Resolution (Saviour) (34 page)

“
What?” He says, looking at me with both a smile and a frown.

“
You look totally fuckable. Come and sit down, we need to talk.”

“
Is it safe? We have guests arriving in like, five minutes Lauren.”

“
Gabe, I promise I will keep my hands to myself, I just want to talk to you.”

He sits down on the bed and pulls me to sit on his lap
and buries his nose into my hair and my neck, right under my jaw and I shudder. I need to start talking otherwise we will never leave this bed or this room.

“
Tonight’s a really big deal for Ava, I want her to feel part of everything, I don’t want her to feel we are moving on and leaving her behind, I’m worried she doesn’t know where she fits in at the moment, you heard how Nina spoke to her earlier, I’m worried that she feels she isn’t wanted with any of us and that’s only going to get worse when she finds out about the babies.”

He instantly puts his hand on my belly and I squirm as I know how big my spare tyre must feel because of how tight my jeans are; I lace my fingers through his
.

“
I think you’re worrying way too much Lauren, she knows that me and her are solid, she knows she will always come first, no matter what, well until Bruce and Sheila arrive and then my priorities will just be split three ways, but my kids will always come first and I’m pretty sure she knows that, despite the shit Nina tries to fill her head with, she knows, I love her, she knows you love her and she knows she is welcome and wanted here anytime, but thank you for caring.”

He kisses me gently on the mouth
. Well I’ve blown him to oblivion and given him a knee trembler to remember and now I’ve bought his sensitive side to the surface. Let’s just go for it.

“
Yeah, I think your right and she obviously sees this as a special occasion as she has gone all out with her outfit, she looks quite the young lady in her new dress and her makeup done to perfection.”

He gives me a bit of a puzzled look
. “Ava’s wearing a dress?”

“
Yep, a really pretty, really girly dress and heels and makeup.”

“
She doesn’t wear heels or makeup.”

Here we go
. “Well that’s how special tonight is to her; she felt the need to get dressed up in something extra special. She is fourteen now Gabe, she‘s a young lady not a little girl and young ladies love to dress up.”

“
What kind of dress is it?”

“
It’s just a blue girly dress with like a peplum over the waist.”

“
What’s a peplum?”

“
It’s like an extra bit that goes from her waist and over her hips.”

“
Good. Extra’s good. Is it short, is it above the knee?”

Shit
. “Well that style of dress tends to come above the knee and Ava’s quite tall so I’m guessing yeah, it will be above her knees, but that’s just a guess, I haven’t seen it on her yet, I’ve only seen it on the hanger.”

His hand is at his jaw and his scratching at his stubble with his thumb and index finger
. “How much makeup is she wearing, have you seen?”

“
Not a lot, just some foundation and blusher and mascara, it’s the usual stuff that fourteen year old girls wear. She’s growing up Gabe, short skirts and makeup are all part of it. At least she’s doing it here, in front of you and not climbing out of windows and getting changed into inappropriate outfits once she’s up the street like I used to. And like many other fourteen year olds do all around the world, Ava’s a good girl.”

“
She fucking wants to be. Is this what the blow job was for, to sweeten me up?”

“
No, I did that because you looked so hot and I didn’t want to take my clothes off again and shag ya.”

“
You are such a liar Lauren Day, you made me promise to behave all night before you blew me because you were worried that I would crack it when I saw Ava dressed in heels and makeup.”

I shrug
. “Well, you’ve promised now so make sure you behave, tell her she looks gorgeous and do not, under any circumstances embarrass her in front of the boys tonight.”

“
What boys?”

Shit, fuck, bollocks
.

“
Well I assume Louie and CJ will be here and I’m sure Sam said they might bring a couple of mates.”

“
What mates, how old?”

“
Gabe, I don’t know, chill out will you, bloody hell, this is our time to celebrate, we’ve had a shitty few months, now we finally have something’s to be happy about so let’s just have a good night. Okay?”

I stand up in front of him and hold onto his jaw and tilt his head up so he has to look me right in the eye
. “Chill, celebrate, have fun and don’t embarrass Ava. I love you.”

Before I even finish talking I can hear the gate opening
.

Within the space of fifteen minutes we have music playing loudly and the sound of talking and laughing can be heard in the background. Jo and Jake have arrived, as well as Stella and her date, a nice enough bloke called Nick, who I just know
, Gabe and his brothers are going to take the piss out of all night; Jemma and Max and Lu and Shannon are next to arrive followed by Ryder and his date Layla, who’s a petit little blonde and barely says a word, Cooper and Jen are next and then my belly goes over as Zac and Sam arrive. Gabe is sorting drinks out for everyone but I see his hand go straight to his jaw as he sees Zac come through the gates, I watch him as he looks beyond his brother, CJ and his mate come in first, good, he still looks like a fifteen year old child. For a second Gabe’s hand leaves his jaw as he laughs and says something to Lu, who I notice keeps putting her hands on him. I will have to have words with Lorraine but that thought leaves my head entirely as I watch Louie and his mate Josh I assume, walk through the gates and over to the pool house, they’re definitely not boys, I’ve seen Lou in boardies and jeans and hoodies but I’ve never seen him dressed up like this, they are both good looking boys and both look about eighteen, nineteen and Gabe is going to have an absolute coronary if Ava and Sophie start flirting with these two in front of him.

I
start making my way over to where he’s standing, removing his hand from his jaw as I reach him, I whisper in his ear. “Chill.”

He smiles and puts his arm around me and kisses my temple
. “I love you, you are the most fuckable pregnant woman I have ever seen, do you know that?”

“
I do know that yes. Is it safe to leave you here while I go upstairs and get the girls to help me with some food?”

“
Go, I promise to behave. If you promise me another blow job.”

I wink at him
. “Anytime baby, just say the word. Be good.”

I go upstairs to the kitchen and call for the girls to come and help me with some dips and chips and hot pies and sausage rolls
. A must at any gathering in Australia. Sophie appears with her bathrobe still around her. “Are you girls still not ready? Hurry up and bring these down before they go cold.”

“
We just need to put our dresses on; we didn’t want to crease them; we’ll be right down.”

I carry two big trays of food down and feel a bit mean for shouting at Sophie so harshly
, but jeeze, they have been pampering and preening themselves for almost four hours. Jo takes a tray off of me and we go in opposite directions, offering everyone food. I make my way back to Gabe and ask him to pour me a lemonade into a wine glass so that nobody gets suspicious about the fact that I’m not drinking, he passes me my drink and I watch as his mouth falls open. I turn and look over my shoulder at Ava coming down the back stairs carrying a tray of party pies and sauce, looking like Miss Australia. The blue dress is skin tight and clings to her, she is stick thin and has no curves to fill it out, apart from her boobs, where the fuck did they come from? They must be at least a generous C cup and on her tiny size four frame, they look pretty big and her legs seem to go on forever. She has a thin silver belt around her waist and is wearing matching silver killer heels, she has added to the makeup she was wearing earlier and now has smokey eyes and red lips, her hair has been taken out of its braid and is hanging in curls over both her shoulders. If I didn’t know it was her, I wouldn’t have recognised her and she looks about twenty. I put my hand on Gabe’s shoulder.

“
Holy fuck man, is that Ava?”

Zac says to Gabe from somewhere behind him, I glare over Gabe’s shoulder at Zac, take my drink from Gabe and squeeze his hand
.

“
Wow dude, your daughter is growing up into a beautiful young woman, you must be proud.”

Zac pats Gabe on the back
as he winks at me and I can feel some of the tension leave his body, his eyes meet mine, he’s so not happy but keeping it under control, I give him a little nod and a smile. We both watch as Ava offers pies to everyone and all the women tell her how grown up and gorgeous she looks and a few of my friends ask how she’s feeling after the accident but she’s cool, she holds her own and stands and chats with all of them. I know I’m holding my breath as she approaches Louie and Josh as they play pool. Louie looks up at her and his mouth drops open too “Wow Ava, look at you. What you got?” He looks at the tray of food and turns around to Josh who has his back to them. “Hey Josh, you wanna pie?”

Josh turns, looks at the tray, then down at Ava’s legs, then up at Ava’s face, then down at Ava’s chest
and they stay there, staring right at Ava’s chest. Gabe moves slightly, I squeeze his hand tighter, suddenly Louie smacks Josh around the head.

“
Dude, stop staring at my cousins tits, that’s so not cool, I will beat you man, don’t do that, Gabe will kill you, I’m serious.”

Josh looks from Ava’s chest to Lou, back to Ava’s face, he’s blushing the same colour as Ava’s lips and although she now has her back to me, I’m sure she is beet red too
, poor thing. Josh takes a pie, mumbles a sorry and a thank you and turns back to his game; Ava turns and starts making her way over to us. “Tell her how nice she looks” I whisper into Gabe’s ear. By the time she gets to us, Ava has only a couple of pies left on the tray, I’m starving but leave the last two for Zac and Gabe, he looks at me. “You sure you don’t want it?”

I shake my head
. “You’ve not eaten much all day babe; I don’t want you pas…”

“
I’m fine Gabe, honestly.” I interrupt him. Zac is watching us with a little too much interest and I watch his eyes wander from Gabe to my boobs, to my belly. Keeping this pregnancy secret for another four or five weeks is not going to be as easy as I thought.

“
I love the dress, you look beautiful Ava” I say, to change the subject.

“
Thanks Lauren, I love your outfit too.”

“
Both my girls look beautiful tonight, you look gorgeous Ava.” He kisses her on the cheek and as embarrassed as she is, I know she’s also relieved that he hasn’t caused a scene and made her go and change.

We had decided that as soon as everyone was here and had a few drinks, we would announce our engagement t
o everyone so once the barbie is lit and warming up, a few trays of appetisers have been served and everyone has at least two or three drinks inside them, Gabe pulls me over to an empty spot away from everyone else and calls out for everyone to please be quiet, everyone is looking at us slightly confused as Gabe stands with his arm around me and starts to speak.

“
Ten weeks ago, my world was rocked when I walked into the pub for a beer with my brothers and my eyes landed on this short, sexy red head, who at the time was singing into an empty beer bottle to the words of  The Clash – Should I Stay Or Should I Go.”

He looks down at me and smiles
, I can’t believe he remembers that… I don’t even remember that… It’s probably because of my outstanding vocal skills that it’s stuck in his mind…

“For any of you that have had the pleasure of hearing Lauren sing, I’m sure you are wondering why I didn’t run far, far away.”

“
Coz then you noticed what a great rack she had.” Trust Zac.

“
Well yeah, there was that too.” Trust Gabe. “But there was so much more; years ago a very wise woman told me that one day I would fall in love and when I did it would be like boom and I would feel like the world was falling out from under me.”

He tilts his beer bottle towards Sam in a cheers gesture
. “Well that night ten weeks ago, it happened. At the time, I’ve got to say, I actually thought I was suffering from indigestion, heartburn or food poisoning but I realised within a few short days it was quite possibly love, it had finally happened, after so many years of me thinking that it was something that wasn’t meant to be for me, when I least expected it, that boom happened. Now, you people here are all aware of the circumstances, you all know what an unconventional start we have had to our relationship and you are all aware of what we have been through in just ten short weeks, despite all of that, we are here, now, together, to let all of you, the people we love most in the world, that what we have is forever and I am honoured, privileged and over the fucking moon to be able to share with you all tonight, that Lauren Marie Day has agreed to become my wife.”