Twelve Days The Beginning

Chapter Nine

Elise woke to her alarm clock after a fitful night. She kept dreaming about Dale and Vaughn. In one dream, she was with Dale and in the other she was with Vaughn. Eventually, both dreams merged into one and both men realised that she was cheating on each of them and all hell had broken loose. The end result hadn’t been pretty and Elise was infinitely grateful when she woke up to normal life.

Well, as normal as her life got these days.

Trudging downstairs, she checked in on Cole who was still asleep. She needed to wake him up and get him home before she went to meet Celeste at the precinct. Not that she had a problem with him being here but it wouldn’t be long before one of her neighbours noticed his car and although she wasn’t especially friendly with any of them, she wouldn’t put it past one particular neighbour to mention the strange car to Dale ‘in passing’.

Making two cups of strong coffee, she headed into the lounge and gently began to shake Cole. She couldn’t believe how beautiful this man was even with all the cuts and bruises which looked even angrier now in the light of day. He was totally relaxed in sleep and she revelled in being able to watch him in these moments when his guard was down.

Mentally, she began comparing him to Vaughn; both men were beautiful but in a different way. Vaughn was more striking; darker and definitely more dangerous. Wait, she was sitting here comparing Cole and Vaughn when her husband was recovering in the hospital, for Christ’s sake! Her priorities were seriously screwed.

Shaking herself, she pushed against Cole a bit harder and finally managed to rouse him. She watched as he opened his eyes and took a moment to work out where he was. She saw the instant that clarity hit and he turned to face her, gorgeous chocolate eyes meeting her baby blues.

“Hey, beautiful.” he said, yawning and stretching a little. “Now this is the way to wake up. My seriously hot best friend and a cup of strong coffee. I must have died and gone to heaven.”

Chuckling, she shoved him good-naturedly. “You need to get your lazy ass out of bed, Cole Andrews. Whilst I love having you stay the night, I really don’t want to provide any more gossip fodder for the neighbours. Besides, I have a hot date!”

Cole choked on his mouthful of coffee. “A hot date! What the ........?”

“Ha! Got you there!” she said, “Although if I did have a hot date it would be absolutely none of your business.”

“If you had a hot date my sweet-cheeked best friend, I can assure you that it would be my business and I would find myself siding with your toe-rag of a husband which is something that I didn’t think would happen until hell froze over!”



She laughed at the seriousness of his expression. “Alright, keep your hair on! I was only joking! I’m going to meet Celeste at the precinct to go shopping. She wants to get a killer dress for clubbing tonight and she seems to think that I’m the perfect person to help her.”

“Are you going?” Cole asked.

“Going where? To the precinct? I just said I was.”

“No. Are you going clubbing?”

“No, not that I know of. Hadn’t thought about it to be honest. Dale would never let me go so it’s not really worth thinking about.”

“I thought Dale was in the hospital ‘til tomorrow,” Cole said, “If you didn’t tell him, how would he know that you’d been out? You should go, you deserve a bit of a break and a chance to let your hair down. I would offer to come with you but, what with the state of my face and my recent personal revelation, I’m feeling just a tiny bit fragile.” He looked saddened for a moment and Elise reached over to brush her hand against his cheek.

“That’s OK, baby. I appreciate the thought but I won’t be going anyway. I’m thirty-one now Cole. A bit too old for nightclubs!”

“Hardly.” he said but he dropped the subject anyway and finished his coffee.

Ten minutes later she had managed to shoo him out of the house, promising to call him when she got back. She needed to have a shower but first she needed to phone the hospital to check on Dale.

The nurse that answered the call assured Elise that he’d had a good night and that they were hoping to complete all their tests today so that he could come home in the morning. She said that they had been concerned about the level of alcohol in his bloodstream but that he didn’t seem to be fighting too many withdrawal symptoms today so they were hopeful that he would have a calm and quiet day. Couldn’t be any worse than yesterday, Elise reflected as she thanked the nurse and hung up. She had promised to go and see him later as soon as visitors were permitted and so she found herself in the strange position of having a day completely to herself. No Dale to worry about, moaning and groaning and telling her what she could and couldn’t do. She felt her heart lift and almost skipped around, as she got ready to go and meet Celeste.



Celeste was waiting at the monument at 9.30am as promised and they fell into an easy banter as they ambled around the precinct. Accustomed to spending as little time as possible shopping so as to keep Dale happy, Elise found the whole experience odd but really rather enjoyable and it wasn’t long before she was getting into the spirit of the day.

After leaving yet another dress shop, still without a killer dress, they decided to stop for a coffee and take a well earned break. As they sat watching other customers bustling about, Elise’s eyes fell on a mother and young baby, which reminded her about Bobby and Helen’s news.

“Hey ‘Leste” she said “We should see if we can find something for Bobby and Helen. Cole said they had a girl, isn’t that great?”

“Yeah, I know.” said Celeste “It was buzzing round the office yesterday but I think that with all your dramas, you kind of missed it.”

Elise rolled her eyes, “Don’t remind me!”

Celeste laughed and they continued with their drinks and muffins in silent contemplation.

After a while, Elise spoke again. “So, you definitely going clubbing tonight then, ‘Leste?”

“Abso – freaking – lutely” she said. “Now that I know that none of the hotties in the office are interested in me then I need to tout my wares elsewhere.”

“Ha ha, very funny. You know that you only have to say the word and Stephen will come running!”

“Hotties, Elise – I said HOTTIES!” Celeste snorted indignantly, causing Elise to burst into fits of laughter and almost choke on the rest of her coffee.

“Which club are you going to anyway?” she asked when she could finally breathe again. “Cole reckoned that I should go with you but I told him that I am waaaaaay too old for that! Honestly, I wonder about that boy sometimes.”

“Maybe he’s got a point.” Celeste said and Elise found herself rolling her eyes again. This was getting to be a seriously bad habit. She needed to have words with the eye-rolling part of her brain.

“We’re going to Indigo,” Celeste continued, “just outside Eastwood on the coast road. It’s new; not long opened and they are doing free entry for ladies tonight. You should come, it’ll be a laugh! And don’t worry about the age thing; it’s an over-25’s night.”

“I don’t know, ‘Leste,” Elise said hesitantly, “it’s not really my thing. I don’t tend to go out other than to work functions. I would feel totally out of place.”

“How can you possibly know you’ll feel out of place when you’ve never been before? Look, I’ve asked Annabel and Amelia and I think Olivia said she would come too so that’s already four people that you know...”

Elise refrained from pointing out that she didn’t consider any of those girls to be her friend. Instead, she asked something else as another thought struck her.

“Hang on....Aren’t they too young if it’s an over-25’s night?”

Celeste shrugged “Amelia is 25, I think, and Annabel and Olivia reckon they’ll have no trouble. I think they are planning on finding themselves some older men. So, are you coming or not?”



That sounded about right. Amelia was still trying to make Cole jealous despite her performance with Stephen the other night and, from what Elise knew of Annabel and Olivia, getting their claws into an older man would fit right into their style. Did she really want to go and witness that?

Elise thought for a moment and suddenly realised that she hadn’t done anything even remotely reckless for a very long time. As annoying as the others could be, it would be entertaining watching them and the thought of losing herself completely in the music was really starting to appeal. She was a free agent tonight so she supposed that she could go. Dale would still be in the hospital and need never know. Perhaps a girlie night out would be just what was needed. She could have some fun, have a few drinks and forget all about the men in her life for one whole evening. Particularly one man with a killer body and the darkest eyes she had ever seen. She had a feeling though that forgetting about him, would take a hell of a lot more than a nightclub and a few drinks. Suddenly though, going out tonight seemed like the perfect plan and smiling her acceptance, she turned to Celeste.

“’Leste, we are now looking for two killer dresses. Count me in!”