Forever With You (Believe in Me Epilogues #2)

Chapter 1

Keanna

I stab my fork into a golden, perfectly seasoned French fry that’s covered in melty cheddar and drizzled with ranch.

Not the store bought ranch, but the good stuff that only restaurants have.

The Main Street Diner has outdone themselves tonight.

Why our small town eatery isn’t famously featured on every food TV show is a mystery I’ll never understand.

Maybe I should write in to some networks and tell them to correct their mistake ASAP.

I shove the gooey delicious bite in my mouth and close my eyes. “Cheesy fries are the greatest food in the entire world.”

“Agreed,” Jett says, reaching across the table and stabbing one of my fries with his fork.

I swat his hand away. “Get your own, Mister-I-ordered-regular-fries!”

He laughs and quickly shoves the fry in his mouth so I can’t steal it back. “I’ll buy you more.”

”Don’t,” I say, shaking my head. “I’ve already gained five pounds this year…I can’t gain more.”

”You look sexy as hell,” he says, wiggling his eyebrows at me before taking a bite of his burger.

I roll my eyes. He always says stuff like that. He’s my husband, so he can’t help it.

Our four-year-old runs up to our booth, her little hands grabbing the edge of the table. Her hair is dirty blonde with little wavy curls, just like her dad. She lifts one hand, palm up. “Can I have more quarters, Daddy?”

”I think you’ve had enough quarters,” I say, eyeing her arms which are covered in all the stickers she got from the bank of quarter machines by the cash register.

Those little machines with their colorful lights and cartoon graphics all over them have a magical pull over children.

This diner must make a ton of money from kids like mine.

”If my little girl wants more quarters, she can have more quarters,” Jett says, winking at her.

He retrieves his wallet, takes out a few dollar bills, and flags our waitress to ask for change.

Janet is our usual waitress, a mid-fifties widow with one of those amazing southern accents and a love of all things crochet, but today her younger daughter Chelsea is serving us.

She brings back a handful of quarters in a paper cup.

”Well aren’t you just getting so big,” she says. “Last time I saw you, you were this little!” She puts a hand out that’s half as tall as our four-year-old.

“I’m a big girl now,” she says, standing a little straighter before taking the cup of quarters and dashing back across the diner to her beloved sticker machines. It’s a small diner, so we can keep an eye on her the entire time, otherwise there’s no way I’d let her leave our table without us.

”She is just the cutest thing,” Chelsea says.

Jett watches her load the machine with a quarter. He smiles, glancing back at Chelsea.

“Our little Renesme.”

Chelsea’s eyebrow quirks. She quickly fixes her expression to hide her true feelings. It’s the same stunned, awkward look everyone gets when Jett tells someone that our daughter’s name is Renesme.

Luckily, he’s only joking.

“That is not her name,” I say, rolling my eyes.

”Oh, that’s good,” Chelsea says.

“You think you’re so funny,” I tell Jett.

He laughs. “I am funny!”

Chelsea’s brows pull together and she snaps her fingers after a moment of thought. ”Isn’t that the kid’s name from Twilight?”

“Yep.” I stab another fry and roll my eyes. “You make your husband watch one movie series with you and he never lets it go.”

”That movie was crazy,” he says. “She named her kid Renesme!” He smacks his palm on his leg as he bursts out laughing. “Renesme! It’s such a dumb name!”

“The rest of the story was good,” I argue, waving bye to Chelsea as she moves to take care of the new customers who just walked in. ”I mean, yeah I’m glad we didn’t name our daughter after our mothers, but the story was still good.”

”Becca and Bayleigh,” Jett says, pressing his lips together in thought. “Beckleigh… Bayca…”

”Beckleigh isn’t terrible actually…” I say. “It’s kind of cute but a little weird to say.”

“No, no, no,” he says, blowing a raspberry. “It is absolutely terrible.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter because that’s not her name.”

He nods. “Unlike Bella Swan, we actually know how to name a child.”

I nod. “Now we just need to work on not spoiling her by giving her everything she wants all the time.”

He pretends to be offended with a fake gasp and a hand to his chest. “I like giving her everything she wants all the time.”

I put my hands on my hips but I’m sitting in the diner booth so it doesn’t have the same effect as if I were standing. “I do, too, but we want to raise a good, well-adjusted kid, not a spoiled brat.”

”I give you everything you want,” he says, stealing another one of my cheese fries. “And you’re not a spoiled brat.”

”Maybe I am,” I say with a grin. His lips quirk up at the sides.

”Well, you’re my spoiled brat.”

Chelsea returns to fill our drinks. “So, if you don’t mind me asking, what is your daughter's name? I remember when she was a little baby but I can’t remember her name.

She’s always so well behaved, unlike other kids who come in here and their parents yell their names constantly, telling them to sit down and be quiet. ”

I laugh, thinking of many times we’ve been out in public while someone else’s kids ran amuck and caused more chaos than if a pack of wild animals had been let loose inside.

“As long as her sticker addiction is being taken care of, she’s a pretty good kid. We thought about naming her something sentimental, like after family members, but then we decided to name her something we thought was beautiful.”

I look at Jett and he smiles at me, and I can remember being in that hospital room four years ago, scared to death of becoming a mom when my own childhood had been rocky and unstable, with no real motherly influence until I was much older.

“Harper Jade Adams,” Jett says, reaching across the table and squeezing my hand. Maybe he noticed I was lost in memories, because I totally forgot to answer Chelsea’s question.

“Aww, that’s so pretty!” Chelsea says. “Such a sweet name for such a sweet girl.”

Once we’ve finished eating and Harper has filled up her princess t-shirt with stickers, we head outside and walk down the little strip of boutique stores along Main Street.

It’s a nice October afternoon and while Lawson, Texas doesn’t get much of a fall, the leaves are still kind of brownish and the air is kind of crisp, although still warmer than I’d prefer.

I love Sunday evenings because The Track is closed and Jett and I are both off work.

Sundays have become family days, where we go out to dinner and then find something relaxing to do before we start the week all over again.

Next fall, Harper will start kindergarten, and I can’t even think about that right now.

Time flies way too fast. I still feel like a teenager half the time, not a full grown adult with a college education, a mortgage, and a kid.

Sheesh. For now, I’m going to enjoy every second of these perfect evenings together.

One day, she’ll be all grown up and on her own.

Since it’s still daylight out, we stop at the park at the end of the street.

It has a small playground, some picnic tables, and the largest part is a soccer field.

The Lawson High cheerleaders are out there now, practicing a cheer.

No, they’re teaching cheer, I realize as I see them talking to a group of young girls all wearing matching pink shirts.

”Mommy! I want to go,” Harper says.

”You have to be six to do junior cheer,” I say, giving her a big exaggerated frown. “That’s two more years from now.”

She frowns, copying my expression, then her gaze drifts back over to the cheerleaders. “They’re so pretty!”

”Yes, they are.”

”Every day I get closer to losing my dream of having a motocross racing kid,” Jett says with a chuckle.

“Not true. She can race dirt bikes and be a cheerleader.”

”Yes!” she says, clapping her hands together. “Both!”

”Perfect,” Jett says, ruffling the top of her hair. “My motocross cheerleading superstar.”

His phone rings and he pulls it out of his pocket. Surprise flashes in his eyes. “Speaking of motocross…” He holds up one finger to us and then steps away, answering the phone.

Jett is assistant manager of our family business, which is a very popular motocross track in town.

His dad and my dad are the co-owners, and I also work there although I’ve taken a step back in my work duties ever since Harper was born.

Pretty much every phone call any of us gets is about motocross. So why would this call be different?

We sit on a park bench and watch the cheerleaders teaching a simple cheer to their captive audience of six year olds.

The last time I looked into this program, it was a small fee to join, which raised funds for the cheerleaders to get new uniforms and pompoms. I never did anything like that when I was a kid.

I never really wanted to—that would have meant hanging out with the cool girls and I was never a cool girl.

But I don’t want my daughter to feel awkward and out of place around her peers.

I want her to make lifelong friends here in town, never worrying about being forced to move away a few months after settling down somewhere new.

Lawson is our home, and we’re not going anywhere.

Jett returns with a strained expression on his face. His lips press flat and he holds the phone in his hand, turning it over between his thumb and palm.

“Is everything okay?”

He nods. “That was Marcus.”

I haven’t heard the name in years but I certainly remember his old boss.

“Well, is he okay?” I ask, wondering why on earth the head of a professional motocross team would be calling my husband.

He nods again. “He’s hosting a charity race in Anaheim. He asked if I’d be interested in dusting off my boots and racing again,” he says, changing his voice to a near perfect impression of Marcus’ California surfer guy accent.

“Oh, that’s cool,” I say before my brain really has a chance to process what this means. “He wants you to fly to California for one race?”

”It’s a three-day series. Lots of sponsors, and a lot of money to be won for charity. They’d pay all my expenses, though. He even said he has a bike I can use so I wouldn’t need to tune up or transport mine.”

“Which charity is it?” I ask.

“Breast Cancer, since it’s October and that’s Breast Cancer Awareness month.”

We’re both silent for a moment. This is a cause close to my heart because my mom is a breast cancer survivor. Every year, we participate in 5K runs for the cause, and wear pink shirts on Pink Out Day. It only makes sense that he should join an event supporting something so dear to me. But…

Jett quit racing professionally when our daughter was born. He said he was a family man now, and all the travel and public appearances that came with professional racing was just too much. He left it behind for us. And we haven’t really talked about it since then.

But a spark died in him when he quit racing.

I don’t think I ever noticed it, not until this very second when his eyes light up the same way they used to back when I first met him.

He loves racing with all of his heart. He was born to do it.

That spark, the one I hadn’t even missed while it was gone, just very clearly came back.