had certainly been that, in a skin-deep way. Dean, meanwhile, may never be on the cover of a romance novel, but her heart fluttered every time she saw him. He was compassionate and caring. He would do anything for his friends and loved ones and that made him even more attractive.
Beautiful eyes . She had a memory of Dean’s green-grey eyes as they stared down into hers, caught by the glimmer of moonlight as it shone through the bedroom window …
The book fell from her fingers. How could I have been so blind?
She’d been so sure back then that it had been Tate. Tall, handsome, charismatic Tate, who had come along and swept her off her feet. She’d been so fixated on finding her very own Jax Lexington that she’d allowed herself to see only the parts of Tate that appeared to be like Jax. And if they hadn’t been there, she’d somehow either ignored them or forced him to fit into this image of the man she’d thought she wanted.
And this entire time, he’d been right here under her nose. She’d been a complete idiot.
It wasn’t Tate. It had never been Tate. She had manifested the man of her dreams—and he’d come back to town after years of being away.
She’d manifested Dean.
No drive had ever invoked this quantity of nervous butterflies in Bel’s stomach. Her mind had been rehearsing a million different ways to explain the chaos that had been unfolding within her ever since she’d made the connection a mere two hours earlier.
It had suddenly become clear why Tate hadn’t worked out. Rushing into things with him had been the dumbest thing she’d ever done, yet maybe that had been part of the universe’s grand plan too; some vital lesson in life she’d apparently needed to learn.
The lack of trust she had in her own judgement because of her previous decisions suddenly cleared up. She could trust her heart. Falling for Tate had never been about her heart—it was simply a hard experience she had to undergo in order to recognise what real love was supposed to feel like when it eventually showed up. It was supposed to feel like Dean.
She’d paced her bedroom floor anxiously before coming to the only logical decision: she needed to tell him she’d been foolishly focused on all the wrong things.
Now, she sat in the car in his driveway, gathering her courage. The outside floodlight came on as she walked towards the house, then the front door opened and Dean appeared in the doorway.
‘Bel?’ His surprise proved he’d obviously been expecting anyone but her. ‘What’s happened? Are you okay?’
She almost smiled at his immediate concern, only she feared she might vomit due to the sudden nausea she was feeling as her nerves rolled about in the pit of her stomach. ‘I’m fine. I should have called,’ she started, then wondered why the hell she hadn’t simply called him. Too late to go back now. ‘I was unpacking at Gran’s.’ She stopped once more. Don’t tell him about all the woo-woo stuff. ‘I made this list,’ she blurted, and immediately groaned inwardly.
‘A list?’ he echoed, obviously still trying to work out if she really was okay.
‘That’s not really important right now,’ she said quickly. ‘The thing is … I thought I knew what I wanted. And, it turned out, I had no idea what I actually need .’
‘And what is it you need?’
Bel swallowed and let out a shaky breath. Just say it. ‘You,’ she said softly. ‘I want to be here with you.’
She watched as his shoulders almost sagged in relief and his face lost its guarded expression, melting into a smile. He reached out and she immediately stepped into his embrace.
‘I’m sorry I’ve been acting like such a moron. I’m clearly a slow learner,’ she said, and she could almost picture her guardian angels nodding their heads in agreement.
‘You’re perfect,’ he said, pulling back slightly to look down at her. ‘You’ve always been perfect to me—glasses, no glasses. Comfy jeans or model-like glamour. I love all of you. I always have.’
Bel swallowed over a hard lump of emotion. Someone seriously needed to write this man into a romance novel of his own—a love story about real people and real love. ‘I love you too. Anyone who could have put up with the amount of indecisive crap I’ve been throwing at you lately is definitely worth holding onto.’
‘If that’s as bad as things get, I reckon we’ll be okay,’ he said with a grin before kissing her. ‘Let’s go and get your stuff first thing tomorrow. I don’t want you changing your mind on me.’
‘No need. I brought it all with me, it’s out in the car,’ she said, grinning as his eyes crinkled and his smile grew wider. ‘I wasn’t planning on changing my mind.’
She’d always thought she’d known what home had felt like, but not until this very moment had she realised the real meaning of the word. And she had finally arrived.