8. Maggie
Chapter eight
Maggie
I didn’t know what I thought I would be doing at twenty-two years old, but never in my wildest dreams did I imagine sitting in the passenger seat next to Jack Hennicke, thanking him for pretending we were married.
Or silently swooning about the soft blanket wrapped around my shoulders and the pillow behind my lower back.
Yeah, wild things were happening these days.
We didn’t talk about specific details after the phone call. Jack asked me what I thought about everything, and I asked him for a few moments to process it.
Except a few moments turned into an hour, and an hour turned into me inwardly spiraling about the fact that I promised I would never get married, let alone to a polo player.
No way in hell was I ending up in the same situation as my mother.
Absent as she was, she taught me one thing in my nine years of knowing her: all men were the same, and you were bound to get hurt if you thought otherwise.
Jack likely fit in the same box as my dad.
He would step up at first and leave me blindsided and dismantled when another woman came along.
After thinking about her —the once maternal figure in my life that had become a stranger—I fell silent.
A few hours after Jack dropped the bomb about me being his fake wife , it began getting dark, and Jack was becoming dazed and unfocused.
We had another hour until we reached our first overnight stop, but he’d been driving for eight hours, only stopping twice for gas.
It had been a long day. I let my eyes settle on his thick hands gripping the steering wheel.
The intensity of his grip matched the frustration I was feeling about everything: confused, terrified, shocked.
As well as he had taken the news about my pregnancy, I wasn’t sure how he truly felt.
I didn’t know Jack. He was still the little kid I grew up with, playing behind the trailers with all those years.
While the last few weeks had taught me he was a decent person and we meshed well when working together, it had nothing on knowing the father of my baby.
Whether we liked it or not, we were going to be connected for the rest of our lives.
I trusted that Jack cared for his horses like they were people, but how did I know how he would treat a baby ?
“Hey.” Jack broke me out of my thoughts. “You awake?”
“Yeah.” I rubbed my eyes, hoping he didn’t notice my staring. “Are you?”
“Barely.” He brushed a hand through his blonde hair and scratched the back of his neck. His voice was low and gravelly.
“One more hour,” I reminded him.
“Nah, that GPS is off. We’re only twenty minutes out.”
“Oh…really?” I perked up.
“Yeah. Don’t get too excited, though. It’s a tiny little cottage next to the barn.”
“All I’m excited about is a bed,” I sighed.
It took me a beat to realize he might’ve taken that differently than I had meant it. I turned to find him blinking slowly at the road, one side of his lips turned up.
“Not like that.” I rolled my eyes. That triggered the question that had been brewing in the back of my mind: what were we now?
I clearly wasn’t in the right headspace to do anything with him, but we would be living together for the next few months.
In the same house. Possibly even in the same room.
And tonight, it would most definitely be in the same bed.
“Like what?” he asked.
“What?”
“I don’t know, I just got to thinking…do we—”
“Jack?”
“Yeah, Mags?”
“Can we figure it out later?”
“Of course.” He nodded grimly.
I suddenly felt uncomfortable. Everything about this relationship seemed to shift whenever a new topic was brought up, and it threw me.
Tonight, though, was not the time to talk about it.
The events of today—and the last three days—had shaken me, and I didn’t want to deal with any more change. I just needed a breather.
Jack pulled the truck and trailer down a dark, gravel driveway and flipped his high beams on to see through the pitch black night.
I shifted in my seat and adjusted the waistband of my leggings, then glanced at Jack, who tore his eyes away from me.
His tongue ran across his lips as my gaze stayed on his face.
“Eyes on the road.” My cheeks burned.
Jack put the truck in park and turned off the ignition, but left on the headlights to shine on the gate in front of us.
I leaped out of the cab, excited to finally stretch my legs.
We met at the back of the trailer, and I let my eyes travel down his body.
His tight, black t-shirt hugged his massive shoulders and biceps impossibly well, and the dark jeans he wore looked too good.
He looked too good.
I watched him closely as he unhooked the latches on the trailer, opening the pair of doors one by one. The concentration in his expression made my whole body tight, and I shut my eyes and shivered before opening them back up to help him.
“Will you hand me the horses, and I’ll let them through the gate?” He turned, catching me in a daze.
“Yeah,” I answered quickly. Just get away from me so I can stop looking at you.
He left me alone to open the gate, and I stepped up into the trailer to meet the eyes of ten curious horses. They were exhausted from the drive and restless to leave the aluminum box they had been inside for nine hours.
I felt that.
Untying the first two horses’ lead ropes, I led them out of the trailer and towards the front of the rig, where Jack opened the gate.
He met me with a slight nod and took them from me, while I raced to escape his eye contact.
We might’ve had that trailer emptied in record time.
I was desperate to find my own space and wallow in my lust and confusion and all of the overwhelming feelings I got around Jack Hennicke.
“Ray said he left the cottage unlocked for us,” Jack grunted as he lifted our suitcases out of the backseat of the truck. “You can head in if you want.”
“Oh, are we—like, is there just one room?” I was not in the right headspace to share a bed with this man.
“Yeah, just the one. It’s a tiny place, so the bed is probably a double.” He shook his head when I offered to take a suitcase and nodded toward the impending cottage of doom.
I stepped through the threshold and felt around for the light switch, but came up with nothing. The floor creaked beneath me as I held my hands out to feel around for anything. The sound of the suitcases dropping to the ground startled me, and I jumped as I felt Jack’s presence close behind me.
“Feel familiar?” He whispered from a few inches away. His hot breath on my neck brought me back to that night in the gift shop. The night that changed both of our lives.
I whipped around to face him, but he was so close that I lost my balance and gripped his shirt to steady myself.
His hands instantly reached for my shoulders.
Warmth seeped into my skin from his fingers.
A sudden flash of memories of his hands on my body— everywhere on my body—rushed through my mind.
Even though it was dark, his deep eyes pierced into mine, clear as glass.
My heart picked up speed as one of his hands brushed a stray hair out of my face.
Shivers fled down my spine as I shuddered at his touch.
His breathing picked up from our proximity.
My fingers itched to touch him, feel him, feel anything, anywhere.
It felt like it had been months since I last held him.
Our fun, no-strings relationship felt like a lifetime ago.
But here he was, right now, watching me again, licking his bottom lip, his expression as intense as it always was before he had me. I wanted to kiss him. So fucking bad.
Abort! Back up!
This couldn’t be happening. I wouldn’t let it.
The last thing I needed was to screw up the unlabeled relationship I had with my new baby daddy.
I had no idea where we stood, and I wasn’t acting on anything until we established that.
Whatever I was feeling could not get in the way.
I squeezed my eyes closed and took a deep breath, jumping away from his touch. “We can’t do this.”
“I know.”
“We can’t do this, Jack.”
His gaze softened, his eyes showing…disappointment? I couldn’t tell if it was because he was heavy with lust or if he truly wanted me .
“We won’t do it, Maggie.” His voice was stern, and he kept his eyes on me until I couldn’t stand his presence any longer.
I turned to find a bathroom—finally one with a light!
—shut the door, and let myself be alone.
Facing the mirror and realizing my hair looked like a bird’s nest atop my head, I turned on the faucet and dunked my face into the sink.
Splashed cold water onto my cheeks as if I had just woken up from a nightmare.
Except it wasn’t a nightmare. It was real life.
A real life in which I shared a child with Jack Hennicke.
Jack Hennicke, whom I would never, ever have a real relationship with, let alone marry .
What the hell had my life come to?
***
I slid into bed after a hot shower, unaware of Jack’s whereabouts until I heard the shower turn on a few minutes later.
I fell asleep for a few hours, then woke up, finding Jack curled next to me, close enough to feel his body heat radiating onto my skin.
We had never slept in a bed together. In fact, I wasn’t sure I had ever slept an entire night in a bed with any man.
But feeling his skin so close to touching mine felt intimate in a way sex would never amount to.
Trying to turn over and go back to sleep, a thousand thoughts came rushing in again.
Why did I run away?
Why didn’t I tell my dad I was pregnant?
How are we going to raise a child together while we’re both so young?
Where will the closest doctor be in Golden Meadow?
Great, this was exactly what I needed.
One minute, I was finally feeling okay with the man next to me, and the next, I was questioning everything about our choices, his promises, my sanity.
It was a rollercoaster I was not prepared for, and I wasn’t sure how long I could endure—and it was only the beginning.
I was only, what, six weeks pregnant? Another eight months of this, plus a lifetime of motherhood, nearly gave me a panic attack.
I tried to focus on my breathing like my mother taught me when I was young and dealing with pressure.
Deep breath in, there you go, Magdaline. Anytime you feel worried like this again, just close your eyes and breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth. Ready to try again?
I flipped onto my back and tried to remember my mother’s words.
God, I wish I had her now. As gutted as I felt about her leaving our family, only a mother could understand what I was going through, and I wasn’t really up for talking to a stranger.
I began to think about if she ever came back or tried to get in touch with me.
Whether or not I would respond kindly was still a question circling in my mind.
Yes, my dad did an awful thing, cheating on her, but that, in no way, constituted her leaving in the middle of the night.
There was no custody battle, no note, no communication.
Nothing. We were her past, and, clearly, she had no reason to come back.
Despite how complicated everything felt with Jack, I promised never, ever to put our child through that. They would always know how much both of their parents loved them. They would never have to worry about being abandoned or forgotten as I had been.
I turned again, my back facing Jack, before I heard him stir under the covers.
“Mags,” he breathed from behind me. His rough fingertips grazed my bare hip, and gooseflesh broke out in their wake.
I rolled over to face him. Jack’s eyes were sleepy, focused on my collarbone.
Taking in a deep breath, his hand moved to touch my shoulder.
His fingers dusted across my skin, and I began to breathe deeper.
I tried to let myself relax—closed my eyes, and leaned into his touch.
Enjoyed his touch. For this one moment, just maybe, I could stop thinking about everything.
I wouldn’t be his, but I could be for tonight.
“What are you thinking, Maggie?”
His eyes searched mine. Who was this man? Somehow, I knew, but in another way, I felt like I knew nothing. The way he looked at me told me that he wanted to know me, that he cared .
I squinted. “I’m terrified.” My voice was still shaky. “There’s a baby, our baby, inside of me. We’re so young. How do we even know how to do this?”
“Hey, hey. We’re in this together, okay?” He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into him. The scent of leather hit me instantly, and my lungs worked a little easier.
God, he was so warm. So big. So protective.
A shield.
“Jack, you have to promise me something,” I whispered into his chest.
“Anything.”
My breath caught.
Anything.
I pulled my head back to look into his eyes. His deep, captivating eyes. “You have to promise me that, no matter what, you will always love this baby. That they will never feel unloved or unwanted.”
“Mags,” he sighed and searched my eyes for some kind of answer I didn’t have.
“This baby,” he reached down to graze a hand on my stomach.
I knew it was to touch the baby, not me, but my breath still left my lungs.
“This baby is always going to come first. They will be loved and wanted in all the ways we weren’t.
Think about this, Maggie. This is all we’ve got: each other and the baby.
We’re two fucking days into this, and your concern tells me that you already love what’s growing inside of you.
I know you care for them and about us being good parents.
We’re in this together. I promise. I’ve got you through all of it. ”
And maybe it was the sleepiness of his voice, or maybe it was just the raw vulnerability he had just laid out in front of me, but his accent crept in halfway through his monologue, and tears brimmed in my eyes.
He didn’t tell me what we were to each other, and I didn’t ask.
If we could live in our bubble of figuring out one thing at a time, I would take it.
Jack pulled me closer than before, and we lay like that until our breathing relaxed and sleep took over.