Epilogue
Epilogue
Gwen
A year…and a bit…later
Every law of geometry had been broken to squeeze the Christmas tree into the corner of Cat’s living room. Noah called it “Ooge.” Barely a speck of green peeked through the twinkle of lights and baubles and tinsel.
So. Much. Tinsel.
“Oi! Gwen!” Toby huffed. “Stop getting distracted by that stupid twig and judge the winner already!”
I tore my attention away from the Christmas tree and the brightly wrapped gifts tumbling around its bottom like an avalanche.
Toby scrambled. Puffing out his chest, he popped his fists on his hips and stuck his nose in the air Superman-style—if Superman were posing in a red knitted sweater with white pom-poms of woolly snow floating around a wonky snowman.
Beside him, Liam was no less hungry for the win, wearing the almost identical navy version. He folded his arms, a glare sliding to Toby from the corner of his eye.
I sighed.
Cat had lovingly toiled for hours knitting sweaters for “all her boys,” but frankly, they both looked ridiculous.
“It’s boiling outside,” I said, stalling for time. These battles always ended with pouting. “Do we really have to do this nonsense?”
Toby spluttered, “Nonsense?”
At the same time, Liam barked, “Obviously.”
I rolled my eyes. “Does everything have to be a competition between you two?”
“Yes!” they snapped.
Toby flexed his bicep. “See that, doll?” He grinned at me. “Those muscles are all yours if you say my sweater looks the best.”
“ Oh là là .” I fanned my face. “Well, in that case, I declare the winner of this year’s sweater-off is…” I wiggled my eyebrows. “Toby.”
Toby’s whoop of victory drowned out Liam’s indignant scoff.
“Hell, yeah!” Toby tackled me in a bear hug, my feet disappearing off the ground as he swung me around.
“Winner, winner, chicken dinner!” His lips crashed onto mine, and after leaving me completely breathless from his deep kiss, he pulled back with a sly grin.
“Wanna sneak up to the bathroom and recreate history?”
Embarrassment burned a fiery trail up my neck. “Toby!” I darted a look over his shoulder to make sure Liam had already slunk off to lick his wounds. I puffed out a relieved breath. The living room was empty except for the monstrosity of a tree.
Toby’s big palm squeezed my butt. “Yes, my Gwen?”
“Twenty people are outside!”
“We’ll need to be quiet then.”
I swatted his shoulder. “Absolutely not.”
“You wanna get loud? Naughty. I’m totally open to th—”
“No!”
“Later?”
“At home .”
“Done deal!” He pecked a kiss on the tip of my nose, but before he pulled back, he squeezed the breath right out of me again in another hug. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
“No backsies?”
“Never.”
Smiling, Toby held out his hand. “If I can’t tempt you to join me in the bathroom, may I escort you back to the Christmas festivities, my lady?”
I laced my fingers through his. “You may.”
We rounded the corner just as Tanya lunged for the drinks tray Cat offered around the room. She chugged down a glass of champagne in one gulp and grabbed another.
Toby’s brows shot up.
“There are way too many freaking kids here,” Tanya explained.
A horn tooted.
She’d barely managed to trip out of the way as the kiddie-sized jeep zoomed past. Noah was a speed demon, and no one was going to stop him from trying to get that jeep airborne.
He blasted the horn again, and Alfie Rawles melted into a fit of giggles in the seat beside him as they shot out of the dining room, onto the patio, and hooned across the grass.
Tanya’s jaw dropped in horror. “What maniac bought those two a car?”
Toby stuffed his hands in his pockets and started whistling.
“I should have known.” She shook her head and gulped the champagne. “I think I’m officially in hell.”
Toby grinned. “Still not maternal, huh?”
“I wonder why?” she scoffed.
Toby’s smile wobbled at the edges. “Did you, uh…” His shoulder lifted. “End up seeing Mum?”
He snuck a cautious look at me but shouldn’t have worried. I looped my arm around his waist and tugged him close. My husband couldn’t help having a big heart—and he’d done everything he’d promised.
Sarah Sullivan had never darkened our doorstep again.
One of my last duties as trustee of the Sullivan family fortune had been to sign on the dotted line and revoke the trust once and for all.
Tanya had only accepted one of the properties as a nest egg, and except for the rainy-day fund she’d insisted we keep aside for Noah, everything else had been sold off. The money had been donated to charity.
The only strange request was when Toby had asked me to sign over that bloody strip club—The Red Room—to Liam.
The reaction that followed had floored me. Liam’s surprise had been downplayed by a dismissive wave and a half-hearted refusal, but there was no mistaking his watery blink once the title deed was in his hands. Owning that club meant the world to him.
“I didn’t bother seeing Mum this year,” Tanya was saying.
“I offered to drop by, but she bleated on and on about how I’d abandoned her to squalor.
Our dear mother is probably the only person who thinks my old place in Concord qualifies as squalor, but…
whatever. She made her bed. She’s got her pension, and that apartment is still more generous than she deserves. ”
“Way more,” Toby grumbled.
“Actually, I did run into that hoity-toity friend of hers at the shops. Mina? Mila?” Tanya mimed a cone over her head. “The one with the hair.”
Toby made a face. “What did that old crow have to say?”
Tanya’s lips curved around the top of the champagne glass before she took another sip.
“What?” he prompted.
“Our mother has resorted to online dating. Can you believe it? She’s been trying to land herself husband number two. I think she was inspired by our old acquaintance.”
My eyebrow arched. “Kayleigh?”
“I mean, the girl did land herself quite the millionaire,” Tanya said. “Her parents shipping her off to England to dodge the stalking charges had quite the unexpected outcome.”
Toby’s face only scrunched up even more. “The guy’s like a hundred years old! I wouldn’t want a wrinkly old man with a beer belly anywhere near my”—he circled a hand around his groin—“you know. Gross .”
“Good riddance to the little witch.” Tanya grinned as she sipped her champagne. “I hope she lives miserably ever after with that old geezer dry humping her into his grave.”
Smiling, I left the siblings chatting between themselves and weaved my way through the steady stream of guests.
On my way to the pool, I wandered past Marnie and Romeo tucked in a darkened corner, his kisses pecking lazily up her neck, and Italian words murmured against her skin.
She caught sight of me and wiggled her eyebrows.
Yeah, yeah. The man was smitten with her.
She was living her best dysfunctional life.
After I wrestled Noah out of his jeep and into his swimmers and floaties, I relaxed with my feet dangling into the pool as he splashed about with John and Alfie to burn off his never-ending toddler energy.
Toby bomb-dived into the pool a few minutes later.
He swam to the side, pushed back the wet flop of his hair, and only demanded one sloppy kiss before I disappeared back inside.
Elias was busy in the kitchen. He’d avoided all the Christmas cheer by reading in the study until Maree had ducked her head in to ask for help preparing lunch. It was good to hear him laughing for once as they peeled prawns for one of Cat’s platters.
Cat, of course, was in heaven. She hadn’t stopped smiling since we’d arrived.
Her life’s wish had been answered—her home was full of laughter and children.
Even if the little ones weren’t her own, she treated them all like they were the most precious gifts on earth.
She was never too busy to stop and give a cuddle.
“Eli!” Cat called out. “Help me with this other table.”
He hurried to wash up, and after wiping his hands dry on a tea towel covered in gingerbread men, he raced behind her to drag in the little table. It usually had pride of place in the playroom Cat had set up for Noah, but this was a special occasion.
Josie stopped twirling on the grass and watched with suspicious eyes as Cat tucked the table and its tiny matching chairs into place.
“Mama Cat.” Josie crept closer. Her faithful companion, Morag, dragged along the ground behind her. “What dat?”
Cat was all smiles. “This, my sweet little ballerina, is where you’ll sit for lunch today.” She flapped out a fresh red tablecloth and laid it over the top.
Josie’s eyes flicked to the oversized dining table where her mother sat perched on Zach’s knee and then back again. She was clever. She put two and two together almost immediately.
“Don’t wanna sit at the baby table with the babies !” Josie’s lip curled. “I’m a big girl!”
“Yes, you are,” Cat said smoothly. “That’s why I’ve given you the very important job of keeping a close watch on those rascally boys.”
Something wicked glinted in Josie’s dark eyes. She bent down to the doll cradled in her arms. “Hear dat, Morag?” she said. “We in charge.”
Zach’s wife giggled into his neck.
“You’re going to regret that,” Zach said with a wink, rubbing an affectionate hand over the barely-there bump rounding Eden’s belly. Number three was on the way. “JoJo takes being in charge very seriously.”
“Do you?” Cat asked the little girl.
Toeing the ground with her red sequin shoe, Josie nodded earnestly.
“Well, in that case, you and Morag better help me lay out the cutlery,” Cat said. “That is the most important job of all…”
Happiness sparkled in every direction.
Two years ago, a near miss on the highway had set off a chain reaction that had entwined the fates crowding the house not far from the beaches of Bondi. Yet, when I scanned the smiling faces, one was missing.