The Problem With Heartache (44 page)

And I would. Because nothing would change this brilliant man who was now six feet under. Nothing would change his memory, and the impact he’d had upon my life.

“I can love you for eternity, Lachlan.” I took a deep breath. “But I’ve found room to love someone else. And it doesn’t mean I’m going to forget, or that I’m deleting you from my life. You’ll always be a part of me.”

I placed the flowers on his grave and looked up. Lee sat in the car, looking at me, his eyes full of emotion. That was my future. That was where I was headed.

“Just because I’ve moved on, doesn’t mean I’ll ever forget.”

I knelt down and gave the cold concrete a soft kiss, then I dusted off my knees and walked toward the car. Toward my future.

Toward my Lee.

T
HE PROBLEM
with life was that things didn’t always fall into place or work out the way you’d planned. And try as you might, you couldn’t always control the things that were going to happen—even if you had Tony on your side, watching over your every move.

I’d spoken some harsh words to him about making Lottie sign that document, but I knew why he’d done it. Having her spill the secret of Jay’s real identity could have been dangerous to us—what he didn’t understand was that it would have been just as dangerous for them, and that Lottie would do anything to protect that little boy. The little boy I was getting to know more and more every day, even with Kate in my life.

Because family was important to me. It always had been; it always would be. It was why I’d stopped at the jewellery store, picking up a little blue box from Tiffany’s on my way to lunch.

I walked into the cafe, scanning the tables, until I spotted them. They were seated at opposite sides of the table, and I wondered if there was any possible way they could put more distance between each other while still sitting ‘together’.

“Mom. Dad.” I bent down and kissed Mom on the cheek, then turned Dad’s chair so I could give him a hug. He took me in a weak embrace, but it felt good. Being here felt better than it had in a while.

“Good to see you, Lee.” Mom nodded.

I passed her the little blue bag. “Here.”

“Lee!” She smiled, but shook her head sadly, pocketing the gift instead of opening. “You didn’t have to …”

I shrugged. “I wanted to.”

Silence wrapped itself around our group, punctuated by laughter from a little girl trying to push what looked to her grandfather in his wheelchair at the next table.

“I know I’ve said it before, but I’m so sorry about … about what happened with …” Mom trailed off, and I shook my head.

“It’s in the past, Mom.” She’d apologised before, but this was the first time I didn’t still feel a slight sting.

Maybe I hadn’t really ever needed her apology.

Maybe I’d needed to forgive myself.

I looked around the other patrons of the eatery outside the nursing home. Families were smiling. Children were laughing. I gave a smile and relaxed back in my chair, my hands behind my head. I was trying to make amends with my parents, even if we weren’t falling into best buddies overnight. My relationship with Jay was getting stronger every day, even if Lottie still hadn’t agreed to the paternity test. Time. I knew she just needed time.

The band was going well, and Tony had presented me with a new contract to sign for another three albums. And I had this girl … the girl of my dreams waiting for me back in my hotel room.

For the first time in forever, I belonged.

T
HE PROBLEM
with life is it rarely wraps things up in a neat circle. Some things come, and some things go. Sometimes things stay in your life with no real resolution, waxing and waning as the years go by until you wonder if they’ll ever really leave your life at all.

For me, that was Lachlan. Sometimes I’d all but forget. I’d be so happy, so caught up in Lee, in his adoration, in the way he looked at me, touched me,
loved
me—it would be all-consuming.

Then I’d see the picture Lachlan drew for me, hanging on the wall in the garage at Mum and Dad’s. Or a social media notification would pop up from his brother Johnny, who sometimes still posted from Lachlan’s account when times were tough. And sometimes, it wouldn’t have to be anything at all—just a feeling that would wash over me and take me from one hundred per cent functional to crippled with need, guilt and devastation, all at once.

But I’d learnt to live with that. And thankfully, so had Lee.

After all, things hadn’t tied themselves up with a little bow for him, either. While Lottie had come around a little, Lee still wasn’t able to convince her to get the paternity test. We spent our lives together but apart; Lee bought an apartment across the road from their house, where Lee lived and I heavily visited when he wasn’t on tour. And Lottie didn’t come on tour anymore, what with preparing Jay for school. But we still got to see Jay whenever we were around. And strangely enough, Xander seemed to hang around there a fair bit, too.

While I loved Lee dearly, I kind of had other things on my mind as we stood outside the obstetrician’s clinic that day, four months later. Right now, there was a very different baby I was excited to see.

“You ready?” I asked Lee, wrapping my fingers through his.

He gave them a gentle squeeze, and he smiled down at me. “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

We walked through the doors of the clinic, ready to see an ultrasound, the first image we’d ever get captured of Stacey and Michael’s four-month-old foetus.

“It’s really happening,” Stacey whispered in my ear, giving me a bone-crushing hug as she met me in the foyer. “We’re going to be parents!”

I didn’t know, but she and Michael hadn’t been using protection when they were doing the naughty. They weren’t trying to fall pregnant; they just weren’t trying not to, either. And I knew this was something they wanted. And that they’d give their everything to it.

“Hey, Dad.” Lee pumped Michael’s hand, a wicked grin in his eye. “So I hear pregnant ladies are insatiable in bed …”

“Dude! That’s the mother of my child you’re talking about.” Michael slapped him across the stomach, and Stacey and I shared a smile. Her cheeks glowed red; she was the epitome of a healthy mother-to-be.

“Allison?” A man called from the doorway, and Stacey gave a small squeal. “That’s us.”

She gestured for us to follow her down the hall and we did, past several doors until Lee jerked me to one side, into the safety of an alcove that contained a whole heap of cleaning supplies. “We’ll catch up,” he called over his shoulder, and I heard Michael make some joke about us screwing in the baby-maker’s clinic. Because, really.

“Kate … this is …” Lee grinned, and I couldn’t help but smile too. He had that affect on me. “I know we’re only new, and we’re still working everything out, but … maybe in a year, do you want to think about making a little Kate?”

His eyes were so full of hope and excitement that they shone. Heat rushed to my cheeks. “How do you know it won’t be a little Lee?” I teased.

“Because if it has any common sense, it will be as much like you as possible,” Lee nodded wisely. “And if I pass one thing on to my protégé, I sure as hell hope it’s some smarts.”

I giggled and cupped his cheek in my hand. “Lee, I’m still only nineteen. I’ll be twenty soon, but … I need to do a whole lot more living before I have a baby.” Lee’s gaze flickered down the hall to where Stacey had disappeared, and he opened his mouth to speak but I butted in. “And don’t you dare say that Stacey’s doing it, so I should do it too, because you know that’s being ridiculous, and that we’re not the same person.”

Lee closed his jaw with a snap, and I grinned. “Besides, don’t you want to do things together first?” I trailed my hand down the side of his face, his day-old stubble brushing my knuckles. “Travel the world … experience new things … maybe get a dog …”

“Maybe get married.” Lee’s eyes weren’t hopeful. This was a statement from him, and it wasn’t the first time he’d brought it up, either. He knew I was waiting; I wanted to finish the correspondence degree I was doing in event management, and wanted to do some good ol’ fashioned dating first, since we seemed to spend most of our time together. I spent a lot of my life in the States with Lee, and every third week I’d fly home to Australia and spend some time with Mum and Dad. And each day I learned more about them. I appreciated them even more.

And I prayed to God to thank them for being a part of my life.

Still, even though we fit like gloves and had made things work, marriage wasn’t on the immediate agenda. But it was neatly filed in my head under Things That Even Though I Knew I Wasn’t Ready For, I Was Excited For To Happen. One day. Not too far away.

Because that was the problem with love. Sometimes you fell, and you fell so hard that it was like the rug had been pulled out from under you, leaving you crushed, crippled and breathless on the floor, changing the way you saw the world, the way you did everything. It made your heart ache. Consumed all your thoughts.

But it also made you be more yourself. Brought two souls together.

Bringing them
home
.

And that was the true problem with heartache. That sometimes, even though Lee had wanted to find one, there wasn’t an ache at all.

Not for us.

Not ever.