Chapter Ten
Jillian
Saying goodbye is the absolute worst.
Doing it before sunrise on a horse as if escaping a crime is the worst. Untangling myself from an embrace I never wanted to break was hard. Kissing Jacob’s soft lips as tears slip down my cheeks, his soft voice calling my name is even harder. I can hardly do it. Almost snuggle back in his warmth, putting off the inevitable goodbye neither of us want to say.
I get on that horse and ride back to Iron H Ranch, tears blurring my vision. Still, I am smiling as I watch the sunrise over the hills, feeling the cool morning breeze on my skin. It feels wrong leaving him behind, not giving a proper goodbye or thanking him for all he has done for me.
To be honest it feels wrong to leave him at all.
This is not a romance story or a hot rom com where we get the ending we hope for. It is life. Goodbyes happen even if we rather they didn’t. Hurt happens even if we try to avoid it. Growing, changing, accepting new things, trying to welcome new people in is always hard yet always a good thing.
Coming here was no mistake. Even if I feared it would be. Being with Jacob was the best thing I have had in so long. I am alive again, awakened to the truth that you can let go of dreams to start new ones. Dreams have no limit, no end—even if you have to start one all over again.
“Time to go home, Jilly Bean.”
Sitting in a taxi I am hit by how hard this is going to be. Pulling away from the ranch makes my chest hurt. I turn back just to see a horse riding through the gray morning. Jacob. He cannot get to me; cannot tell me he wants me to stay—not when I want to stay. It is not about me or him. My life is not here, my happy ending is not here even if we believed for a moment this weekend it could be.
Jacob gave me all he could, but I cannot give him the same.
Five Weeks Later...
Clutching a ceramic throne, cool tile against my face, I have little reason to laugh. Little excuse for the smile on my face as another wave of nausea hits me. Still, as I empty my basically emptied stomach, wiping drool from my mouth in the least attractive form ever, I am grinning ear to ear.
Because even before I glance at the pink stick, before I visit the doctor for tests that will confirm what I know, I am thinking about babies. About seeing my little baby with his cowboy hat on and tiny boots. Watching Jacob hoist a little version of himself up on a pony to take him for his first ride.
Pressing my hand to my belly, I laugh. Here I am, assuming it is a boy. With my little princess, I knew it was a girl. We both had wanted a girl. Thinking about Jocie having a little brother turns my laugh into a sob.
“How do I tell Jacob? How do we do this?”
It has been five weeks. Thirty-five days. It took two days to want a lifetime with him. Leaving that ranch was the hardest thing I have ever done. Harder than admitting a dream marriage, house, hell my whole dream life was over. Until a few days ago, I convinced myself another dream was over.
On the first morning, it was the smell of coffee. It smelled just like the strong stuff Jacob brewed over the fire while we camped. I thought my reaction was because I was missing him. I was wrong. Next it was the sweetness my favorite tea being too sweet. Last night it truly hit me.
“I am pregnant with Jacob’s little cowboy.”
Cleaning myself up, I climb to my feet even as dizziness has me stumbling. Weaving through the packed boxes that fill my bedroom, I seal the final one with a strip of tape. Packing while being pregnant is no fun. Not that it ever is. Thankfully, my former husband is all hands-on deck while we get the old dream home on the market.
“How you holding up?” He wonders as he stands at the doorway, bouncing an animated Jocie on his hip.
For a moment, just a breath of time, I am back in time. Our first night here, a big cheese pizza on the bed, my stomach swollen with our little girl. We hoped to have our entire lives here together. For the first time, I am not sad that we won’t get to have that together. Because with Jocie, we will always be a part of each other’s lives so we’re both blessed.
“Better than with that little monster,” I tease, pointing an accusing finger at my little girl. Elliot laughs, giving her a tickle as a teasing punishment.
“True, you seem...lighter. Easier the second time?”
“Besides the guilt, the confusion, the total heartache, yeah.”
“Jill, go back to Jacob. Tell him what he deserves to know. Not just about the baby,” he insists in a way that makes it sound so simple. “You have not stopped talking about your cowboy. I doubt you ever will. I gave my blessing, Jill. Jocie thinks cowboys are just tops,” he teases again, both of us laughing as she hoists her pink horse up as if agreeing with him.
“That makes two of us, huh Jocie?” We laugh again as she claps her hand, making her horse ride through the air.
Downstairs, a knock sounds at the door, startling us both. Thinking it might be the pizza, the last we will have in this house, I playfully push him out of the way. Jocie laughs at how we race down the stairs towards the door. Throwing it open dramatically, I gasp at what is on the other side.
Leather, grass, sunshine scents hit me. My cowboy.
“Cowboy! Mama, cowboy!”
Blinking at the big, beautiful cowboy standing before me, I nod. It is all I can do. I am not breathing, not the way I ought to be. Inside my chest, my heart stops for longer than it should before it gallops as fast as Jocie’s pink horse. Sunshine shimmers behind his hat, making him seem to be a mirage.
“Jilly Bean,” his voice breaks as he stares down at me, towering over all of us as he takes up all the space in the doorway.
His eyes eat me up and for a moment, it is just the two of us. I know my daughter is there watching us. Elliot too. Neither of them registers for me. All I see is his light eyes, smell his sweet, earthy scent, feel him aching for me the way I have been aching for him.
Those eyes slide past me, flashing with pain at what they find. I grip my chest as it twists because damn, it hurts to see him hurting. To see him think for one second I used him before coming back to my life here. He starts to back up before I am stunned when Elliot steps forward.
“Come on in. I am just leaving since we’re packed up. Jill, let me deal with the realtor. Something tells me you might be otherwise occupied. Tell mama bye for tonight, little bug. Mama has a cowboy to talk to.”
“Cowboy,” Jocie giggles, reaching towards his hat. Jacob grins at her, dimple flashing, eyes lighting back up. Taking it off his head, he sets it on hers with a plop. Our little girl laughs and laughs, tugging it down.
“Not getting that back, partner,” Elliot tells him, the two sharing a look I cannot decipher. “See both of you tomorrow.”
We both watch them go, Jocie blowing kisses at us with her little hands. Once they back out of the drive he moves as fast as a comic book hero. Rushing me, he lifts me up, kicking the door shut with a booming thud, whirling to pin me to it. I shriek, almost laughing as he slams me against the door with a vibrating growl.
“Did I come to get you too late, Jilly Bean?”
“Y-you’re here to get me?”
“Course I am honey. Didn’t take too long did I?”
“N-no. No, Jacob, you got here just in time.”
“Fuck, I miss you,” he hums, pressing his face against my throat as I work my fingers through his hair.
Fingers tunneling in my hair, he yanks me down, his mouth crashing against mine. I cry out as tears slip down my cheeks. God, I missed him. Missed this pull that bounces between us. Wraps him around me and me around him. I stroke his hot tongue with mine, tasting whiskey.
“You drunk, cowboy? Take a few drinks to get you here?”
“To get me to knock on the door to your dream house, thinking you might be in here reliving your dream life? Hell, yes, it took me a drink or two. Is that what this is, honey? You starting over somewhere new with Elliot? Because…I reckon I might have something to say about it.”
“Starting somewhere new yes. Know of a castle somewhere?”
Grinning up me, his fist in my hair yanks my head down. His hips pin me to the door as he kisses me stupid. We start pulling and pushing at clothes before he lets out a shout. Falling backward with a thud, he rolls to pin me beneath him, both of us laugh.
Here we are right where it all started.
“Jilly Bean I will build you a castle with my bare hands. A cottage on a hill or a ranch anywhere you want, honey. We can’t…I can’t be without you again. I missed you too bad. We’re not doing that again. Can we agree on that? Can you promise me we’re not going to be apart again?”
“Yes. Yes, I miss you too. So much, baby. Left half of myself back there on that damn ranch, Jacob.”
“Took half of me with you that morning you left. I waited for it to go, Jilly Bean. For it to just stop. Told myself it was a crush, a fling, something to get over. It didn’t go, didn’t stop, and I won’t ever get over you. I don’t want to. Even if you don’t want me or can’t give me more than a few nights beneath the stars…I will take it.”
Smiling against his mouth, I shake my head. What a clueless cowboy. “I do want you. How could I not want the man who showed me how to live again? Be whole again. I meant what I said before. I am starting again, I have a new dream, Jacob. One with a cowboy, a princess, and maybe a few horses on a farm you could bring back to life the way you did me.”
“If that is on the auction block, Jilly Bean, I will take it. Sold.”
Nodding, I bend my head to kiss him before a wave of nausea hits me. Oh right, the other cowboy in my new dream. “Uh…before you buy the cow for the milk or hitch your wagon on me, I need to tell you something.”
“None of that made a lick of sense. Nothing you can tell me changes my bid on you, Jilly Bean.”
Gazing down at him, the nausea fades. Warmth takes its place as I see the truth in his pretty blue eyes. See my whole dream right there, looking back at me. He will want this, me and Jocie and our little cowpoke.
“Jacob, we might need a bigger castle. We’re having a baby. I’m pregnant.”
Jacob stares up at me before a wobbly smile, dimple, overtake his handsome face. “A baby? Oh, honey…we’re going to have a little one? Besides Jocie? I mean…I’m going to be a daddy, Jilly Bean?”
“Yeah, baby, we’re having a little rancher.”
“Honey, that is a dream come true if I ever heard of one. Becoming a father, being with you, with Jocie…in whatever dream home anywhere on earth is beyond any dream I could have dreamed up alone. I will take it.”
“You and me both, cowboy. Sold.”