Chapter 20
twenty
Leo
Icouldn’t stop replaying the kiss Carolina and I shared last night.
The way her lips felt on mine felt like a taste of home I’d long since forgotten.
I felt like the piece of my soul that had been shattered eight years ago mended just a tiny fraction.
When she pulled away, I immediately wanted to pull her back in, my promise to steer clear of her thrown completely out the window.
Even though she was right. We shouldn’t.
Too much was at stake. Luke being the number one priority at the top of the list. We couldn’t start something when I’d yet to resolve the feelings I’d kept buried of her breaking my heart and all the promises she’d made.
During the trail rides today, my mind kept wondering what kind of life I wanted to give Luke when I wasn’t thinking about Carolina and how conflicted I’d felt.
I wanted him to have a home like the one I grew up in.
Even if that meant his mother and I weren’t together, I wanted him to have a place where the two of us could share moments together and make memories.
While I loved living with my brothers, now I had a child to think about, and my brothers and I shared a three-bedroom house.
There wasn’t enough space for Luke in the tiny rancher.
When our grandparents passed away, they left Ainsleigh their home, and Holden, Brooks, and I our own acreage within the ranch in the hopes that we’d build our own homes.
The three of us hadn’t acted on it because we were still young and didn’t have families.
My piece of property sat adjacent to where Ainsleigh and Gentry lived.
Luke would love being neighbors with baby Olivia.
I could see them now playing together outside as we had a barbeque.
Now that I had Luke to think about, I needed to come up with a plan. And I had the perfect one. Determination spread through me like wildfire to bring that plan to fruition.
Dad, can I see you later this afternoon?
Dad
Sure thing, son. Is everything okay?
It was just like him to worry, and I smiled down at my phone before I responded.
Yeah, everythin’ is fine. Just want to run somethin’ by you.
Dad
Come by when you’re done for the day. I’ll be in the office.
The day dragged on as I waited for the trail rides to be over. It was difficult to keep my mind on the task at hand as I couldn’t wait to talk to my dad at the end of the day.
Finally after what felt like forever, the day came to an end.
I said goodbye to Holden, Brooks, and Gentry and rode my ATV over to Dad’s office.
I opened the door to find Ainsleigh packing up for the day.
“Hey, Leo. Did y’all have a good day?” she asked as she picked up hers and Olivia’s bags. Olivia was strapped to Ainsleigh in her baby carrier asleep.
“It wasn’t bad. Everyone had a good time,” I told her as I walked over and gave her a side hug.
“That’s good. Do you need somethin’ before I leave for the day?”
“Is Dad in his office?”
“Yeah, he’s still in there. He doesn’t have any appointments that I know of, so you should be able to go right in,” she said as she patted the baby’s back.
“Thank you. Gentry should be on his way here soon,” I told her as I headed to my dad’s office. The door chimed behind me, and Gentry walked in.
“How are my beautiful girls,” he greeted them with a smile and took the bags from Ainsleigh.
I smiled at their interaction.
I knocked on the doorframe and waited for Dad to acknowledge my presence before entering. He had his reading glasses on as he stared at the computer screen.
He pushed his chair away from his desk at the sound of my knock and waved me in.
“I swear this old man isn’t meant to use computers,” he said with a laugh as he took his readers off.
I sat in the leather chair across from him and laughed.
“Anythin’ I can help you with?”
“Nah, I’ll get your sister to help me in the morning. What did you want to talk to me about, son?” he asked, giving me his full attention.
I didn’t know how to broach this without giving him some sense of false hope, but I couldn’t get the idea out of my head now that the seed had been planted. I had an unexplainable need to give this to Luke, and to myself if I was truly honest, and I had to see it through no matter how long it took.
“Do you remember years ago when I had blueprints drawn up?”
“I do,” he said as he gave me a questioning stare.
“I know I told you to get rid of them, but is there any chance you happened to keep them?” I asked. I hoped he’d been like Mom had been and didn’t listen to me.
Without saying a word, he got up from his chair, his knees popped as he stood, and he walked over to the closet to my left.
He rummaged through the closet, and my heart pounded in my chest at the thought of him keeping those plans.
“Ah ha,” he said as he grabbed a white tube and blew off the dust that had collected on the top, and closed the closet behind him.
“Come here,” he said as he opened the tube and took out the blueprints. He spread them across the white table he had against the wall behind me.
On unsteady legs, I walked over to where he stood. I stared down at those plans as so many emotions coursed through me.
Carolina and I had talked about our dream house we’d build on one of the many nights we’d spent in the bed of my truck staring up at the stars.
I blinked rapidly as the memory of one of our many discussions came to mind.
Her head rested on my chest, my arm wrapped around her shoulder, as we stared into the sky as stars shone brightly above.
“What’s one thing you have to have in your dream house?” I asked her as I ran my thumb up and down her arm.
“I need a porch. One that wraps around the entire house,” she said, her voice so full of excitement mixed with hope. I wanted to give her everything. I’d give her the world if she'd let me.
“Why a porch that big?” I asked with a laugh.
“Because I want to see the sunrise in the morning and set in the evening. I want to be able to walk around the house and see the perfect view from all directions. But, Leo, where’d we even build this house?
” she asked as she sat up and propped her head on my chest. Her chocolate eyes stared at me, and I almost didn’t answer because I was so lost in her.
“You’ll see,” I said with a wink. I didn’t want to tell her that I already had the property. She’d find out soon enough.
She laid her head back down on my chest, the tip of her finger tracing an imaginable line on my shirt.
I blinked out of the memory. One I tried so hard over the years to bury.
The blueprints before me held every detail so intricately.
I’d worked so hard with the builder to get these plans just right.
I wanted both of our dreams to shine brightly.
Just after she’d left, I received these blueprints and demanded my dad destroy them.
I never got the chance to show her because she shattered our dreams before they even had the chance to bloom.
Even though she might never live in this house, the one we designed together, her not even knowing at the time, I wanted to make this mine and Luke’s reality.
“Why’d you keep them?” I asked as I stared down at them.
Instead of envisioning the memories of Carolina and me, all I could see was Luke running through the front door, his footsteps echoing through the one-story rancher, his laughter filling the walls, us cooking in the massive kitchen, flour on the two of us as we had a food fight before we finished baking the cookies; Luke playing on the playset I had in mind to build for him.
“Somethin’ told me you’d need them one day,” he explained.
“How’d you know?” I never gave him any indication that I’d ever go through with building this house. If anything, based on how I forbid everyone to even mention her name, he should’ve just tossed them.
He turned to me and leaned against the table. I turned to face him and waited for him to respond.
“I knew you’d want a home someday. And I guess I always hoped you’d find someone to make a life with,” he said, and I interrupted him.
“This house is just for Luke and me,” I explained, and the explanation tasted bitter in my mouth.
He gave me a smirk and a wink like he knew something I didn’t. I shook my head, not sure I wanted him to elaborate further.
“What’re you planning to do with these?”
“I was thinking today that I have no place for Luke in my house. I can’t get him overnight there, and I want a place that’s just ours,” I told him.
“Why these plans?”
That I couldn’t explain. I could have new ones drawn up. I could design something completely different. But my gut told me these plans, this house, was the one that I just had to build. That didn’t make rational sense, but I was going to listen to my gut on this one.
“I can’t explain that. It’s just a feeling I have,” I told him.
“I can put you in touch with a builder from Willow Bend. He’s one of the best,” he said with a smile as he rolled the plans up and put them in the white plastic tube.
He handed them over to me and patted my shoulder.
“Let’s go home and eat some dinner. I assume you’re eatin’ with us,” he said with a smirk.
“Yeah,” was all I could manage to say. A choke of emotion clogged my throat knowing I’d be seeing my boy and Carolina.
Luke animatedly talked throughout dinner about the day he had with his grandma.
He told us all about how he helped make breakfast and lunch and brownies, and how he went to see the cows and chickens.
I looked between the two of them, a smile on my mom’s face so wide that I was sure her cheeks would hurt.
She looked at him with pure joy, and I couldn’t be happier that he was now a part of our lives.
As we wrapped up dinner, Luke yawned and asked if he could watch Rio for the umpteenth time. Carolina smiled and laughed to herself as she helped my mom clean up dinner.