Epilogue
Later That Summer
Jackie pulled the garden hose from the side of the house to the flagpole in the front yard and aimed the sprayer at the marigolds growing in a circle at the base.
The vibrant golds and oranges never failed to please her with their cheeriness, and she loved the contrast of color against the trim green lawn.
From her time as a WASP and later flying courier for the military, she’d never had the time or opportunity to make things grow. Flowers, vegetables, or ordinary grass just weren’t something she’d cared much about. Or knew anything about. Or were something she was any good at flourishing.
All that had changed, thanks to her new mother-in-law, Ruthie, who could turn bare dirt into something miraculous.
Thank goodness, Ruthie was a patient woman, and Jackie had thrived under her guidance.
Soon, Jackie would try her hand at canning vegetables from her garden—something else she’d never done—which involved extra lessons from Ruthie, who declared Jackie and Beck would have more food put away for the winter than they could eat.
Permanence. That’s what living on Archer land meant.
Roy Kincaid wouldn’t recognize the old house he’d once lived in. Jackie and Beck had spent the months before their wedding improving the place with a new roof, exterior paint, and renovating every room, with plans to add more bedrooms to hold the babies they longed to have.
More than her gardening, she’d grown peace, too, which filled her every thought and breath since she’d married Beck.
It was as if she were like the little blooms she cared for every day, rooted here in the Sandhills, trusting she’d be here with him forever to watch them bloom and fade and bloom again through all the seasons to come.
Jackie tugged on the hose again, this time aiming the water toward the day lilies growing along the foundation. Soon, she’d move toward the chrysanthemums along the edge of the drive, and so engrossed was she with her watering, she didn’t hear Beck stroll up behind her.
His arm circled her waist, and his hand was quick over the hose.
Jackie laughed and glanced back at him. “What are you doing?”
“Taking precautions.”
Her eyes rounded. “What? You don’t trust me?”
He chuckled, a sound she would always love coming out of him.
“Sweetheart, I trust you with my life.” His grip kept firm, but his voice was seductive in her ear. “Just not with a hose. I prefer to keep my shirt dry.”
Her laugh lingered. Well, she had that coming. She’d already drenched him once and had promised not to do it again, even though he gave as much as he took, and she loved the sight of him with his shirt plastered to his muscular chest and water running off his jaw.
“You got a little time to spend with me?” he asked.
Her lashes moved with a flirtatious flutter. “Inside or out?”
His eyes gleamed with promise. “Outside now. Inside later.”
A knowing smile tugged at her mouth. “How can I say no?” She lowered the hose and shut off the nozzle. “I’ll always find time for my husband.”
He helped her coil the hose into a neat heap on the grass. “A man shouldn’t have to go all afternoon without being with his bride, either. Thought I’d see what you came up with for our Marriage Note and the locket.”
“I’ve been working on them half the morning. I want them to be perfect from us.” She tucked her arm in his.
While Beck waited on the new porch swing he’d built for her, keeping it in motion with the lazy push of his boot against the wooden boards, she stepped into the house, returning soon after with the black leather jewelry box and a folded sheet of paper.
He reached for her, drawing her down beside him.
“Show me what you came up with,” he murmured.
She needed a moment for a wave of sentiment to pass before she opened the paper and began to read:
From the perils of war came sacrifice and hope, but it was in the sky between us that we found our love. Beck Archer and Jackie Sinclair. Halsey, Nebraska, August 10, 1955.
“You couldn’t have said it better,” he said huskily. “I’d be proud to have our names beneath that.”
Her heart warmed at his compliment. “Then I’ll add it with the other Marriage Notes.”
Opening the lid, she pulled out the old parchment kept in the lining, yet her pen hovered over the last entry….
As our town gathered beneath the banner of liberty and remembrance, Wilson and I discovered that the true heart of honor lies not only in brave deeds, but also in understanding, compassion, and enduring love. Mercy Owens and Wilson Porter, Hawthorn, Texas, August 3, 1876.
Humbled by the words of another bride writing about her own happiness, as if love had reached across the decades and welcomed her into a special sisterhood, Jackie penned her Marriage Note carefully onto the parchment, refolded it, and slipped the paper into the lining.
Then she reached for the locket resting in her lap.
“There’s one more thing I want to show you,” she said.
Her fingers moved over the embossed design on the front, almost reverently, before she pressed the clasp and opened the first compartment for Beck to see.
On one side, the words In God We Trust were inscribed.
Inside, too, were the precious keepsakes left by the couple before them—a faded sprig of lavender, a scripture reference, and two small buttons tied together with thread, along with a note explaining they’d come from wedding clothes.
Beck bent closer, his shoulder brushing hers. “You aiming to leave them there?”
Jackie hesitated. “I don’t think I can. There isn’t enough room for all of it.” Her expression softened. “But I hate the thought of simply putting them away and forgetting them.” She lifted the buttons carefully into her palm and smiled. “Maybe someday these could be sewn onto a christening dress.”
Beck’s gaze came to hers, warm and searching. “For our baby girl?”
“If we’re blessed with one.”
His expression turned so tender it nearly stole her breath. He folded her fingers over the buttons and kissed her temple. “Then we’ll keep them safe for her.”
Her smile trembled. “Yes.”
As gently as her avowal had been, Jackie removed the lavender sprig and both notes and set them aside with the tiny wedding buttons.
Then, taking her own keepsakes, she tenderly nestled a tiny scrap of flight map into the empty space, smoothing it lightly before turning the locket so Beck could see.
His gaze settled on it. “Is that yours?”
Jackie nodded. “From Korea.” She touched the worn little piece with the tip of her finger.
“I kept it all this time. I couldn’t bear to destroy it, even when I wanted to.
” Her eyes lifted to his. “That map held the sky where I first saw you and tried to help you. Where, without even knowing it, everything began for us.”
Next, she placed a blade of prairie grass over the map, her breath catching at how right the two small pieces looked together.
“From the ranch,” she said. “Our front yard.”
The warmth of his look curled straight through her. “You and the sky. Me and the land. We’ve made one life out of both.”
She managed a tremulous smile and closed the compartments. “I like thinking of it that way.”
After resting the locket on top with the chain secure inside the lining, she closed the black container and sighed with happiness.
“We’ll take good care of the jewelry box until the time comes when someone else will have need of it,” Beck said quietly, pressing a kiss into her hair.
Jackie leaned into him and held the leather box a little closer, humbled by the sweetness of belonging not only to Beck, but to a love story larger than their own.
Because love was never meant to end, only to be passed on.
T H E E N D