Engagement Rate (The Callaghan Green Series Book 1)

by Annie Dyer

  "When do you want to move in?" he said. "Officially."

  "After the retirement ball? Then my company has finished its contract with you. Although I may not have much left to move over," I said, applying highlighter to my cheeks. Jackson was now ready, his wet hair tied up messily.

  He nodded, watching me in the mirror. "I think that's a good plan although I'd rather it be sooner. How will your dad take it?"

  "He trusts me. I've told him about you, as has Gran. He'll be supportive," I said. "He'll want to meet you, if you're okay with that. He's nothing like your father."

  Jackson stood and moved towards me, sweeping me into him and pulling me close. "Just because he's not been a workaholic lawyer for most of his life doesn't mean I won't like him. There have been a lot of days when I haven't liked my father."

  I looked up at him, smiling. "Let's go see what Seph has told your family. Find out if it's boys or girls and how far along I am." For a moment, I wondered what it would be like to have that conversation with his parents and siblings, what Jackson's reaction would be.

  Jackson dropped his lips to my head. "I'd crack a joke about it, but Marie would become so excited we'd have trouble breaking the news that she wasn't going to be a grandmother.

  "Do you want kids?" I said, my heart rate rising. This wasn't a make or break; I hadn't considered it when I was with Richard, so why now with this man?

  He looked at me. "Yes, in short, but I'd rather have a longer discussion about it another time."

  "Oh." I was surprised. He'd obviously thought about it to know he needed to talk about it.

  Jackson shook his head. "No, there's nothing the matter, not as far as I know anyway. But if I talk about having children, I'll start thinking about how they're made and making one with you and then I'll need a cold shower. Or to be inside you."

  I laughed. "Just think about sleepless nights and dirty nappies, homework and Saturday mornings at swimming lessons and only being able to go on holiday when it's school holidays and four times the price..."

  "That's helped." He kept hold of me. "Do you want children?"

  With you, yes. "Yes, I think so. It's not something I thought would happen with Richard."

  "But with me?"

  "Yes. Let's have this conversation another time. When we're at yours with the curtains open and a bottle of Chianti." I tugged at his t-shirt. "Let's go."

  The family was scattered around the kitchen, Ed at the grill and hob, cooking eggs, bacon, and sausage. Claire looked half human, a glass of some effervescent vitamin next to her and greasy looking fried bread in front. She smiled knowingly. "Seph has big ears. He knows everything."

  "What does he know?" Jackson said. "Enlighten us." He passed me a plate and gestured to the pile of toast. I shook my head, keeping track of my carbs as the gym was off the menu for the weekend.

  Seph coughed, drawing the attention to himself. "I overheard that Vanessa was moving in with you."

  "So, you've told everyone?" Jackson said. I saw Marie's expression lighting up and figured she was desperate to scream and hug her stepson, then squeeze my bones too. "What if what you heard was us discussing it and Van had said no, that it was too soon?"

  "I've got good hearing. If I had any doubts I'd have made up something completely outlandish, like Van was pregnant with twins, a boy and girl who you were naming Joseph and Payton," Seph said, stepping over and picking up several rashers of bacon and a couple of sausages from a plate that Marie had just put down.

  "There's no way any child would be named after you," Max said, drinking what looked like beetroot juice. "We definitely wouldn't have believed that."

  "Besides, Jackson and I agreed we'd name any child after the other," Claire said. "He wouldn't renege on that."

  "Trust me, Claire, I would. Seph heard right. We're moving in together in a few weeks, after the retirement ball. Can we move on to something else now so she doesn't change her mind when she finally realizes what a ward of lunatics I have for a family," Jackson said, passing me a couple of rashers of bacon and a sausage. My stomach rumbled appreciatively.

  "No," Claire said, swinging around a barstool. "I want to know how you're going to furnish that place? It's like Switzerland, it's that neutral."

  I laughed and the attention on us started to disintegrate. Marie came over and hugged me as predicted. Ed smiled and gave me a slight nod, which I interpreted as his approval and then Killian came in, having been sent to the shop for more milk, which caused Claire to start being verbally abusive towards him, again.

  "What's with Claire and Killian?" I asked Payton when we took our breakfasts outside in the warm sunshine. The day was promising after the heavy showers of the night before.

  "No one knows," Payton said. "Killian was Max's roommate at university and Claire used to stay with him for weekends. They were fine up until Claire's second year when for some reason they fell out and since then he can't do anything right. Only Claire would hold a grudge for twelve years."

  "What does Max say about it?"

  Payton shrugged. "Nothing. He doesn't get involved unless he has to and he says he has no idea why she's so nasty to him, although Killian does give as good as he gets when he can be bothered. I think she's mad: I've crushed on Killian since I was about twelve. He looks like Thor with short hair and I've seen him naked on a couple of occasions. You'd totally ditch my brother. No vibrator could ever compete with what he has between his legs," she gestured an obscene length with her hands, adding both together to give me an idea of girth.

  "Payton, how on earth did you see all that?"

  "I might have been fifteen and curious. I was exceptionally good at hiding and being stealth-like. He has spoilt me for every other man," she said, lounging back and sighing loudly. "He knows I saw him, by the way. I told him a couple of years ago. Max wasn't impressed."

  "That doesn't surprise me. And what you gestured would hurt," I said, clamping my legs together at the thought.

  "Plenty of lube would help," Payton said thoughtfully. "I did some research on the internet and I'm pretty sure your body would become accustomed to it as long as the man knew what he was doing. But then you'd be wrecked for any other."

  "I think we should pause this conversation until after we've had alcohol," I said. "Lots and lots of alcohol and then I'm going to introduce you to my friend, Sophie, who keeps notes on the different penises she's encountered over the years."

  Payton's eyes lit up. "Really? She sounds fun." I made a mental note to make sure Sophie knew how young Payton was and would therefore not encourage her to follow in her woman whoring ways. Not that I judged Sophie: she enjoyed what she did and was remarkably self-assured and well balanced, but Payton was Jackson's baby sister and there had to be a line somewhere.

  "She is. She also owns Stream Spas, so she's useful to know," I said, the topic of conversation firmly away from the size of Killian's penis.

  "Your friend Sophie?" Claire said, coming to join us. "Isn't she the one who keeps notes on different dicks?"

  And we were back.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Chapter Twenty

  Jackson

  I fucking watched her sleep.

  I lay there, hitched up on one elbow, watching her curled into her side, exhausted from having spent a weekend with my family. She was my epitome of beauty; lips pink and slightly open, dark mahogany hair curled around her face; long black eyelashes draped over pinked cheeks. She was moving in with me, and I didn't want to run away in fear or start to draft an agreement around property ownership or panic over a bottle of whiskey. Instead, I wanted to stand on the rooftops and make a declaration to the world that this woman saw enough of a man in me to want to be there every morning and evening, to let me inside her, to be the only one to make her come and to be the one she shared everything with. Or at least I hoped nearly everything. Somethings might be reserved for girlfriends only; but I could let that happen.

  I pushed her hair back from her face, feeling silk
across my fingers. My chest was full and I wanted to burst. My family had loved her, she seemed to have loved them, even made Dad, who was as much of an acquired taste as whiskey. We'd played cricket in the fields, rammed the pub, lazed in the gardens with gin and tonics, barbequed the local butcher's stock and then proceeded to drink into my parents' wine cellar. By the end of the evening, she knew most everything about Seph, none of which she had shared with me yet, and everything about Ava and Payton's sex life, none of which I wanted to know. She fit; with me, with my family, she just fit.

  Vanessa's eyes flitted open, fixing on me. "How long was I asleep?"

  "Since we got home," I said, not balking at the use of the word home, it was now, for both of us, even if it wouldn't be official until after the retirement ball.

  "I'm sorry, you've carried all the luggage in yourself," she said, stretching. "I would've helped."

  "I think I can manage to bring in a few bags," I said, moving out a hand to touch her. "I know you had work to do. Can it wait?"

  She moved onto her back. "Not really. It's for a meeting tomorrow, so it's a choice of getting up early or doing it now. I'd rather do it now."

  I was silent, my mind blurring with questions from the weekend, from the things we'd talked about in passing and the things we'd hinted at. "Let's start planning the office," I said. "If nothing else, we can make sure the desk's the perfect height for fucking."

  She peeled with laughter. "Is that all you think about?"

  I paused for a moment. "No. I've thought about a lot more than that, especially this weekend."

  She sat up, the shirt she was wearing gaping enough to expose her bra. I looked, unable not to. I wanted to touch too, but managed to resist. Somehow.

  "Like what?"

  I remembered what Marie had said about honesty and what my dad had told me about when he and Marie had first met. From all of what I knew, they'd never had a disagreement they couldn't solve. They'd always been honest. Even when me or Max or Callum had done something to warrant us asking Marie not to tell Dad, she had done, but he'd been quiet enough about it so we hadn't known our confidence had been blown until it didn't matter. But then, it was clear that they had trusted each other in dealing with us. "Children."

  This was the biggie, I knew. I hadn't thought about it much before, but I hadn't had a relationship where I'd asked someone to live with me. We were both of an age where children had to be a question, although there was still time for an answer.

  "Okay," she said, thoughtful. "You said you wanted them. I think I do too."

  I nodded, my hand in her hair, needing some connection. "I do. I hadn't thought about it much as it wasn't relevant, but I'd like to be a dad and that's not a dad like mine was, who didn't know what he was doing and needed Marie to teach him. We learned to be parents with Callum and then the twins and Ava, so I know something about babies..." I stop, not quite having realized how important this was to me until now and now wanting to burden her with my needs.

  "Okay," she said, creating distance by sitting further up. "I didn't think I was bothered while I was with Richard. I thought I was all about my career and had no space for children. You seem to have kick-started a biological clock." She looked sleep-mussed and vulnerable. It itched to sit behind her and pull her into my chest and give her some form of physical reassurance.

  "Maybe that's what's happened to me. I think about you being pregnant with my child and all I want to do is fuck you. That sounds so unromantic, I know. But the idea of it just makes me want to tie you to the bed and get you that way. I know every man is meant to be terrified of a girl telling him he's gotten her pregnant, but if it happened I think I'd be shouting from the rooftops. Maybe not quite so soon though." I said, hating how desperate I sounded.

  She laughed, her hands making that connection between us and she pulled me into her. "I know. I've had the same picture. I think we're on the same page. But I'm aware of rushing things and also, if there's a reason we can't."

  I did pull her into me, so I was spooning her, feeling her body heat against mine. "Then we'd be a very good aunt and uncle or look at other options if that wasn't what we wanted. Chemistry's complex because it's quite likely based on biology, but there has to be something more and I think we have that, else all we'd do would be fuck and never talk."

  She laughed, moving my hand to her stomach. "You slept with your hand here the other night."

  "Really?" I knew I had. I had woken up with my hands on her stomach, dreaming she was big with my baby. "Maybe I'm too possessive."

  She laughed quietly. "Maybe. But I like it, so that's okay. Jackson, you've never told me what happened to your mum."

  The room felt a little smaller and I tried to not move my hands. This was something none of us talked about, me, Max and Claire. It wasn't an issue for Callum, he'd had Marie, but the rest of us remembered. But if, and yes, it was still and if, I was going to have a future with this woman, she needed to know from me and sooner rather than later. "It's not pleasant," I said.

  "Death never is," she responded. "My mum not being there was horrific; I was twelve, I needed her more than ever at that point."

  "I can understand that. By the time I was that age, we'd had Marie."

  She left the silence for a few minutes. "You don't need to tell me if it's too difficult. I understand."

  I waited, pushing the cold away. I never talked about her, not even with Claire and Max, and never, ever Callum. "I can give you the short version now. Maybe more another time. It's not something we talk about."

  "Whatever you're comfortable with." She moved the back of her head under my chin, her whole body against mine, still both fully clothed.

  "Our mum committed suicide after Callum was born. She'd suffered massive post-natal depression after Claire, and probably me, probably before. Max and I woke up one day with no sign of her around," I took a deep breath, knowing Vanessa could feel how tense I was. "We played outside, got out our own breakfast but by lunchtime we needed Mum. She was in bed, so sound asleep. Claire was lying next to her, talking to her and trying to wake her up. She had Callum with her and had tried to change him and had fed him. Mum had made up a load of bottles before."

  Vanessa said nothing, just turned around and moved up the bed, holding me, pulling my head into her chest as if she knew I couldn't look at her.

  "She'd taken pills. Her friend was due round just after lunch, the cleaner should've been round early on, but she'd not arrived because her daughter had gone into early labor. Our mum had planned everything for us to be looked after, including letters for all of us apologizing. We didn't see ours until we were old enough and Marie had spoken to us so much about it when we needed to talk," I said, ignoring the wet that came from my eyes.

  "I'm sorry, Jackson," she said, holding me. "I want to say that your mum loved you, which I know she did. And I want to say that it wasn't your fault, because it wasn't, and you know that. Mental health, which we all have, is a complex entity and I don't want to try to compartmentalize and explain it because I can't. Just know that although none of us can understand – both her and what you went through – I empathize and know what it's like to lose a parent. And I'm glad you've trusted me enough to tell me." She kissed the top of my head, wrapping herself around me fully and I let my eyes close, leaning into her and knowing that as much as I wanted to protect and defend her, she would do the same for me.

  ***

  After a great weekend, one that had left me feeling as if nothing could bowl me over, Monday morning provided its usual storm of flying feces. It began with a reporter contacting me just after I'd got to my desk after working whatever emotional residue had been left at the office gym. It was one I'd known for a few years, having supplied her with information on a dodgy supplier of goods who was known to the opposition some years ago. Jeanne and I had gone out for drinks and I'd acted the part of a possessive boyfriend when her rather nasty ex-had crawled out of his cesspit. Every so often we'd met up, always platonic.r />
  "Jackson," she said. "I've had a tip-off. Or rather, one of my colleagues did, but passed it over to me."

  "And you want to check its validity?" I said. "Interesting. Go on."

  "Katie Worthington. She was being beaten by her ex. We've been given photos – they were scanned in and sent from a random Gmail account. I'll forward it to you, but as far as I'm concerned this could be evidence used in court and publishing it could jeopardize any outcome," Jeanne said.

  "And your morally adept compass is pointing which way?" I said, feeling slightly twitchy, but unsurprised. Shit like this was going to happen all the way through Claire's case.

  "They were sent to Louisa Hoffman, whose ex is currently serving time for abusing his wife. She will deny all knowledge of receiving them, as will I, if some scumbag needs prosecuting. If that's not going to happen, I'd rather have your assurance for the story when it's available before any other publication," Jeanne said, giving nothing else away. I knew the score and was happy to abide by it. We had a good relationship and she was a good person, not like some journalists who could be nothing short of piranha-like.

  "Done," I said, knowing the full extent of what I was agreeing to. "Don't know how those images are going to be used yet, or if our client is pressing charges. Clearly, we have a leak in the office. Any identification on the email?"

  "Yes. Vanessa Moore. There's an offer of more information if money is sent to an account, the details of which will be given if we respond to the email. In all honesty, Jackson, the pictures could be found via other sources. Alan Lacey's been linked with assault on his partner before, this is just a picture we haven't seen and could be attributed to Katie having surgery," Jeanne said. "The sender might not be from your office, but the email does say that Callaghan Greene are acting for Katie Worthington with regards to her divorce. I know Vanessa Moore is behind your upcoming marketing campaign and your dad's ball. I've met her a few times and this does not seem like something she'd pull."