Lizzie Blake's Best Mistake (A Brush with Love, #2)(42)

“Do you want me to try and get us out of it?” Rake said with a sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Lizzie was silent for another moment before saying, “Send me pictures of it. I want to see.”

He put her on speakerphone then sent over the link, crossing his fingers and toes that she would like those fucking windows with all their fucking light and maybe save his ass.

He waited a moment, letting her scroll through. “Well?” he said at last.

“It looks really, really nice,” Lizzie said, her voice sounding tired. She sounded tired a lot lately, and for some bizarre reason, the idea of her being weary without him there to help her plucked oddly at the base of his throat. Weird.

“Okay,” she said after another moment. “What the hell. Let’s go for it. That rent can’t be beat.”

“Really?” Rake asked, relief flooding him.

“Yeah, I do really like those windows,” Lizzie said with a tiny laugh, and confirmation that she liked them made him want to punch his fist in the air. Which was also weird.

“I’ll try and set up a time to look at the daycare you mentioned,” Lizzie added. “Indira, all-knowing-goddess-of-things that she is, mentioned daycare wait lists are long as hell. I already have a few places I’ve found to put our name down if that’s okay with you.”

“That’s perfect. This’ll be great. We’ll make it great.”

“LOL. It will be pure chaos, and it’s best you realize that now,” she said, giggling. “I gotta run. I’ll talk to you soon.”

She hung up, and Rake brought his phone down to his chest, tapping it against the organ in there that seemed to be acting up.



* * *



TIME FLEW BY after that, Rake making his way through an endless list of work and personal tasks to get done before the move.

For her part, Lizzie seemed to be throwing herself into the deepest corners of the internet with pregnancy research, sending Rake weekly texts and keeping him thoroughly updated on every time she puked and just how badly her boobs still hurt. A few days before his move, she sent him a message that stopped him in his tracks and made everything feel that much realer.

Do you want to go to the first ultrasound? Followed immediately by: No pressure or whatever.

Of course he wanted to go. The idea of not being there was unthinkable, and he told her such. In a much less dramatic way, of course.

On Rake’s final day in Sydney, he drove out of the city to visit his parents. He pulled up in front of the short picket fence surrounding the bungalow he’d grown up in. He stared at the home for a few minutes, suddenly desperate to memorize every crack in the walk-up, every leaf of his mum’s rosebushes. He was feeling a bit … sentimental? Perhaps? It was hard to know for sure because Rake picked up the emotion by its scruff and tossed it right out of his brain.

Eventually, he pulled himself out of the trance and headed inside.

“Oh, sweetheart,” his mum, Leanne, said by way of greeting, wrapping him in a hug as he stepped into the kitchen. Rake stooped down a bit to accommodate her, giving her a gentle pat on the back. “I hope you’re hungry,” Leanne said, pulling away and trying to subtly wipe the tears from her cheeks. “Your dad has enough food on the barbie to feed an army.”

“I simply cook whatever she hands me,” Rake’s dad, Peter, said, as he walked in through the sliding doors from the backyard. “Learned long ago not to ask questions,” Peter added, shooting Leanne a cheeky wink as she swatted at him with her towel. Rake smiled.

Peter placed a plate of grilled prawns and a platter stacked with enough meat to feed a family of ten at the center of the table.

“How’s Lizzie?” Leanne asked as she scooped some salad onto her plate.

Rake had one of those bizarrely healthy relationships with his parents, and he’d told them both everything when he’d returned from seeing Lizzie. While his mum had shed some tears over him moving so far away, she’d been supportive of the situation and had asked Rake about Lizzie every day for weeks.

“She’s good,” Rake said. “Told me yesterday she feels like she’s carrying a big wheel of cheese.”

Peter snorted.

“Oh Lord, I remember that feeling, even thirty years later,” Leanne said, shooting Rake a smile. “Felt the size of a house.”

“She was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” Peter said, beaming at his wife. Rake looked on as they glanced at each other with such natural affection.

He wondered why he didn’t have that gene, why it felt so unnatural for him to show endearment. Not that he wanted the capability. Fondness led to hurt, and Rake was not interested in that experience again, thank you very much.

His parents chattered on in earnest—his mum discussing her book club, his dad talking about their plans to visit friends in Melbourne in a few weeks—and Rake let their words flow around him like a river of contentment. He’d miss them like hell.

When the time finally came for goodbye, both of his parents misty-eyed as they wrapped him in tight hugs, something sharp and strong poked at Rake’s ribs and throat, but he pushed it away.

Everything would be okay. It had to be.





Chapter 22




RAKE could barely keep his eyes open as the Lyft made its way from the Philadelphia airport to Lizzie’s apartment.