Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Xander woke the next day and smiled to see Immy wrapped in his arms as she lay on his chest. He couldn’t be any happier right now. He had pushed this away for so long after Brook had died but now it was all he wanted.
Immy stirred and he kissed her head.
‘No more sex,’ Immy muttered. ‘I’m all orgasmed out.’
He laughed. It had got a bit heated the night before once they came back from the restaurant.
He’d pretty much ravished her once they got through the door, and again later on the sofa and again once they made it to the bed.
It was probably a good thing Etta was back later that day, Immy probably needed a bit of a rest from his insatiable demands.
While he still intended to make love to Immy quietly in his bed once Etta had gone to sleep, he obviously wouldn’t be able to do it all over the house any more.
Xander leaned over to grab his phone to see what time it was. It was just past eight, so still relatively early. He was about to put his phone back down, ignoring all messages, when he noticed that one of them was from Margaret, Etta’s nan. He quickly opened and read it, then cursed.
‘Etta’s on her way back.’
Immy sat up. ‘Now?’
‘Yes, I thought we’d have at least some of the day together before they got bored of her.
They always do this and I hate how it must make Etta feel.
’ He climbed out of bed and started getting dressed.
‘They play the doting grandparents very well, always buying her gifts and clothes, but when it comes to actually spending time with her, they always seem to let her down. They promise to take her for the weekend and then cancel at the last minute. They’ll take her out for the day but bring her back after a few hours.
Etta always says she has a nice time with them, they give her copious amounts of ice cream or cake or sweets and they watch movies or go to nice places. ’
He threw on his jeans. ‘I suppose she’s always been at that age where she doesn’t have a great concept of time so probably doesn’t understand that she’s been brought back early but lately she’s starting to realise.
Last time she asked me if she had been naughty and that was why her grandparents had brought her back so early.
I had to make up some excuse that they had some appointment they’d forgotten about but, the truth is, they just aren’t children people.
I don’t think they know how to engage with her beyond giving her cakes or sweets, or sitting her down in front of the TV to watch kids’ films or TV programmes.
Maybe that’s why Brook turned out to be so anti-children too, because she didn’t get the love she needed when she was little.
But I suppose it’s nice that they try – my own parents couldn’t care less. ’
‘I’m sorry it’s like that. Your parents don’t know what they’re missing by not being in your life. And I totally appreciate it’s a tricky situation with Brook’s parents, you want her to have a relationship with them but you don’t want her to get hurt.’
‘No, especially after what happened with her mum.’
Immy started getting dressed. ‘Do you want me to go?’
He frowned. ‘No, absolutely not.’
‘But what about Etta?’
‘She knows you. She’s been to your sweet shop enough times and sees you at family events. I think she likes you.’
Immy smiled at that. ‘The feeling is very mutual, she’s an easy girl to love. But how do you think Brook’s parents will feel about me being here?’
‘Well they will have to get used to it, as you’ll be here a lot more often from here on in.’
‘But it has only been eighteen months since Brook died, they might think you’re moving on too soon.’
‘They know that Etta probably isn’t mine, at least biologically.
It was something I never wanted to discuss with anyone, least of all them.
But they came to me shortly after Brook had died and asked if I planned to keep Etta as they were worried if I didn’t what would happen to her.
They said they had very busy lives and couldn’t possibly accommodate a child.
I told them of course I would, she’s my daughter, and the look they gave each other spoke volumes.
I asked them if they knew and they said Brook had told them before we got married that she thought Nick was Etta’s father.
They also knew that she’d been seeing him for years behind my back.
They can’t possibly expect me to stay loyal to her after that. ’
‘I guess not, but grief is a funny thing. Even despite them knowing their daughter was far from perfect, they will still grieve over her and put her on a pedestal. They might not take kindly to this.’ Immy paused. ‘Will you tell them about the baby?’
‘I think I’ll have to. It won’t be long before you start to show and I don’t want them to find out accidentally. We’ll see if it’s appropriate today when they arrive. Maybe you can take Etta out to play in the garden and I can have a little chat with them.’
‘OK, if you think that’s best.’
‘I’m not sure what’s best to be honest. I don’t want to lie to anyone. And I’m excited about our baby. I want to be excited, I don’t want to have to keep it a secret.’
She smiled and moved over to him and gave him a hug. ‘I’m happy about this too and I’m excited to share it with people. Although I haven’t even told my sister yet.’
‘We’ll tell her together, when she gets back from her holiday.’
‘It might not wait that long. Now your brothers know, Quinn will find out very quickly.’
‘Then we tell them tonight.’ He heard a car pull up outside. He looked out the window to see it was Tom and Margaret’s car. ‘But let’s deal with this first.’
The doorbell rang and Xander buzzed them in. There was a thunder of feet as Etta charged upstairs and the steady clomp of Margaret and Tom walking slowly up the stairs too, before Etta arrived back in the lounge.
‘Daddy!’ Etta said, throwing her arms around him happily.
He swung her up in his arms and held her tight. God he loved this little girl so much. That love hadn’t changed when he found out the truth. She was his daughter and nothing would ever change that.
Margaret and Tom arrived in the lounge just as Etta spotted Immy.
‘Immy!’ She wriggled to get down and then ran over to give Immy a big hug. She loved hugging people. Whenever they had the big Christmas Day family lunch, she’d spend half an hour going round hugging every family member, even ones she hadn’t seen for a year or more. ‘What are you doing here?’
Immy knelt down to hug her and then pulled back to talk to her. ‘There was a fire in my shop and I can’t go back to my flat until someone comes out to look at the shop and says it’s safe for me to return. So your daddy said I could stay here for a few days.’
Etta’s face fell. ‘There was a fire in the shop?’
‘Yes, a small one,’ Immy reassured her, even if it wasn’t exactly true.
‘But what about all the sweets?’ Etta said, as mournfully as if she’d been told a bunch of puppies had sadly died.
Immy suppressed a smirk. ‘The sweets won’t be OK to eat any more, but I’ll get new ones once we can fix the shop. And your uncles have very kindly offered to help me get the shop back to normal.’
Etta nodded then her eyes fell on Jacob and everything else was forgotten. ‘Jacob’s here!’
She charged over to a sleeping Jacob who woke up and wagged his tail happily as Etta doted on him with strokes and belly rubs.
Xander turned round to address Etta’s grandparents. ‘Did you have a good weekend?’
‘Yes, we had a lovely time,’ Margaret said. ‘Sorry we had to bring her back early, we forgot we had plans today.’
Xander nodded. They both knew that was a lie but he wasn’t going to challenge them on it, certainly not in front of Etta. It was good for her to have some kind of grandparent relationship, even if it was a slightly rubbish one.
‘So where’s she sleeping?’ Tom nodded towards Immy who was chatting to Etta as she played with Jacob.
Xander turned back round to speak to his daughter. ‘Etta, why don’t you take Jacob and Immy and show them the tree swing in the garden.’
‘Oh yes, let me show you, you can go really high,’ Etta said, excitedly.
Immy started following them outside when a thought occurred to him.
‘And Etta, be careful with Immy, she, umm… has a bad back, so no jumping all over her.’
Etta nodded, took Immy’s hand and led her outside, Jacob trundling after them.
Xander turned back to face Margaret and Tom. ‘Immy is my girlfriend, we’ve been seeing each other for a few months.’
Although that wasn’t technically true, there was no need to go into what an idiot he’d been pushing her away when he’d been crazy about her from the start.
‘We’ve been keeping it secret from Etta but we’ll be telling her tonight.’ He chewed his lip. There was no easy way to say this so he might as well come out with it. ‘She’s also pregnant with my baby.’
They looked like they’d been slapped and he immediately wanted to take it back.
Even though he hated Brook with a vengeance for the way she’d broken Etta’s heart, he didn’t want to hurt her parents.
Losing Brook, despite her shortcomings, must have been heartbreaking for them.
So this would be difficult for them to hear.
Maybe he should have approached it more delicately.
‘It’s not even been eighteen months since Brook died and you’ve moved on already,’ Tom said, clearly angry.