CHAPTER 55
Summer
The past twenty-four hours has been nothing but one long, nonstop pep talk.
Declan, family, friends, healthcare professionals, and just now the attendant at the private hangar bathroom—everyone’s assured me that being unable to conceive is not the end of the world.
“There are ways around that!”
“Adoption!”
“Surrogacy!”
“Nothing wrong with not having children at all!”
“It might even be a blessing, not a curse!”
So basically, I’m being told to pull myself together and smile. That it’s okay to go through life with one bum ovary and “substandard fertility”—which is one hell of a wishy-washy way of saying I’m barren.
If I were a horse, I’d be what’s called a “maiden mare,” the kind that can never be in foal.
Not the end of the world, sure, but the end of Declan’s world. His dreams.
Because rolling around my head are those words—he wants at least four children.
I look into the mirror in the ladies’ room and shake my head.
I’ve put him through the wringer since we got blackout drunk and mistakenly married. I’m not a blessing in his life. I’m a fucking curse. A menopausal, twenty-something weight he thinks he’s obligated to carry for the rest of his days.
Yep, Declan sure caught the brass ring with this chick!
I sigh. In the mirror, I catch the concerned look of the bathroom attendant, who’s trying not to stare.
“I’m fine,” I tell her.
“You will be, honey,” she says. “Give yourself some time to bounce back.”
I nod my thanks. She’s closer to the truth than she knows, because bouncing is exactly what I’m going to have to do.
Declan’s been putting on a brave face for my sake, so sweet and supportive, telling me it’s going to be fine.
That it’s no big deal. He reminds me—at least once every half hour—how lucky we are.
That only yesterday we thought I was dying!
And now it’s all turned around and I’m going to live a long, happy, healthy life with him at my side.
Together.
And yet, I know this news has absolutely gutted him. It’s the latest in a series of Summer-related disasters that has brought him to his knees.
That poor man.
It’s not like I’ve spent the last decade daydreaming about having babies. Why would I? I had no one in my life I’d consider having a family with. Except for Declan, who I truly believed was an impossibility.
Maybe the lack of a partner wasn’t the only reason I didn’t dream of having kids. I think there’s always been a part of me that didn’t want to risk it. My parents were gold medalists in the Bad Parenting Games, and the only thing they taught me about family was how to survive it.
Not until I came to Yosemite Ranch did I realize that some families were different. Some parents loved their kids. Some people loved each other.
And then in Las Vegas, of all the places on earth, everything changed. On a dime. One bad double date. One dozen too many alcoholic beverages. One mask slipped off my face.
One kiss.
Suddenly, there I was, married to Declan and allowed to love him. And the sky of possibilities opened wide over me. I wanted it all with him, I really did. He wanted it, too.
Within weeks we were imagining a bunch of little Declans running around, with their dark MacLaine curls and their violet eyes. Driving us crazy with their dumbass antics.
I’ve gone and stolen that from him.
Those children will never be mine. But they can one day be his. So I know what I have to do—let him find all that with someone else.
Let him find true happiness.
And this, right here, is my challenge.
Declan will never let me go. If I tell him that he’s better off without me, he’ll fight me out of a sense of loyalty. He’ll pull some kind of wild romantic shit, with or without the barbecue, and I won’t be strong enough to break away from him.
Which means I’ll have to do it without his knowledge. Without a discussion. Without tears—mine or his.
I push the bathroom door open and walk out into the hangar.
“There’s my girl.” Declan greets me, his gentle hand on my upper arm, his head dipped down so that he can see into my eyes. “How’re you feeling?”
“Fine.”
I’ve got to find a word other than fine, because I’m already sick of it.
“Any pain?”
“Nope. I was a little sore, but I took a couple Tylenol, and now I’m fffff—” I stop myself. “I’m good, Declan. Really.”
He’s beaming at me, and I do my best to beam back at him.
He’s heartbreakingly handsome in jeans, T-shirt, and a worn leather jacket.
I know his watch is worth a kajillion dollars, but otherwise, he looks like any other incredibly tall, muscular, Adonis with perfect bone structure and unnaturally intense eyes.
“You want to go to Lanai? You could recuperate for two weeks there. My place overlooks the ocean, and there’s a walkway to the beach. We could swim naked for two weeks, and there isn’t another soul around to bother us.”
I would love to go to Lanai with him. More than anything in the world. I’d love to be pampered and loved in paradise, in complete luxury, with the best man I’ve ever known.
But there would be no turning away from that. We would spend two weeks together in total isolation, bonding even more than we already have, if that’s possible. I wouldn’t be able to summon the strength to do the right thing and leave him after that.
It’s time to go home. It’s time for me to make plans.
“Maybe in the spring,” I tell him. “For now, I just want to see my beloved Yosemite Ranch. That’s the place that will heal me.”
And the place where I’ll say goodbye.