Chapter 31
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Jocelyn
“It’s dark out here,” I state as we pull up.
“I know. It’s a farm. They don’t have lights,” Drew hisses.
“Drew, it’s not eighteen forty. They have electricity,” I state deadpan.
“Come on. His mom said that part of the living area is done being renovated and we can hang stuff there,” Roxy says. Somehow, she was able to get his mom’s number and called her.
With flashlights in hand, we walk up to a front porch and Drew enters a code on a lock that his mom gave us. I feel a little weird being here since I haven’t met her, but first, I need to prove to Hutch that we can be together again.
The door opens and we step inside. I can tell it’s beautiful, but there are curtains hanging everywhere. Only a small corner by the door is visible.
“Here. She said they already had some nails in the wall. Let’s just use those,” Drew suggests as he motions to a wall with nothing on it.
Oddly, it looks like something was on it, but it was removed.
With a shrug, I start handing him the framed jerseys.
Roxy goes to get the rest. I hear her talking to someone, and then she comes back inside.
“Just his dad. He suggested we go check out the pier they just put on the pond after we finish,” Roxy explains.
“Oh. I…would love to meet his parents,” I state, feeling weird about being here without Hutch. I always envisioned coming here with him.
“You can. Later. Let’s finish this wall-slash-ode to Hutch’s career,” she says as she hands me more items to hang up.
When we finish, I smile. It’s almost like the wall’s nails were pre-measured to hang exactly what I wanted. It looks great. Subtle, but it’s all there. There was even a small shelf where we put some enclosed in glass footballs that his teammates signed for him.
“OK, let’s go,” I say as I wipe my hands on my dress.
Roxy insisted I wear a dress in case we met his parents out here, even though their house is on the other side of the property, but I guess they do come here since his dad stopped by.
I follow her back out, and she walks around the back of the cottage on a little path that looks newly landscaped.
Little solar lights dot the way. As we round the corner, my breath hitches.
Hutch stands on a small pier. Fairy lights are strung in a cross pattern over him.
Two Adirondack chairs sit on the pier with a table in between them.
It looks magical. The path continues in that direction, with a fork of it going back to the giant porch that runs the entire backside of the cabin.
“Hutch?” I say as I stare at him.
“Hi, princessa,” he replies. He doesn’t seem surprised to see me. I don’t even look back at my friends as I walk to him as if in a trance.
When I reach the pier, I stop, and he smiles at me.
“I missed you,” he whispers.
I close the distance between us in three giant steps, which would probably equal one of his. I throw my arms around his neck, and he lifts me off the ground and twirls me in a circle.
“I take it you missed me, too,” he says with a laugh.
I lean back to look up at him. “Possibly.”
He gives me a pointed look.
“Yes, I missed you so much,” I admit.
He grins. “Come on. I have something to show you,” he says.
“Oh, uh.” I turn to say something to Roxy and Drew, but they are gone. I roll my eyes. They are probably giving us privacy. I’ll go find them in a minute.
“OK,” I say as he grabs me by the hand and leads me to the back porch. It, too, has little lights hung overhead and big rocking chairs. There’s even one of those daybed swings. I grin. It’s lovely, even more so than I imagined.
He opens double doors, and I follow him inside. He stands behind me and turns on the lights.
My breath leaves my body. Giant bookshelves line one wall with one of those rolling ladders. So many books are on the shelves, and most look like romance novels. I walk straight to it and run my finger over some spines.
“Try it out,” Hutch says from behind me.
I step on the ladder and do my best impression of Belle in Beauty and the Beast as I roll it along the shelves.
He chuckles, and I grin at him.
“You had one of these and never told me?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “I built it for you.” I frown. He motions around us. “I redid all of this for you.”
Slowly, I spin in a circle and see the rest of the cabin.
There’s a small hall with three doors off it.
Probably the bedroom, bathroom, and maybe a closet or something.
This half of the building is all open to the beams with a small “L” where the kitchen is.
It’s redone and beautiful. There’s a desk space in front of giant windows that look out at the rolling countryside.
It’s right between the shelves and a wall where a fireplace made of stone goes all the way to the roofline.
A cozy sofa sits across from it, and a few chairs by the front window. It’s perfect, a perfect escape.
I notice the curtains are down, around the front entry that I just decorated. And Hutch is standing there, having walked over while I was looking around. He’s not moving as he looks at the wall of his football memorabilia.
“How…when?” he stammers.
I walk up beside him. “I wanted to give you a grand gesture,” I say as I wrap an arm around his waist. “You should want these things out where you can see them, Hutch. I know you miss football, but it’s still part of you. Don’t hide it.”
He turns with tears in his eyes and cups my face. “I thought I was the one giving you a grand gesture,” he whispers as his thumbs wipe tears from my cheeks. When the hell did I start crying?
“I thought you needed one,” I protest.
He smiles. “I guess we were thinking the same thing, huh?”
I nod. “I was stupid. I don’t know why I thought we needed to wait.
We don’t. We need each other. All these things would be so much easier to conquer together.
If we can trust each other, then maybe, eventually, everything else will fall into place,” I say in a rush, my words running together as I desperately make my case.
“I agree,” he replies, and I take a breath.
“What do we do now?” I ask.
“I haven’t had a happily ever after before, but I’ve read a few of them. And I’m pretty sure they go something like this,” he says, and he leans down and kisses me.
I lose myself in his kiss. His lips claim mine, his tongue telling me exactly what he wants to do later.
“Get a room!” Drew yells, and I pull back and lean over to see around Hutch.
I start laughing as I find Drew, Roxy, Kasen, Bray, Gray, Piper, Al, Cam, and Fletcher standing by the back door.
“Did you all know?” I ask them. Hutch turns to face them, wrapping a protective arm around my shoulders.
“We might have known you guys are hopeless romantics and planned dueling grand gestures,” Roxy says with a smirk.
“I swear, you guys suck. And here I was going to start getting over my trust issues,” I joke.
“Oh, sweetie, the only thing you can trust is romance, don’t you know that?” Drew says with a wink.
Hutch suddenly grabs my waist and dips me back. I giggle as I look up at him.
“I agree with that. We can definitely trust the romance,” he says as he presses his lips to mine.
My friends’ hooting, hollering, and clapping disappear as I focus on Hutch.
I never in a million years thought I’d be dating a cinnamon roll, ex-football-player softy with a penchant for wayward wild animals of the raccoon variety.
But here I am, and I can’t imagine being any happier.
“Is this OK for the happily ever after?” he asks.
“Yeah, I think this will work,” I tease as I lean up and kiss my favorite main character of all time.