Resolution (Saviour) (14 page)

“
Yep no worries, take a seat Jake I’ll sort you out a plate.”

There’s enough food to make Jake up a full dinner, I reheat it while Gabe gets everyone a drink,
and we spend the rest of the evening sitting around the dining table, listening to Jake and Gabe tell stories about their exploits over the years. It turns out Jake is a sport photographer and travels around the world and stays with Gabe whenever he is in Melbourne. I assume Jake will be staying in the guest room downstairs so I nip down and make sure it’s all in order and that there are fresh towels in the bathroom. At around midnight I say goodnight to everyone and take myself off to bed, they are all drinking hard liquor and I’m still suffering from last night’s consumption as well as once again feeling exhausted by events of the previous week.

I wake to
the sensation of fingertips stroking so, so gently between my legs. I open my eyes, Gabe is laying on his side, propped on one elbow, his fingers of his free hand working their magic on my clit, he’s barely touching me but it feels amazing. I blink a few times and stretch and smile at him.

“
Marry me, please?”

What? Bloody hell
.

“
Gabe, we’ve been over this”

“
Not now, I know you can’t marry me now, but as soon as it’s legally possible, marry me, please.”

“
No, I’m sorry, I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you but I don’t want to get married.”

He sighs, shrugs, then leans forward and takes my right nipple in his mouth
, sucking with his lips, all the while still working me with his fingers. No arguments, no more mention of marriage, he positions himself on top of me and slides inside slowly, his mouth moving from my nipple as he looks up at me, with those eyes and I get that all too familiar light headed sensation, just from his stare.

“
I love you Lauren.”

“
I love you Gabe.”

We make love in our bed and again in the shower and then both quietly get ready for work, I am up at Redhill today, organising tradesman and Gabe is off to South Australia for the day for a meeting about the hospital deal the company has been working on, he won’t be back until late tonight.
We drink our coffee quietly together and he heads off before me. I almost jump out of my skin when I come out of the bedroom to find Jake in a t shirt and jocks, making himself a coffee. I had completely forgotten he was here and Gabe hadn’t mentioned him this morning.

“
Shit Jake, you made me jump. Good morning.”

“
Sorry Lauren, I thought you had both gone.”

My phone goes off to tell me I have a text, it’s Gabe
.

Don’t forget Jakes downstairs, he probably wont be up until after lunch, just get takeout for dinner, I will be home as soon as I’m dun. Don’t believe anything he tells you. Luv ya. Will u marry me, plz? x

I smile at the message.

“
No, no, Gabe’s gone out early to the airport, he has a meeting in Adelaide this morning; he’ll be back later this evening. Did you sleep okay?”

He gives a small laugh
, “Yeah, I slept great – eventually”.

I frown
, “Oh was everything; oh – did Jo stay over?”

I feel my cheeks burn, this is Jo we’re talking about, there’s no way she would let a fine looking specimen like Jake slip through her fingers
– or her legs for that matter!

“
She did, yeah, she just left before Gabe did. Sorry, it’s um, I didn’t think, it’s usually just me and Gabe here, I didn’t think it might, you might.”

For fucks sake, what does he think I’m some old prude, the shag police?

“Jake, it’s fine, really, I couldn’t give a shit, just carry on as you would normally.”

“
Well that you might object to, normally Gabe would have joined me, if he had been here alone.”

He laughs
, I most definitely don’t. WTF! I close my eyes for a second to clear that thought from my brains.

“
I mean, not with Jo of course, she’s your friend, although, I mean just with some random, shit, I’m sorry, I’ll just shut up, sorry Lauren, I can’t get my head around Gabe being all loved up and Facebook official and everything, I’ve never known it, not even when he was married.”

I smile at him, it’s all in the past, just let it go.

“Don’t worry Jake, honestly, Gabe’s past is his past, we all have one. Right I need to get going, help yourself to anything, the keys to the Ute are there if you need a car, shall I bring something in for dinner or get takeout or are you going out?”

“
No, no, don’t worry about dinner, I will sort all of that out, I’ll just see you when you get home, you have a nice day at the office dear.”

I smile, I can see why Gabe and Jak
e get along, they both have fairly easy going natures and despite both being blessed with faces and bodies belonging to the God’s neither of them are up their own arse.

“
I don’t work in an office, but thanks.”

I’m actually dreading going to work today, it will be the first time I have seen Karen Palmer since Gabe and I were up there, we have spoken on the phone but nothing was said
about their affair and I refuse to work with an atmosphere so if she doesn’t say anything, I will, I don’t want to lose out on work over this but I need to just set things straight. I suddenly wonder how much Jake knows about Gabe’s past.

“
I’m an interior designer, I’m working on a refurb up at Redhill. You might have heard of the owners, Steve and Karen Palmer,” Jake spits his coffee all over the bench top and I hold back a laugh, he knows all right.

I wonder if he went there too?
Jake coughs and splutters, “Shit, sorry Lauren.”

“
You okay? There’s paper towel in the pantry.”

He wipes up the mess and lo
oks at me, in a complete panic, “So, have you met her, them, the Palmers, have you met them before?”

“
Yeah, I’ve done a few jobs for them, don’t really see much of Steve but I’ve worked pretty closely with Karen over the years…although this is the first time since I’ve been with Gabe, anyway, I have to go, I will see ya sometime this arvo.”

I grab my keys to my shiny new car and head down the stairs, wondering how long Jake will wait before calling Gabe,
I’m wicked really as I know Gabe will have his phone off as he gets on the plane, oh well, that’s brightened my morning, that and the bed sex and the shower sex and Gabe’s marriage proposal and knowing that he loves me. I reverse out onto the esplanade feeling pretty good, despite the fact I’m off to face a woman Gabe once slept with.

‘Bella Vista’ is a hive of activity as I rock up around nine thirty. I have to leave my car out on the nature strip as there are untold trucks,
Utes and an excavator on the driveway. I haven’t dressed up today as I knew I would be walking onto a building site and I am feeling extremely glad of my choice of jeans and my favourite old biker boots with a hoodie and body warmer on top, it’s not particularly warm today and rain is forecast. I head into the house and try to find Gabe’s site manager Dave, who I am to liaise with, I ask the electricians as I step around them and I’m told his office is in one of the bedrooms, great, so do I decorate around him? My phone goes but the noise in the house is deafening, I can see from the screen it’s Gabe and I want to know he’s arrived safe, I know it’s only a half hour or so flight but I still worry.

“
Hey baby, you’re gonna have to shout, its chaos here, just tell me you landed safe and I will call you back in a bit.”

Before he answers someone bellows
, “Oi, get your hard hat on!”

I just know they’re talking to me…Shit!

A mountain of a man comes towards me, “Get a hat on or get off my site!” He shouts at me again in a strong Scottish accent and my first thought is to cry.

“
Sorry mate, I’m looking for Dave, I was hoping to grab a hat from him, I’m Lauren Day, the Palmer’s interior designer.”

“
I don’t give a fuck who you are, get a fucking hat on or get out, are those boots toecaps?”

“
Yes actually they are,” I lie “And if you would stop being so rude and point me towards Dave’s office I will get a fucking hat.”

My phone goes off again, I
had forgotten Gabe’s call, he must have hung up and called back, I swipe to answer but before I can say a word he shouts down the phone, “Put that Scottish cunt on the phone now!”

Without
a word I pass the phone to the Scottish cunt. He looks confused as he takes it, then shocked, “Gabe? Well she should have come straight to the off…I’m well aware of that. Yep. Okay.”

He passes the phone back to me
, “I’ll get ya hat.”

He walks away as I walk outside so as to hear what Gabe’s saying
, “If that fucker so much as breathes at you the wrong way, I want you to call and tell me. I’ve just given him his first and last warning. Are you okay?”

“
I’m fine, who is he, the Scottish cunt I mean?”

“
Language Lauren, I know you’re on a building site but there’s no need to swear like one of the blokes. That’s Dave, the bloke I told you to ask for, his office was set up on the drive but we needed the room so he moved inside, now visitors have to go onsite to get their safety gear, which is against OH&S. I’m sorry Lauren, that was so unprofessional, what if you had been the client, the blokes a liability, good at his job but shit people skills, I’ve got to go, go get your sexy hard hat on and send me a picture of you wearing it. Have a good day baby, I love you, can’t wait till you marry me.”

He hangs up before I can reply; I turn and see Dave standing behind me with a hard hat and Hi Vis jacket in his hand. I’ve worked on properties still classed as building sites before, I know the rules, I would have worn my own kit if I had known it was going to cause so much trouble this morning.

“Sorry about all that, it’s been chaos here this morning, I should never have taken it out on you.”

He puts his hand out for me to shake and I accept.
“David Mackenzie, site manager.”

“
Lauren Day, interior designer.”

We head off to his office for a coffee and he gives me a tour and a
rundown of what rooms are ready for me to work on, which is basically all of them, except the kitchen and the pool house, The Palmers decided to have the entire house renovated all at once and instead of just a refurb of the pool house, they have had a whole new fully self-contained unit built down there, along with a standalone kitchen, wet bar and full bathroom, the unit itself has two double bedrooms with full en suite and a luxury kitchen, this is a guest house, in a holiday home, there’s a good chance it could get used maybe once or twice a year but hey, I’ve seen people with money spend it on worse things for their homes and I know from past dealings with Karen, she likes everyone to know she has money, she doesn’t have particularly good taste…that’s where I come in …and she doesn’t have particularly good morals…which is where Gabe came in…her apparently…several times. I shake my head at that thought as I walk back to my car to get my crap that I left in there earlier, as I pull my bag from the boot, I hear a car door slam and I look around to see Karen staring at my number plate. Okay let’s get this over with, If I can take on a six feet five inch hairy arsed Scotsman, I can certainly take on Karen Palmer and her big back combed hair and sparkly Louboutin heels…Which she is so going to regret wearing when she sees the state of the driveway she needs to cross before getting into the house, and I bet they’re not toe capped…my heart is hammering in my throat and my mouth has gone dry…

“
Lauren, good morning, how are you?”

I watch her ankle twist and tilt to the side as she stumbles towards me and have to t
urn quickly back to my bag that I’m retrieving from the car so she doesn’t see me grin…Deep breath

“
Morning Karen”

She takes off her sunnies and stands next to
me as I gather some fabric swatches I have brought to show her for the pool house. There’s an awkward silence

“
The house is packed full of builders so I’m glad I’ve seen you out here, Gabe has told me everything about what went on between you two.”

“
Oh but th…”

“
Let me finish please Karen, as far as I’m concerned, it was a long time ago and quite frankly none of my business, I hope this isn’t going to cause any issues in our professional relationship, we’ve always worked well together and I hope that can continue through this and any future projects.”

Wow, I had no idea what I was going to say when I opened my mouth
.

Well I did but it went along the lines of
, “Fuck you, you fuckin whore, keep your fuckin claws away from my man, else I will rip your scrawny throat out.”…But I didn’t think that would be good for working relations. So all in all, I think I did well. She’s looking down at the floor, obviously embarrassed, finally bringing her eyes up to meet mine.