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Chapter Forty Eight

“So she’s sleeping and eating just fine?”

“She’s absolutely perfect. So where are you?”

I looked around. If I had thought that the Park Hyatt was fancy, it paled in comparison to the Lilianfels. Located about an hour and a half away from Sydney in Katoomba, the hotel was actually housed in a historic country mansion. Unfortunately, being up in the Blue Mountains was also like staying at a ski lodge this time of year. Nick and I had stopped at a couple stores along the way and I had lots of soft sweaters and thick socks. It was almost noon and the temperature was expected to top out at forty nine degrees.

Because of the cold, the hotel wasn’t busy. Nick had booked us for the Cloudmaker suite, which overlooked the Jamison Valley. As pretty as Sydney was, it was definitely a tourist town. This hotel actually made me feel like a newlywed secluded in our own little area of the world.

“We had a little, er, paparazzi issue so we’re staying outside Sydney.” I explained to my mom. “It’s winter here.”

My mom laughed. “Did you pack the right clothes?”

“Dresses, skirts, tank tops, and jeans” I admitted. “But we stopped on our way here and I got some sweaters.”

“That’s a lot of clothes to have to wear on a honeymoon,” my mom teased. I laughed. Nick came out of the bathroom, drying his wet hair with towel. He looked at me.

“Who is it?” he mouthed.

“My mom,” I mouthed back. He came over and sat by me, motioning for the phone.

“Hey mom, I’m going to put Nick on,” I said. I handed him the phone.

“Hi mom,” Nick said. “How’s Brookey?” He listened for a moment. “Can you put us on speaker? It’s the button on the bottom left. No, your other left.”

After a few seconds, Nick broke into a grin.

“Hi sweetheart, it’s daddy. How’s my Brookey? Mommy and daddy miss you.”

I pulled the phone away from him. “Love you sweetie!” I called out into the phone.

Nick cooed for a few more seconds and then mom must have come back on the line.

“It’s nine in the morning here. Yeah, we’re a day ahead of you. Are you getting Brooklyn ready for bed? Okay, well thank you so much. We’ll see you soon. Love you.”

I grabbed the phone again. “Love you mom!”

I heard mom laughing. “Love you both. Now how do I turn off this speakerphone?”

The line went dead as she began pressing buttons. I fell back on the bed.

“If we had booger here with us I might never want to go back,” I said lazily.

Nick fell back right beside me.

“I completely agree.”

“What do you want to do today?”

We had stayed up late the night before looking at all the little things to do around the area. Unfortunately, from the moment I had opened my eyes this morning I felt like I had gotten run over by a truck.

“Can we stay at the hotel today?” I asked. Nick rolled over on his side. He brushed a piece of hair away from my eyes.

“Not feeling well?” he guessed. I nodded.

“Well how about we go to the tea room and get you some of that prego tea and then get a pedicure?”

I laughed. “You’ll get a pedicure?”

He smiled. “If they don’t run screaming away from my ugly feet, sure I will. I’m very secure in my masculinity. Brian gets pedicures all the time.”

I slowly sat up. For a moment the room spun. I clasped a hand over my mouth.

“Too late for the tea?” Nick guessed sitting up fast. I nodded as I ran towards the bathroom.

So much for not feeling pregnant; today baby Carter was clearly reminding me what the first trimester felt like.

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“Better?” Nick asked.

We sat at a small table with a beautiful view of the mountains. My hands wrapped around my mug of ginger tea. I nodded gratefully. Nick’s hands rested gently over mine. We sat just staring into each other’s faces for the longest time. I felt like I had every single laugh line in his face memorized. I knew him so much more intimately than I had ever known anyone in my entire life.

“I wish that it hadn’t taken me so long to meet you,” Nick said.

“The important thing is that we met,” I reminded him.

“True,” he conceded. He dropped his hands and reached for a scone. “Plus, if we had met earlier you probably would have gone sniffing around Brian. Then I would have had to kick his ass. And it wouldn’t have been pretty.”

I laughed. “If I had met you guys before Brian was married I would have only been sixteen and Brian would have landed his ass in jail if he gave me attention.”

Nick grinned. “True.”

After finishing my tea I felt a little better. We walked hand and hand to the spa. Fifteen minutes later we were sitting in side by side chairs.

“Can you take a picture for us?” I asked before the masseuses began. One of the girl’s took the camera.

“Absolutely.”

She stood back. Nick and I leaned over our chairs until our heads touched. She took a couple shots and handed me the camera back.

“Thank you,” I said as she knelt down at my feet.

I’ve only had a couple of pedicures in my life, most of them being within the last year. I fondly called Leighanne the pedicure queen. But, I had never had a pedicure like the one I was currently undergoing. The masseuses scrubbed vigorously at my feet. I struggled not to wince. Nick looked like he was going to crawl out of his skin.

“You girls are insane,” Nick whispered to me.

“I thought you were secure in your masculinity?”

“I am. But males are wimps.”

I laughed.

At just the moment that even I thought I couldn’t take it anymore, the scrubbing finally stopped.

“The scrub was to refresh the skin and stimulate circulation,” my masseuse explained. I glanced down at my red feet. I was pretty sure she had ripped almost every single layer of skin off my feet.

“Well, thank you,” I said kindly.

“Oh, we’re not done.”

“We’re not?” Nick asked.

His masseuse smiled. “Oh, no. Now comes the fun part.”

Both girls opened the floor to reveal two identical stone pits. They knelt down beside the pit and began to rub an amazing smelling lotion into our feet.

“What is this?” I asked, inhaling deeply.

“Lavender and peppermint oils. They’re a natural massage tool to alleviate aches and pains.”

“It smells amazing,” I said. My masseuse smiled.

“Wonderful. Now stick your feet in the coals.”

“What?”

“The oils have to heat up on your feet for the full effect. You have to put your feet on the coals.”

“You know how they have shrimp on the Barbie?” Nick said. “This is like putting your feet on the Barbie.”

I glanced over at Nick. “Then you go first!”

A look washed over his face. I think he forgot that he was getting the same pedicure as I was.

“Er…”

“Go ahead, dear,” I said. I pointed towards his coal pit.

With a little trepidation, he lowered his feet on the coals. As they hit the stones I saw a look of relief cross his face.

“They’re not hot; just warm. It feels like putting your feet by a fireplace.”

As someone who loves warming my feet by a fire, I copied him. He was right; it felt wonderful. The smell of lavender and peppermint intensified.

The pedicure lasted an hour. As we walked out and back up to our room, I felt a million times better than I had in the morning.

“I have a good feeling about that smile,” Nick teased. I laughed.

“I’m just relaxed. I feel better.”

“Good enough to bundle up and go outside for a romantic dinner for two on the cliff top tonight?”

I think even if I was dead I would have told him I felt good enough for that.

“Absolutely.”

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“I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The hotel had set us up with a private little dinner table and our own butler as we sat on the cliff tops watching the sunset. We had opted for grilled chicken salads for dinner considering the temperature outside, but really I could barely eat. The sunset cast a glowing shadow across Nick’s face that kept me coming back to his eyes time and time again.

“It’s delicious,” Nick said, catching my eye for the umpteenth time. He held out his fork to me. With a smile I leaned over and took the salad. After I had swallowed, Nick leaned over and kissed me softly.

We stayed outside until the last golden rays of sunset dipped below the mountains. As the cold air began to blow in Nick stood up. Our butler seemed to appear from thin air.

“All finished sir?”

“Yes, thank you,” Nick said, passing him a sizeable tip.

Nick pressed me close, his hand rubbing my arm as we walked back towards the hotel. We hadn’t seen any paparazzi or any fans. It had been a perfect day.

“So if you’re feeling okay tomorrow I thought we could take a little walk and see the Three Sisters rock formation,” Nick said.

“That sounds great.”

“And then the day after that we’ll drive north and do some koala cuddling.”

“What?” I said with a laugh.

“It’s illegal in Sydney, but north of here you can actually hug a koala.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, they’re really cute little boogers. I fed one a euchre-leaptus leaf one time.”

I stopped halfway through the lobby. Nick turned.

“What?”

“A what leaf?”

“A euchre-leaptus leaf.”

“A eucalyptus leaf?”

“Yeah. Wha’ did I say?”

“Euchre-leaptus.”

“Same thing.”

I smiled. “What would I do without your Nick-isms?”

“Life would be really, really boring,” Nick said seriously. I looped my arms around his neck from behind. He bucked forward a little bit, pulling me onto his back. He carried me that way up to the room.

“Your legs feel great,” he said as he nudged the door closed with his foot.

“Really?”

“Mmhmm. Smooth. Silky. And they smell like candy.”

“That turns you on doesn’t it?”

“Air turns me on.”

I laughed.

At least he was honest.