Chapter 1 – Kenna-Present #2
Millie lets out a laugh. “Not a dog, bud. Something even better.”
Cohen gasps dramatically, hands flying to his face. “Are you getting a pool? Wait—are you adopting a unicorn?”
“Better,” I whisper. “She’s having a baby.”
Cohen’s mouth falls open. He turns to Millie as if she’s grown a crown. “You’re having a real-life baby?! Like…an actual one that cries and poops and stuff?”
Millie grins and nods. “An actual one.”
Cohen is quiet for a second, and then he does something that makes my chest ache. He throws his arms around Millie and hugs her tightly. “That baby is so lucky to have you.”
My throat tightens. It reminds me just how much heart this little boy has. What reminds me of how loved he is—and how deeply he loves in return.
He pulls back and turns to me, his voice low, almost like a secret. “Do you think Auntie Mills is nervous?”
I brush my fingers through his hair again. “Probably. But I think she’s also really, really excited. Just like I was. I knew loving you would be the easiest thing I’d ever do, even when I was scared.”
Cohen leans into me, his little arms wrapping around my neck. “I love you, Mom. You’re the best human.”
“You’re my favorite human, too.”
I reach over to hug her, her joy contagious.
It wasn’t like I wasn’t happy for her—I was—but I couldn’t help the rush of emotions that came with it.
I couldn’t quite explain why, but something about it made everything feel…
different. The weight of Cole’s return, the history between us, and now, Millie’s new chapter in life—it was all hitting me at once.
Maybe it was that I wasn’t sure how I fit into this picture anymore.
I was still stuck in my world, unsure of where I belonged in my family's new realities.
“I assume you told Gabriel,” I say, smiling.
She nods her head excitedly. “I was telling him when you called.”
“Well, let’s invite the family to the cafe to celebrate! There’s no better time than now!” I say, grinning while wiping a tear from my eye that sneaked out of nowhere.
Millie’s smile widened. “You’re right. Let’s go to the cafe. We’ll tell everyone there.”
A couple of hours later, I am sitting at a booth at Millie’s cafe—Beanstalk—trying to focus on something other than the fluttering in my chest. Millie had told everyone about the pregnancy when we got there.
Gabriel looked overjoyed as he wrapped his wife in his arms, lifting her off the floor.
It was one of those moments that felt almost too perfect to be real.
Aura, their little girl, is running around the cafe, her dark brown curls bouncing, her giggles echoing off the walls. It wasn’t just Millie and Gabriel here, though.
Our family fills the space—Mom and Dad beaming with pride, Asher and Reuben tossing jokes across the room, Lucie peppering Millie with questions like she’s interviewing a celebrity. Cohen is bouncing around too, being Cohen.
He throws his arms dramatically around Millie. “Your baby’s already cooler than me, Auntie Mills. I bet it’s got a better playlist in the womb.”
I shoot him a look, trying to keep him behaved, but he just grins back at me. It’s moments like this—Cohen, all energy and mischief—that keeps everything light, reminding me how much he fills my life with happiness. But the warmth doesn’t erase the weight sitting in my chest.
Cohen returns to my side and climbs up onto my lap, resting his head on my shoulder. I wrap my arms around him automatically.
“You good, Mom?” he murmurs, only loud enough so I can hear it.
I nod. “I’m okay, lovebug.”
“You don’t look okay.”
I look down at him, his gray-blue eyes scanning my face. They’re so much like Cole’s. Too knowing.
“I just have a lot of adult stuff on my mind,” I say honestly. “But being with you makes it a lot better.”
He smiles, small and content, tucking himself closer to me. “I’m going to be with you forever, Mom. Even when I’m old and famous living in a treehouse mansion.”
I laugh softly. “A treehouse mansion?”
“With a hot tub. Duh.”
But the moment fades too fast. Cole is here. In this town. Breathing the same air. Walking the streets I know by heart. And every second I don’t tell him about Cohen feels like a countdown to something I can’t control.
“Kenna?” My mom’s voice cuts through my spiral. “You okay, sweetheart?”
I blink, a little disoriented. “Sorry, Mom. I’m just…thinking.”
She studies me, arms crossed loosely over her chest. “You’ve been doing a lot of that lately.”
“I guess I have.”
“What’s going on in that head of yours?” She asks gently, but there’s a firmness underneath. “And don’t say ‘nothing,’ because I know that look.”
I try to smile, but it doesn’t quite land. “It’s just hard. Everything is so complicated.”
She sits beside me, lowering her voice. “You’ve been carrying this secret around for years, sweetheart. It’s going to be complicated, but I will always be here for you.”
I glance over at Cohen, now yapping a mile a minute to Gabriel.
“I’m scared, Mom.”
She leans in slightly. “Of what?”
“Messing everything up. Of losing people I love. About causing pain to others.”
She gives me a look that says she doesn’t buy it, but thankfully Lucie distracts her with another pregnancy question. I take the chance to slip away. I need air. Space. Quiet.
I excuse myself quietly, standing up and making my way toward the back of the cafe. The quiet hum of the space feels suddenly too loud, too chaotic. I need a moment to breathe. To think. To sort through the storm of feelings that had been building inside me all day.
As I reach the hallway near the back door, I hear footsteps behind me. “Mom!”
I turn around to find Cohen trotting after me, his hair flopping over his forehead. He’s out of breath like he ran to catch up.
“Hey lovebug,” I say, crouching so we’re eye-level. “What’s up?”
He frowns. “You left without saying goodbye.”
My chest squeezes. He’s right. It didn’t even occur to me. “I’m sorry, baby. I just needed a second to think.”
He studies me again. “Is it a bad-think or a good-think?”
“Both,” I admit. “A lot’s changing. I think I just needed a second to catch up with it all.”
He throws his arms around my neck again, and I hold him close, soaking in his warmth. “If something bad is coming, I’ll protect you, Mommy.”
Mommy.
The word hits me like a soft punch to the heart. He doesn’t say it much anymore. Not since he decided he was “too big” for it.
But now and then, it slips out. Like just now and I soak up the sound of it like sunlight in winter. I don’t correct or tease him. I just let it land where it belongs. Right in the middle of my aching, overwhelmed heart.
Tears sting the backs of my eyes again. “Yeah,” I whisper. “I’ve got you.”
I squeeze him a little tighter, memorizing the way his arms feel around my neck. The way he still smells like shampoo and sun and the vanilla muffin he had earlier.
And the thing is, I do. Cohen has always been my motivation for everything. My anchor. My beginning and my second chance.
And as I hold him in that quiet hallway, I realize that maybe it’s time to stop letting fear be the loudest voice in the room.
Because this little boy deserves to know the whole truth.
And Cole deserves to know him.
The bell above the front door chimes as I step into the salon, the soft lighting and familiar calm is a relief after the noise outside. I move past the styling stations and down the hallway toward the back, until I reach my office. A small, private space that has become my sanctuary over the years.
But something is wrong. My purse—which I had left on the desk—is gone.
And then I see him.
Cole.
He’s sitting in the chair across from my desk, elbows on his knees, hands clasped like he’s been waiting. He looks up, and those eyes—the ones I’ve seen every day in Cohen—lock onto mine.
He stands slowly. His voice is barely above a whisper. “Hey, Sunshine.”
The world tilts.
Everything inside me reacts all at once. Heat rushes to my cheeks, my heart stumbles in my chest, and a breath I didn’t know I was holding catches in my throat.
Before I can speak, he closes the distance and pulls me into his arms. I gasp, but my body doesn’t resist—it remembers.
The way we used to fit, the way his arms were always wide enough to hold all my broken pieces.
This scent—lemon, mint, jasmine—it’s him, all him, and it crashes into me like a wave I didn’t see coming.
His voice, deep and warm, whispers into my hair, sending shivers down my spine. “I’ve finally found my sunshine.”
God, I could break from that one line. He’s still calling me that. Like I never stopped being it. Like the years haven’t dulled his memory of who we used to be.
I am quiet for a moment, too overwhelmed by the force of everything. The familiarity of his embrace, the weight of years between us, and the reality that I am standing here, in the arms of the one person who had once made me feel seen.
Tears burn my eyes. “Cole…”
He pulls back slightly, his hands still resting on my shoulders as he looks down at me, eyes full of something that is both soft and intense.
“I’ve been waiting to see you, Kenna. Every single day.
I never wanted to leave you, and I know I fucked up.
But I couldn’t make you wait for me. I know I hurt you, but I’m back.
I’m here, Sunshine. I’m not going anywhere. ”
The words tumble out of him like a confession, and I can feel the ache behind them. The years, the silence, the longing.
His words hit me like a rush of wind, a jolt of lightning that sparks every nerve ending in my body.
I want to pull away, to stop myself from falling into the gravitational pull, but I couldn’t.
It feels like the years apart never happened.
Like I’ve been waiting in a silent corner of my life for this moment, and now it’s finally here.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” I whisper.