Page 85 of The Final Beat

“Fucking hell.” He blinked slowly as he shook his head. “I’m shocked. Totally shocked. You and Destiny. In love.”

“I love her.” I scoffed. “Not so sure she loves me.”

“If you thought she did then I’m sure she does,” he said, placating me. “Like you said, she’s probably just scared. One thing is for sure, you can’t leave in the next couple of hours without speaking to her.” He reached forward and slapped a hand on my knee. “You can’t go away for six months without speaking to her, Joey.”

The idea of not seeing her before I left made my palms sweaty, but I was sure we’d said everything that we were going to say the night before.

“I don’t want to,” I stressed. “I can’t tell you how bad the need is to see her. It’s gnawing away at me, but she was clear about the fact that was how it was going to be.”

Ronnie’s eyes shone and I couldn’t stand having to watch him cry. Me wanting to weep was bad enough, I didn’t want to have to cling to Ronnie while we both sobbed.

“Just call her, Joe,” he said, with sympathy and empathy showing in his face. “Call her one more time before you leave.”

As my chest clenched with pain, I nodded. I knew he was right. I had to give it one last try, otherwise I’d regret it for the rest of my days.

“I’ll ring her. I’m going to ring her now,” I said.

“Good.” Ronnie stood and came to me. Wrapping his arm around my shoulders he stooped down and kissed the top of my head. “It’ll be fine, mate, I know it will.”

I looked up at him and gave him a small smile. “I hope so, Ron, I really do.”

“What do you want to do about the airport?” he asked. “Do you want me to take you or are you going to cancel the flight?”

“Shit.” My head sagged between my shoulders as I groaned. “I can’t not go, but I don’t want to go until I’ve spoken to her.”

“So, try her now.” He shook my shoulder, forcing me to look up at him. “Get your phone out and call her now.”

He was nodding enthusiastically, urging me on. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and hit Destiny’s number. As soon as it rang out I jumped up out of the chair and started to pace the room. Ronnie moved out of my way as I strode, watching me carefully with his arms firmly crossed over his chest.

“It’s just ringing out,” I said, panic setting in as I knew time was moving on. “I can’t miss that flight, Ron, but I need to speak to Daisy.”

“Daisy?”

I hit recall on my phone. “Yeah, it’s what I call her. She loves daisies. I buy her daisies.”

“Right,” he said with a smirk. “Daisies. I get you.”

“Oh, fuck off, you’re the one who has to ring your girlfriend every half hour when you’re not with her.”

“Because she’s pregnant, numb nuts, that’s why, and for your information once the boys are here, we’re getting married. So, that kind of makes her my fiancée.”

“We all know that you’re getting married. You told us ages ago, before Jimmy died.”

He shrugged and curled his top lip like a stroppy teenager. “And?”

“Nothing. I’m just saying that you’re laughing at daisies when you call yourfiancéeall the time.” When my call wasn’t answered, I hit redial again. “Anyway, why haven’t you bought her a ring, you fucking tight arse?”

“I have,” he protested. “She doesn’t know. She thinks we’re going to go together to pick one, but I’ve already got it. It was one she saw ages ago. I’m going to give it to her the day the boys are born.”

I blinked at him. “You might want to rethink that one, mate. I doubt she’ll be feeling ready to celebrate, she’ll be bloody knackered.”

Redial.

“I’m not going to do it just as the last one pops out, am I?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“I’m going to give her a couple of hours.”

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