Chapter 19 Juliana
JULIANA
The fever made the ceiling ripple.
Not literally—Juliana knew that—but her vision kept doing this soft-focus slide, like the wood paneling above Gideon’s couch was a mirage shimmering in Arizona heat.
She hated it. Hated the cotton-stuffed feeling in her head, the way every joint ached as if she’d done squats for the first time since college, the drip-drip-drip of her treacherous nose.
Worst of all, she hated being benched. No clipboard, no checklist, no control.
Gideon eased into the room, a bowl steaming in one hand and a chipped enamel mug in the other. The string lights he’d stapled around the cabin’s front porch cast halos through the window, and for one dizzy second she thought they were part of his entrance, as if he’d called in lighting cues.
“Soup delivery,” he announced in a stage whisper. “There were two options: Connie’s chicken noodle, and my experimental ginger miso ‘please don’t die on me’ special.”
She sniffed, which turned into a cough, which turned into a glare. “Define experimental.”
He set the tray on the nightstand, grin crooked. He angled the bowl closer. “Mom’s won the coin toss.”
Thank the Lord for that. Juliana pushed herself up against the armrest. The pillow smelled like cedar and laundry soap and something unmistakably Gideon.
He’d cracked the window to let in a whisper of cold air, and the contrast of the steam against her cheeks and the winter breath in her lungs felt oddly luxurious.
“Careful,” he warned, settling on the edge of the couch cushion, “it’s super hot.”
“So am I,” she muttered, then immediately regretted it as his eyebrows shot up, eyes twinkling.
“Yeah, you are.” His words brought a snort of laughter that set off a minute-long coughing fit. How the man could flirt with her when her hair was plastered to her sweaty forehead and she hadn’t showered in two days, she would never understand.
After she could breathe again, she took a cautious sip. “Okay,” she conceded, tipping her spoon at him. “You get points.”
“For the soup or for the joke you didn’t mean to make?”
“For the soup.” She dabbed at her nose with the crumpled tissue. “And for . . . this.”
His gaze softened. “This?”
“The . . . fussing,” she said, vague on purpose.
He’d tucked the flannel around her—his flannel, swallowed in his smell—propped her up with an offensive number of pillows, queued up a kettle on the wood stove like a pioneer with Wi-Fi, and turned his favorite beanie into a hot water bottle cozy.
He had not, in fact, mocked her list labeled “flu protocol” on her notepad, even after she’d given up on it at hour two.
He pretended not to notice the mist in her eyes. “I’m a world-class fusser,” he said lightly. He pointed toward the mug. “Magic tea. Ginger, honey, and some lemon.”
She took the mug. It was hot enough to make her palms hum. “What’s the dosage? One sip every ten minutes? Or do I just chug until I start believing in essential oils?”
“Just drink until your sarcasm gauge returns to factory settings.”
“Tragic. I’m pretty sure it’s never going back. I’ve been more sarcastic in the last four weeks here than I’ve ever been.”
“Only out loud. I have a feeling it was always there inside you.” He adjusted the throw at her feet. “Thermometer says you’ve dropped a degree.”
“Thermometer is a liar,” she said, but softer. The truth was, she felt a tiny bit less like she’d been run over by a herd of decorative reindeer.
“You should be at work,” she murmured. The cabin’s clock ticked, the only sound besides the wind whipping over the eaves. “Tours. Trails. Whatever reckless thing you were going to talk me into today.”
“Already canceled,” he said, unbothered. He gently brushed a damp strand of hair off her forehead, then rested the back of his fingers there like a farmhouse thermometer. His touch was cool. Familiar. “I wanted to be here.”
Her throat went tight around a lump that had nothing to do with congestion. “If I admit this is nice, will you use it against me later?”
“Obviously,” he said. “I’ll cite the now established case law. Reynolds v. Reynolds: The Great Soup Precedent.”
“Not legally binding,” she said automatically, then wished she could reach out and take the words back. Binding. Not binding. The vocabulary of the last few months had burrowed under her skin and taken up permanent residence.
He didn’t flinch. “No law talk tonight,” he said, voice easy. “Just flu and tea and maybe one Christmas movie where the small town saves the big city girl through the power of caroling and a man in a flannel.”
“Sounds contrived,” she murmured.
“You love contrived,” he said, then tilted his head. “Okay, you love executed.”
She snorted and regretted it as it triggered a coughing fit.
He took the bowl, set it aside, and handed her the mug again, palm steady against her shoulder as if he could anchor her coughs away.
When the fit passed, he didn’t comment on the tear that had escaped or the ridiculous trumpeting sound the tissue made.
He just rubbed slow circles between her shoulder blades until her ribs stopped protesting.
Her mind kept trying to sprint laps it didn’t have the oxygen for. Harrison Hotels flashed across the inside of her skull like a neon sign. Scottsdale in February. Event Excellence division. A tidy salary and a tidy life. She should have been spinning with it. She’d been spinning for days.
Instead, she stared at the steam rising from the mug and realized, with a little jolt of betrayal, that a picture had started to form behind the neon.
A different kind of tidy. Gideon’s boots by the door and her heels mostly collecting dust. The Triple R chapel at sunset.
A pot on a stove because he swore peppermint could cure anything.
A calendar that still had lists but left room for detours.
She was not built for detours. Except, apparently, she now . . . was?
“Penny for your thoughts,” he said softly, as if he could see the cogs grinding.
“Inflation,” she rasped. “You owe me at least a dollar.”
“Deal.” He dug into the pocket of his worn jeans and set an actual crumpled dollar on her tray, deadpan. “Now talk.”
She blinked at it, laughed once, and found she couldn’t stop. The laugh dissolved into a cough and then into a few helpless tears she tried and failed to swipe away. “I hate being sick,” she muttered, as if that were new information. “I hate not being able to fix it.”
He sat back down, forearms on his thighs, eyes steady on hers. “You don’t have to fix it.”
“I know.” She tipped the mug to hide. “That’s the hateful part.”
They were quiet for a minute.
“Do you want to pray?” he asked with no trace of the awkwardness she would have felt asking the same question. “I can, if your throat’s done with words.”
The question punched straight through her defenses and landed where the certainty had started to root. Back on Tealua, prayer had been desperation. Lately, it had been something else. Not a lever to pull, but a seat to sink into.
She nodded. He took her hand like it was the simplest, most normal thing in the world and bowed his head.
His prayer was unadorned—thank You for Juliana, help her breathe, heal what’s broken, grant peace about decisions—and by the time he said amen, the pressure in her chest had shifted. Not gone. Less bossy.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Anytime.” He squeezed her fingers and let go. “If you finish this, I’ll consider allowing you to review the tea schedule.”
“I’m not touching whatever you call a tea schedule,” she said, suspicious.
He fished in his back pocket and pulled out an index card, the front of it covered in big block letters and tiny doodles of turtles and pineapples.
Hydrate every 30 minutes with a little turtle reminding her to go slow.
Steam 10 minutes with a stick-figure pineapple in sunglasses.
She stared at it, mortified by the way her heart did something enormous and unprofessional.
“You made me a visual aid?”
“I made you art,” he said solemnly. “Please respect the gallery.”
She had to look away before she did something dramatic, like cry into the broth. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You said that when we got on the pineapple truck.”
A knock sounded—a firm, practiced rap that had never once been used on this door. Juliana’s body reacted before her brain caught up: shoulders braced, stomach dipped, that old pre-party adrenaline that often preceded disaster rising like a reflex.
Gideon went still. “Expecting someone?”
“No.” Her voice came out thin. “Are you?”
He shook his head and set the mug down. “Stay,” he said, a gentle order that somehow soothed instead of rankled. He crossed to the door and pulled it open.
Cold air spilled in alongside a familiar perfume that didn’t belong in a mountain cabin. Juliana didn’t have to see her mother to know who stood on the stoop. She could feel the shape of that presence in her bones.
“Hello,” her mother said brightly, the kind of brightness that could cut glass. “I do hope this is a good time. I’m looking for my daughter.”
Gideon glanced back at Juliana. The question in his eyes wasn’t do you want me to handle this? but do you want privacy? She swallowed, unsure her voice would cooperate, and gave a small, shaky nod.
He understood. Of course he did.
“I’ll . . . give you two the room,” he said gently. “I’ll be in back.”
He brushed a knuckle along Juliana’s shoulder as he passed. Then he slipped down the short hall, leaving her wrapped in his flannel and the scent of eucalyptus, bracing herself for a conversation she hadn’t wanted and the test she suddenly, sorely hoped she could pass.
Juliana tugged the blanket tighter around herself, but it didn’t stop the chill that came with her mother’s entrance. Her mom’s perfume hit first. Then the heels. Clicking against the wood floors like they had every right to echo here.
Her mother’s gaze swept the room in a single practiced glance, the kind she used at charity galas to size up whether the centerpieces were up to par. “So, this is where you’ve been hiding.”
Juliana wanted to point out that she wasn’t hiding, she was sick. But no defense would matter. Her mom always interpreted things to her own narrative. “I didn’t know you were coming.” Her voice was hoarse, but she held her chin level.
“I didn’t exactly have confidence you’d invite me,” her mom replied coolly, unbuttoning her coat and draping it neatly over the nearest chair. “But when I heard . . . well. I couldn’t sit by while you threw away everything we’ve worked for.”
Juliana’s stomach twisted. Not from the flu this time. The words sounded familiar, but her mom was hiding something.
Her mom’s lips curved in a way that made Juliana brace. “You got married to Gideon Reynolds. I can see why. He’s a very handsome man. Not to mention, he needed you to access his ownership of the Reynolds Ranching Corporation. Why didn’t you tell me you’d bagged a rich one after all?”
Juliana’s pulse hammered. There it was—the grenade. The words Gideon hadn’t told her. Her mother had lobbed them across the room like gossip at a country club, but it landed in Juliana’s chest like shrapnel.
She forced her face neutral. “This is my business, Mom.”
Her mother leaned closer, eyes gleaming.
“Maybe you’re smarter than I thought. The family kept the inheritance clause a secret, but I’m sure he was tired of waiting.
Then you, all heartbroken on that pathetic honeymoon.
You were the perfect woman to help him take his rightful place.
” Her mother’s smile was deceptively sweet, but there was a hint of envy and malice she couldn’t hide.
She must have seen something on Juliana’s face, because she continued with a click of her tongue.
“Come now, surely you didn’t think he was only interested in you for your sparkling personality. ”
Juliana’s cheeks heated, fever or fury she couldn’t tell. She wanted to defend him. Wanted to snap that Gideon hadn’t once acted like a man chasing money or power. He’d acted like . . . Gideon. Soup and tea and ridiculous index cards. The man who thought her lists were both maddening and beautiful.
But the doubt slithered in anyway. He hadn’t told her. That silence suddenly felt deafening.
“I don’t think that’s why he—” Juliana stopped herself. Why he what? Why he kissed her like she mattered? Why he prayed with her when she couldn’t string her own thoughts together? Why he made her believe that detours could be better than plans?
Her mother’s expression softened in mock sympathy. “Oh, sweetheart. I know you want to believe this cowboy cares about you. But men like him . . . they see an opportunity. And you’ve always been too na?ve to spot it until it’s too late.”
Juliana swallowed hard. The words hurt more than they should have, probably because they landed on the fragile place inside her still wrestling with her own worth. Hadn’t she just convinced herself to stay? To trust?
She hated how her voice trembled. “Gideon’s not like Dad.
Or Leo. He doesn’t make promises he won’t keep, and he doesn’t care about money or status.
” Juliana straightened, though her body ached with fever.
If anything, that clause was exactly why he probably didn’t want to stay married.
The man ran from responsibility like a nest of copperheads.
The room went quiet for a beat. Her mother’s polished mask didn’t crack, but the faintest twitch of irritation crossed her eyes.
“You really believe that?” she asked. “So what, you’re not going to stay with him?”
“I don’t know yet.” Juliana’s voice steadied. “If I stay, it’ll be because I love him and he loves me.”
Her mom’s sigh was heavy, disappointed. “You’re throwing away a future people would kill for.”
“No.” Juliana shook her head. “I’m finally living one.”
The words surprised even her. They rose from somewhere deeper than fever or stubbornness—somewhere rooted in all her whispered prayers, in the way Gideon’s steadiness had slowly rewired her heart.
Her mother stood, smoothing her coat with precise motions. “You’ll regret this, Juliana. Mark my words.”
“Maybe,” Juliana whispered. Her throat burned, but the conviction didn’t waver. “But at least the regret will be mine. Not yours.”
Her mother didn’t reply. Just clicked her way out the door, leaving the perfume lingering like smoke after a fire.
Juliana sagged against the pillows, every muscle trembling from the confrontation. Tears blurred her vision, but she let them fall this time. She wasn’t crying because of her mother’s accusations. She was crying because, for once, she knew they didn’t own her anymore.
Still, one truth gnawed at her. Gideon hadn’t told her about the clause. And no matter how much she trusted his heart, that omission left a hollow place she couldn’t ignore.