Marin
Applause joins the soft background sound of the nature. My cheeks hurt from smiling so much as I watch Janie bring the cake. Janie, Stevie, my grandpa, Margaret and little Steven are all gathered around the table.
Davis wraps his arms around me from behind and I lean into his strong body. I look around me. We’re exactly where everything started ten years ago. In the cabin. Only this time, we’re surrounded with love and joy.
“Make a wish, Mommy!” Margaret, my gorgeous daughter, interrupts my thoughts.
I nod. “I wish to spend the rest of my life in your arms,” I whisper, only for Davis to hear.
“Happy tenth anniversary, baby girl,” Davis whispers into my ear, biting my earlobe. “Let’s cut the cake and send everyone home so I can have you all to myself.”
The soft words cause me to shiver with desire.
“Oh, Jesus,” Grandpa murmurs when he notices the photo on the cake.
It’s me. From one of the modeling gigs I did after my second pregnancy. It’s one of the daring ones, with a mom tummy, boobs and c-section scar. A woman’s body through and through. I look hot in a black lace babydoll, looking into camera while straddling Davis’ lap.
I didn’t think modeling would be my calling but Davis made me feel so good about me, it all fell into place naturally.
When I was younger, it was my friends that pushed the modeling always telling me how beautiful I was, tall, thin…
perfect for that industry. I do feel lucky that I’ve got what other people consider physical beauty and I don’t struggle with my weight, but I’m just me.
I have my flaws and insecurities like everyone.
I do a very rare shoot these days but it’s been fun and Davis goes with me to every show and shoot, no questions.
I finished high school with some tutors, then took some courses at the local college but being a mom was really where my heart wanted to be.
The year after we married, Davis asked me if I ever wanted to try to find my biological father. I thought about it for a few months, then decided yes. Grandpa had revealed that my mother had only told him a first name and that he was a cowboy passing through town with the rodeo.
Well, Davis has some mad skills when it comes to research and giving me what I want because after a month, he had a name, phone number, address, email and lifetime rodeo stats, bank account and credit report.
He wanted to pay someone to get his medical records but I said maybe we should meet him first and he would offer up any information that might be important.
He was shocked at first as I can imagine. He didn’t know I existed. He’s a good man, living in Arizona with his wife and two grown children. After some phone calls and lots of emails and texts, we met for dinner at his ranch in Phoenix and it felt like my mom was right here with us.
As time went on, we developed a nice friendship. I don’t call him dad, but he’s been there for me ever since I contacted him. His wife and my half-brothers are all part of our extended family and now I know where my love of horses comes from.
“Franklin,” Davis warns Grandpa, and I laugh when my grandpa lifts his hands in surrender.
It’s still a miracle to see him this relaxed and carefree. If it was 10 years ago, he would probably think of me as the devil incarnated. Not now, though.
“I told you marijuana is way better than the tobacco business,” Stevie says. “Look at old Franklin, finally seeing the fun in life.”
Stevie Ray is right. Stevie Ray convincing my grandpa to change profession was one of the best things to fix my relationship with the man who raised me.
And together, they’ve done a lot to help people in chronic pain and with spinal cord injuries.
And my gorgeous husband has also helped them.
They started a family business of sorts.
Davis, Stevie, Paul and my grandpa. Such a weird combination, but it seems to work.
Grandpa still has Jesus on his dashboard, but life and time has softened him.
He has finally seen the wrongness of his ways.
Or possibly it’s the THC. But either way, I’ll take it.
Everything in my life seems to work as I look at the people I’m surrounded by, and the life I’m living with the man I love.
***
A wolf howls in the distance, and the kids squeal with delighted fear from inside our blanket fort as I close The Hobbit book I’ve been reading to them over the last month. I leave out the really scary parts but it’s a timeless story and I hope they grow to love a good adventure as much as I do.
Davis puts the final touches on our cozy little castle—one final comforter, pulled tight over couch cushions set up vertically—and crawls in with us looking like a giant among the Hobbits. Little Steven and Margaret smoosh between us.
“Daddy. Will you protect us?” Margaret, now nine years old, asks with a hint of worry.
She’s old enough to have a curious and active mind, yet still struggles to make sense of everything.
With her dad’s eyes and my hair, she’s apple-pie sweet right down to her core.
Steven, at the age six, is a spitting image of me, but full of mischief just like his Uncle Stevie Ray.
I glance at Davis, teasing him with the soft lilt in my voice. “Will you, Daddy? Will you protect us?”
His eyes, intense and hungry, meet mine in the dim light. The cabin is dark, just like it was that first night I met him. It’s now repainted and renovated, though. Fresh and new. But still, being here reminds me of that night. When everything changed for me forever.
“Of course, I will,” Davis responds, gruffly. “Daddy will always protect you. All of you.”
God. From the first day to this, nobody and nothing makes me feel so full of love and desire as him.
Margaret lets out a sleepy yawn. “You promise, Daddy?”
“Promise, Sunshine,” he says, giving her a kiss on the forehead. “Now, go to sleep. Rest up. We’re chopping firewood tomorrow and I need you to be ready.”
“Can I swing the axe?” Steven asks for what feels like the seven-hundredth time today, and I bubble out with a giggle.
“Go to bed, stinker. Close your eyes,” I say, giving him a little tickle on his still-chubby tummy. “Count your sheep.”
“I want to count wolves,” Stevie says, sounding sleepy now, too.
“Then count wolves,” Davis says, sternly. “But you heard your mother. Go to sleep.”
They both shut their eyes, pretending to be asleep. Like two little terrible actors playing dead in a school play. Davis gets up on one shoulder, watching me over the two of them. Eyes connected. Souls connected. Hearts connected. As one.
“I love you,” he mouths to me.
“I love you, too,” I whisper back.
The wolves howl again, getting closer now. I hear claws nearby, but now I’m not afraid. Not with Davis here. Never.
“I have something for you, gorgeous,” Davis says, keeping his voice low so as not to wake the kids.
I roll over as best I can, wedged in between cushions and blankets and everything. “We said no gifts.”
He lifts an eyebrow at me. “You said no gifts. But Daddy decides for himself.”
The way he says it makes me blush instantly. We are always evolving, changing, getting kinkier and closer and hotter. We still make love like it’s the very first time. Every time. Enough passion to light the world on fire.
He slips his hand into the pocket of his plaid flannel, lumberjack green.
And hooked over his thick, strong finger comes a gold chain with diamond letters.
One for each of the kids, and two gold horses.
“Happy tenth anniversary to the love of my life. The center of my universe. The only pure thing in the world.”
“I love it. Even if you broke the rules. You want to go for a ride in the morning?” I ask, already itching to get into the saddle and take a ride to where everything started. I love the trails and I’ve become quite the horsewoman and riding has become my church.
“You know by now, there isn’t a single kind of ride I don’t want to take with you baby.”
“My smooth-talking mountain man.”
“That’s me. Forever baby. Forever.”
Get your Palate Teased Good and Proper with