28. Jesse
— ? —
Jesse
The hospital room has become a command center.
Two days post-emergency delivery, and Lo’s bed is surrounded by more people than the fire code probably allows.
Bree’s perched on the radiator cover, Molly’s cross-legged on the floor with Rosie, and Rafael’s leaning against the door frame.
Ruth’s in the armchair by the window, watching everything with the quiet satisfaction of my mother watching the family she nearly lost. Hattie’s asleep in her bassinet, completely unbothered by the crowd.
The TV mounted in the corner is playing Nashville news.
“Turn it up,” Lo says. “They’re showing the label offices.”
I find the remote. The screen shows a familiar building, glass and steel, the kind of architecture that screams money. Police cars are parked out front.
“ - sources confirm that Sloane Marsh, prominent music industry manager, was taken into custody this afternoon on charges related to stalking and conspiracy-”
“There she is,” Molly says.
The camera catches Sloane being led out. Handcuffs, designer dress, fighting the officers like dignity was never an option.
And then it happens.
Her stomach shifts. Not the way a pregnant belly shifts, the way something attached shifts when it’s coming loose. One movement too violent, and the prosthetic slides sideways under her dress, obviously fake, obviously falling.
It hits the marble floor. Foam and elastic, bouncing once before settling.
Every camera catches it. Every angle, every lens.
“Well,” Ruth says dryly. “There it is.”
“Holy sh-” Molly catches herself, glances at Rosie. “Holy shirtballs.”
“What happened to her tummy?” Rosie asks.
“It fell off,” Bree says. “Because it wasn’t real.”
“Why wasn’t it real?”
“Because she’s a liar, sweetie. A big, fancy liar who thought she could fool everyone.”
“That’s not very nice.”
“No, it’s not. That’s why she’s going to jail.”
On screen, Sloane’s still struggling, but the fight’s gone out of her. The officers get her into a squad car, and the camera cuts to a reporter with barely contained excitement.
“ - dramatic turn as what appears to be a prosthetic pregnancy device became visible during the arrest. Questions are now being raised about Marsh’s previous claims-”
Lo laughs.
It’s careful. She’s got stitches, but it’s real. Her whole face lights up.
“She faked it,” Lo says. “The whole time. Every single day of it.”
“Every single day.”
“I almost believed her. That day in the parking lot, when she showed up with the lawyers - I almost believed it was possible.”
“She wanted you to. That was the point.”
“Ten seconds too long.”
“Ten seconds is pretty good, considering she had lawyers and a belly and a whole performance planned.”
“Ten seconds is ten seconds more than she deserved.”
“Fair point.”
Peter’s name lights up my phone.
“Speaker,” Lo says. “I want to hear everything.”
I answer and put it on the bedside table. Peter’s voice fills the room.
“You watching the news?”
“We’re watching. We saw the belly situation.”
“That’s going to make the conspiracy charges easier to prove. Fabricating a pregnancy to manipulate someone is clear evidence of intent.” He pauses. “But that’s not why I’m calling. We got into Brandi’s phone. Pruitt’s team helped crack it - they’ve been building this case for months.”
The room goes quiet.
“What did you find?”
“Messages. Hundreds of them. Between Brandi and Sloane, going back months.”
“Months,” Lo says. “She’s been coordinating with my stalker for months.”
“Longer than we knew about the letters. Sloane was feeding her information - your schedule, Jesse. Lo’s address at the ranch. The cabin location. Doctor’s appointments. Everything Brandi needed to track you both.”
“She gave her everything,” I say.
“More than that. She was directing her. Telling her when to send letters, when to back off, when to escalate. She used Brandi to create the danger, then used that danger to justify keeping Lo hidden - which isolated you both and gave Sloane more control over your career.”
“Control,” Lo says quietly. “That was always the point, wasn’t it? Not love. Control.”
“The messages make it clear,” Peter continues.
“Sloane told Brandi the pregnancy announcement was temporary - a publicity move to pressure Jesse into certain decisions. She promised Brandi that once it served its purpose, she’d claim a loss, collect a quiet settlement, and the whole thing would go away. Then Brandi would get her shot.”
“Her shot at what?” Molly asks.
“At Jesse. Sloane sold her a fantasy - that once Lo was out of the picture and the fake pregnancy was resolved, Jesse would be ‘free to choose’ and Brandi would be positioned as the sympathetic figure who’d been waiting.”
“That’s insane,” Molly says.
“That’s two different kinds of delusion feeding each other.” Peter sighs. “Sloane wanted career control and was willing to manufacture a crisis to get it. Brandi wanted Jesse and was willing to believe anything that kept that hope alive. They used each other.”
I think about that. About Sloane walking through my house with her iPad, rearranging whatever she pleased. About the way she looked at me like she owned my schedule, my image, my future. It was never about love. It was about power.
“The bribe attempt with Doc Abernathy is on record,” Peter continues.
“The forged lyrics page Sloane showed your wife? Pruitt’s team found scans of your old notebooks in Sloane’s cloud files, along with practice attempts where she traced your handwriting.
File creation dates prove she made the fake before she ever showed it to Lo.
The actual Friday single - ’Crossroads’ - has completely different lyrics.
She grabbed random notebook lines, forged your margin notes, and hoped nobody would check. ”
“And the phone access?”
“Access logs confirm she read your personal messages through the label system - including texts Lo sent you about the anniversary, about feeling alone. Copies of those texts were in her files too. Doesn’t prove you never told her anything, but it proves she had another way to learn it.”
“And now?”
“Now they’re both being charged. Sloane’s facing stalking, conspiracy to commit stalking, fraud, and a few other things the DA’s still working out. Brandi’s got breaking and entering, assault, trespassing at the hospital. They’ll both go through the system.”
“Will they be convicted?” I ask.
“I can’t promise anything - that’s up to judges and juries. But the evidence is strong. The digital trail alone is damning. And Brandi flipped in about an hour once she realized Sloane wasn’t going to protect her. She’s cooperating fully.”
“Sloane’s lawyers?”
“Already quit. Both of them. Nobody wants to touch this case.”
Ruth leans forward. “What about the label? Did they know?”
“Still being investigated. So far it looks like Sloane was operating independently, using her position for access but not involving the company. But the investigation’s ongoing.”
“Thank you, Peter,” Lo says. “For everything. For believing us when it sounded crazy.”
“It never sounded crazy. It sounded like a woman being stalked and a man being manipulated. That’s not crazy - that’s crime. I’ll call if anything develops.”
He hangs up.
“So it’s really over,” Bree says.
“It’s really over.”
“No more letters.”
“No more letters.”
“No more strangers at the hospital.”
“No more strangers anywhere.”
“No more Sloane,” Lo says. “No more any of it.”
My phone buzzes again. I check the screen and feel my jaw tighten.
Dwight Harlan.
“Who is it?” Lo asks.
“The label.”
“Are you going to answer?”
I think about it. Then I accept the call.
“Jesse.” Harlan’s voice is careful. “I just saw the news. I wanted to reach out personally-”
“To say what?”
“To say I’m sorry. We had no idea what Sloane was doing. If we’d known-”
“You didn’t ask. You didn’t look. You let her run my career and my life for over a year, and you never once questioned what she was doing or why.” I keep my voice level. It costs me.
“That’s - look, I understand you’re upset-”
“I’m not upset. I’m clarifying. My independent counsel already handled the contract restructuring with your legal team. I have scheduling approval now. Any future work goes through my terms, not yours.”
“Jesse, the cancellation costs-”
“Were settled this summer. Paid from my earnings, not the ranch. The lawyers earned their fee.”
“Jesse, let’s not be hasty. We can discuss-”
“There’s nothing to discuss. The new agreement is signed. If you have questions, talk to my lawyer.” Lo lifts Hattie from the bassinet and settles her against her chest. I glance at them. “Right now, I’m with my family. That’s where I’m staying.”
“We could renegotiate. Better terms-”
“I already have better terms. I negotiated them myself, with representation that actually works for me.”
“Jesse-”
I hang up.
“Damn,” Molly says. “That was cold.”
“That was overdue.”
“That was extremely satisfying to witness,” Ruth adds. “I’ve wanted to tell that man off since I met him.”
“You’ve met him?”
“Once. At some industry event Lo dragged me to. He talked for twenty minutes about synergy and never once asked about the ranch.”
“Sounds about right.”
There’s a knock at the door. Rafael opens it to reveal Dot, carrying a cake box.
“I heard we were having a party,” she says. “Nobody told me, but I decided we were having one anyway.”
“Dot, you didn’t have to-”
“Hush. I’ve been stress-baking for two days. Someone needs to eat this before I start on another one.” She sets the box on the rolling tray and opens it. White frosting, pink letters: WELCOME HATTIE.
“You spelled her name right,” I say.
“I called Bree to check. Three times. Fourth time she stopped answering, so I had to trust myself.”
“It’s perfect,” Lo says.
“It’s cake. Cake is always perfect. That’s the nature of cake.”
Rafael produces a bottle of sparkling cider. “No alcohol for the new mother. But we should toast.”
He pours cups for everyone. Rosie bounces, demanding cake immediately.
“I want to sing a song,” Rosie announces. “For baby Hattie.”
“Go ahead, sweetie.”
Rosie clears her throat, stands very straight, and begins, completely off-key, with improvised lyrics:
“Welcome baby Hattie, you are very small. Welcome baby Hattie, we hope you don’t fall. Your daddy is a singer, your mommy is nice. Welcome baby Hattie, I’ll teach you to throw dice.”
“Throw dice?” Bree says.
“It rhymes with nice!”
“Where did you learn about throwing dice?”
“Rafael taught me.”
“Rafael.”
“It’s a perfectly legitimate skill,” Rafael says. “Useful in many contexts.”
“Name one context where a six-year-old needs to throw dice.”
“Board games. Probability education. Casino heists.”
“We are not planning casino heists.”
“Not with that attitude.”
Hattie sleeps through the entire performance. Probably for the best.
I eat cake. I drink cider. I watch my daughter sleep and my wife smile while my mother brushes a crumb from Lo’s blanket.
“You look tired, sweetheart,” Mom says.
“I just made a person.”
“I meant him.”
Lo looks at me and starts laughing. “He helped. He carried the bag.”
“Heroically,” I say.
“We’ll get you a plaque.”
The party winds down gradually. Dot packs up leftover cake. Rafael and Bree gather Rosie, who’s crashing from sugar and doesn’t want to leave. Molly promises to bring coffee tomorrow, the good kind. Ruth says she’s staying at the inn for another week.
Finally, it’s just us. Me and Lo and Hattie still held close against Lo’s chest, in the quiet of the hospital room.
“You were right about one thing,” Lo says.
“Just one?”
“Don’t push your luck.” She’s smiling. “What you told Sloane at the clinic. She was never the team.”
“What made you think about that?”
“Watching her get arrested with a fake belly falling off on live television. It clarified some things.”
“She wanted control,” I say. “Not me. Not really. Just control over everything around me.”
“And you gave it to her.”
“I did. For too long. That part’s still on me - the messages prove what she did, but they don’t erase that I let her do it.”
Lo looks at me for a long moment. “No. They don’t. But you stopped letting her. That counts.”
“Justice is weird.”
“Justice is poetic. She wanted to be famous. Now she is.”
I take her hand. Her grip is stronger today. She’s healing.
“So,” she says. “What happens now?”
“Now you recover. Now Hattie grows. Now we figure out what comes next.”
“And where does ‘next’ happen?” She looks at me. “The cabin’s not big enough for three. Bree’s been generous, but it’s not home.”
“The ranch is home.”
“The ranch is yours.”
“The ranch is ours.” I reach into my bag, pull out an envelope. “Open it.”
She does. Inside is a document, thick, official. I watch her face as she finds the relevant section.
“Both names,” she says.
“Lorilee Cooper and Jesse Cooper. Equal owners.”
“You put my name on the deed.”
“It was always supposed to be there. I just never got around to it.” I squeeze her hand. “The ranch is ours. Has been since the day we got married. I just made it official.”
“When did you do this?”
“The week I got to Marigold. Before I knew if you’d even talk to me.”
“That was presumptuous.”
“That was hopeful. There’s a difference.”
“Is there?”
“Presumptuous assumes you’ll say yes. Hopeful just wants you to have the option.”
She’s crying. Quietly, but definitely crying.
“This isn’t payment,” I say. “Not for forgiving me, not for taking me back. It’s just what should have been true all along.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want you to feel like-”
“Jesse.” She puts her hand over mine. “I know. It’s not transactional. It’s just right.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”