Rachael lives in the Swan Valley with her hyperactive husband, three mostly gorgeous heroes-in-training, two ravenous cats, a cantankerous bird and a very badly behaved dog.
Rachael loves to hear from readers and can be contacted via her website rachaeljohns.com. She is also on Facebook and Instagram.
Also by Rachael Johns:
The Patterson Girls
The Art of Keeping Secrets
The Greatest Gift
Lost Without You
Just One Wish
The Rose Hill novels
Talk of the Town
Something to Talk About
The Bunyip Bay novels
Outback Dreams
Outback Blaze
Outback Ghost
Outback Sisters
The Hope Junction novels
Jilted
The Road to Hope
Man Drought
The Kissing Season (e-novella)
The Next Season (e-novella)
Secret Confessions Down and Dusty: Casey (e-novella)
www.harlequinbooks.com.au
This one’s for the boy who broke my heart at seventeen, which led
me to start writing. It’s probably about time I thanked you!
I married beneath me. All women do.
—Nancy Astor
Contents
Praise
Also by Rachael Johns
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
1
Perth
It was seven o’clock in the morning and I was cutting oranges for Payton’s soccer game when Adrian casually asked if I’d heard of nest parenting.
I paused and searched my memory. It sounded vaguely familiar—like I’d read about the concept online or heard it discussed in one of the many podcasts I listened to. Although I’m almost forty, I pride myself on my memory and, sure enough, I recalled there was a mum who had a kid in the year below at Saxon’s school who was nest parenting with her husband. Or rather ex-husband!
‘Yeah, what about it?’ I said, as I bent to get a large container from our Tupperware drawer.
Adrian took a sip of his coffee, then, ‘I was thinking we should give it a try.’
And that is the exact moment the bottom fell out of my world!
2
I had to have heard wrong or at least misunderstood. Or maybe Adrian had.
How did he even know what nest parenting was? It wasn’t like he usually concerned himself with the day-to-day minutiae of our kids’ world, never mind other people’s. Adrian’s world revolved around his podiatry clinic and (currently) cycling.