She was a lot like Miles, she supposed, in that it took her a long time to totally feel comfortable in a place or with people. She had that here. Had a community.

But . . . she wanted to be with him. She wanted to live in a house with her son and his father. Location was something they could work on. So what was the real problem, damn it?

Fear. She loved Adrian so much it scared her.

She sat back, arse on the floor, resting her head against the cabinets. It took her years to love someone, and with Adrian it had happened so fast. One part of her was okay with that. Love was a certain kind of magic and she accepted it as such.

Miles had been instant love. The moment she held him against her chest she’d loved him so fiercely it had filled up everything.

And that had been enough. More than enough. She’d loved being a mother more than she could have ever imagined. She made mistakes with it, of course. But even if everything else in her life had been out of sequence, she and Miles had been in sync.

Adrian had changed everything in much the same way Miles had. And, she supposed, she loved him in much the very quick way she’d loved Miles. He felt like family.

When she’d been growing up, her mother had thought she was doing a favor for Gillian by keeping her expectations low. A girl like her wasn’t pretty like Tina, so she could play piano and be a good enough wife and mum for some bloke who’d sit and watch footie every night down the pub with his buddies while she handled the home life.

Low expectations had been her main dish as a child. While she’d had Miles and had found an avenue for her passion with the piano, the ugly, unvarnished truth was that she’d never expected to have a love like she had with Adrian.

Fucking was hard enough. But letting someone into her soul? Past all her defenses into her very heart? The unvarnished truth was that he was there already. It wasn’t a matter of decisions on her part. It simply was true and at the end of the day, she accepted it. And it strengthened her. She also knew that.

She could see herself and Miles living in Adrian’s house. It was big and bright and had a gorgeous view. She could most definitely do her work there. She might even be able to expand to some new avenues around the area.

But the yard, while lovely, wasn’t the kind of yard a boy could really run around in. Not that Miles was much for sporting around in the back anyway.

It would only be half an hour from her friends. Not the same quick ride over to Mary’s or down to Tart, but it was doable. She could still go to dinner and hang out and they could come to her as well.

She didn’t like parts of his life. The constant exposure troubled her. Quite frequently, people camped out at the base of his drive. Just outside his gate on any given day there’d be fans. Most were very respectful, though she had her doubts about the level of obsession of people who came to find his house and then camped as if they were in the forest instead of a neighborhood.

Instead of going to get coffee nearby his home, he headed to the café Erin owned. He didn’t do anything in his own neighborhood as a matter of fact. And it was a nice neighborhood!

But his face was too well known there, and while the people he lived around seemed just fine with his celebrity, that didn’t stop the camping out and the occasional paparazzi.

Twice since Miami, photographs of Gillian and Miles had ended up on gossip websites. That was a whole new level of exposure and it pushed those buttons she’d had for a very long time. She had enough of that when she was young and everyone knew her mum was the town bike and her dad was a drug dealer who liked young girls.

This country had brought her relief from that. She’d reinvented herself away from that, and the idea of people looking at her and judging her for what others did or didn’t do made her sick.

Was it all about her? Was she so self-centered that she’d make it all about how she felt when clearly Miles and his dad deserved to be together?

“Get it together, Gillian,” she muttered, going back to scrubbing the floor. Dithering never got anyone anywhere. Period. She needed to make her mind up and go forward from there.

So she refilled the bucket with clean soapy water and got back to work.

“Lookie here, Miles.”

She glanced up from where she’d just finished cleaning the baseboards to find Adrian and Miles standing there, grinning.

“I thought you two were off for the day with mischief in mind.” She got to her feet, peeling off the rubber gloves after pouring out the dirty water.

“We missed you.” Miles tromped over her freshly scrubbed floors, but it was to hug her and so it didn’t matter.

“Hey, love. I missed you too.”

Oh, beautiful love. Love flooded through her, that warm, bonedeep mother-love. Filled her up to bursting.

And when he stepped away there was Adrian, also tromping across her freshly scrubbed floor.

She knew she wore a fool’s smile but it didn’t matter.

“Mister Brown. I trust you have not broken our son?”

“I do my best, English.” He leaned in to kiss her, a sweet sort of smooch that made the backs of her knees tingle.

“Miles and I were hanging out and all after we woke up and we both decided we needed to see you.” He leaned past her to put a bag on the counter. “You have no idea how hot it makes me to see you this way,” he murmured softly.

Oh, he thrilled her right to her toes.

“We brought shrimp, corn on the cob and potatoes. I think we can work with this combo.”

“I think we can, yes. I’ll make a pasta salad to go with. We’ll do a boil, don’t you think?” Gillian shooed them both from the room while she re-mopped and dried up quickly.