Hand On Heart: Sequel to Head Over Heels Read Online Free PDF

live. It was only a few short months since the lowest point of her life, but now Grace couldn’t be happier.  Secure in her relationship with Tom, they had the impending arrival of the twins to look forward to, followed by their wedding day.  Life couldn’t be better.
     
July 2015
     
    Grace was enjoying the freedom of the summer holidays; the past year had been more than a little hectic as she’d gone back to working full time once the twins started at her school.  The two days a week she’d worked whilst they were still in nursery seemed a dim and distant memory, and so easy, compared to the stresses and strains of a full week of work.  She was finding that fitting in the job during the working day was the easy part, but the juggling started when they all left for the day.  Lily and Jack were too young to stay for afterschool clubs yet, and so she was unable to stay either, to get on top of her marking and prep like she used to.  That all had to be left to the evenings, and fitted in when they had gone to bed.  And so most nights she was utterly ravaged by the routine of feeding, bathing and reading stories by the time she could get her books out and get down to work. 
    It was only fair that the twins had her full attention when they came home from school; she felt guilty about not spending enough time with them anyway – which she knew was ludicrous really, but it was every parent’s dilemma – and couldn’t even bring herself to park them in front of the TV for an hour to get a little work done before she cooked their tea.  Life would be a lot easier next year when they would be allowed to stay for a couple of clubs and she would have an extra hour at the end of school.  It would make some small difference, at least.
    ‘You have to stop beating yourself up all the time, Grace,’ Tom had said one night, when the pressures of her mad work/life balance were proving particularly stressful.  She had collapsed in tears as they were going to bed, feeling guilty about not giving her all to either the twins or her job.  Tom thought she was doing perfectly well at both, but she wouldn’t be told, and thought he was just trying to placate her.  ‘You can’t do everything.  Look, we’re a bit better off now, aren’t we, so why don’t you increase Karina’s hours a couple of afternoons a week when we go back in September?’
    Karina was the young Polish woman they had taken on to do the cleaning and a bit of ironing when the babies had been small.  She was an absolute Godsend; diligent in her cleaning and ironing duties, she had also proved herself a real hit with the twins, and they gazed at her with their big googly baby eyes as she babbled to them and tickled their tummies as they lay in their cots. Grace had hung onto her, just for a couple of hours a week, when she went back to work, to help keep the housework under control, and it seemed now that they could really do with more of her help again.  Karina would be thrilled to be asked to do some childcare, Grace was sure of it.  It was just her own conscience she needed to convince.
    ‘We can afford it, you’re right.  I have to learn to let go a little here.  But they’re my babies, I want to be the one to bring them up.’
    ‘Look, a couple of hours a week after school isn’t going to make them think Karina is their mother and not you, is it?  Even if all she does is take them to the park for an hour, then bring them back and do their tea, then you can stay on at school till you’re all done, and the time you have at home with them will be quality time, no work, and no stressing about when you’re going to get it done.’
    ‘I suppose you’re right,’ Grace said.  It wasn’t like she was handing them over to a nanny or anything; it would only be a few hours a week but would make such a difference to their lives.  She’d have more time to spend with Tom, too, which would be great.  He tended to go into school early and get home