Chapter 29
The knock is soft, so soft I almost miss it over the click of the microwave. I glance at the clock. A little after six. Not late necessarily, but late enough that anyone I know who’d stop by are already seated at their own dinner tables.
Wyatt left for a job first thing this morning.
Aiden swung by around lunch with a bag of sandwiches from the diner and that look on his face that said he was checking to make sure I haven’t fallen apart since the last time he checked on me yesterday evening.
Sadie’s spending the week in Ashford Falls with Reid.
And Beckett told me after our morning run that he’s deep in a new song and probably won’t come out of the writing cave until it’s done.
So, who in the world is at my door?
I make my way toward the front door, my socked feet quiet on the hardwood. Through the curtained window I can see the silhouette of a woman. The shadow is slight and there’s something in her hands, a dish of some kind. And I know before I open the door who it is.
Taking a deep breath, I hold it for a second and let it out.
When I open the door, my mother stands on the front porch, a casserole dish cradled against her chest like a peace offering.
Her coat is buttoned wrong, the top looped through the second hold, and her hair is pulled back in a clip like I haven’t seen it before.
She looks nervous, and that’s the thing that strikes me most. Ruby Hawthorne doesn’t get nervous.
“Hi, darling.”
“Mom.” The word isn’t harsh, but it’s not warm either. It’s just a word—flat and careful—the way you handle something you’re not sure will hold.
Her smile falters for a second before she fixes it back in place. “I brought you dinner.”
Over her shoulder, I see movement at the cottage.
Dad is standing on the porch with Beckett, both of them turned toward my house.
When Dad catches my eye, he gives me a sad smile, one that says I’m sorry and I don’t know what else to do.
He doesn’t wait for any acknowledgement before he disappears through the cottage door.
Beckett stays where he is, his body turned to the side leaving room for Dad to move past. His eyes aren’t on my mother, they’re watching me, searching for something.
Most likely a sign that I’m okay or if I need him to come rescue me.
I feel the questions in his gaze from here.
Mom follows my line of sight. “That Beckett is a good man.”
My gaze flies back to her for a quick second before I look back at Beckett, offering him a small nod to let him know I’m okay. It might be a half-truth at the moment, but it’s enough. He returns it with a dip of his chin but still doesn’t move from his open doorway.
“Come on in.”
She steps past me into the house, and I close the door behind her.
We walk to the kitchen without talking, the casserole dish the only thing between us.
She sets it on the counter and pulls the foil back.
The smell hits me immediately. Chicken, broccoli, and cheese.
It’s the same casserole she makes every birthday, every illness, every time I need to be reminded I’m loved through food instead of words.
“Your favorite,” she says, like I haven’t noticed.
“Thank you,” I murmur, my gaze locked on the dish. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“I wanted to.” She moves around my kitchen like she’s been doing it her whole life, which, in a way, she has.
She helped me unpack when I moved in, decided where the spatulas went, and which drawer the measuring cups made the most sense.
She knows where everything is. As such, she opens a cabinet and pulls down a few plates without asking. “How are things at the inn?”
“Good. Steady. We’re booked until Valentine’s Day, which is nice for this time of year.”
“That’s wonderful, darling. I always worry about the slow season.”
“We’re fine, Mom.” The words are a little exasperated, but I know she’s not here to talk about the inn, not that it stops her.
She nods, still moving around the kitchen, finding small tasks for her hands.
I want to shake her and make her tell me what she’s really doing here, but I let her carry the conversation the way she needs to, answering questions about the inn and the guests, whether the heater in the Albert Room is still making that noise.
I give her the details and she absorbs them like she’s filling a reservoir, building up to whatever she’s actually come to say.
It happens when she turns to the fridge, most likely moving to pull out the iced tea she knows is in the door.
She freezes mid-air, her hand reaching for the handle but her eyes are somewhere else.
On the ultrasound pictures I taped to the fridge the day I got them, right next to the magnet of the inn and the photo of Jackson at the pumpkin patch.
The black and white image of a profile—a curved nose and a tiny hand pressed against a cheek.
Mom’s fingers find it first, gently tracing the outline of his face. Her touch is so reverent I feel my throat tighten.
“How are you feeling?” she asks, her voice soft in that way it does when she’s trying not to cry. “How far along are you now?” Her eyes don’t leave the image in front of her, and I don’t blame her.
“Twenty-four weeks.” If I’m right about the day we conceived, it’s twenty-four weeks exactly. According to my app, he’s the size of an ear of corn now.
Mom draws in a breath. “Have you felt the baby kick yet? It’s right around now you might.”
“I’ve felt him move. Flutters, mostly, but no real kicks yet.”
Her hand stills on the picture and her gaze swings toward mine. “You’re having a boy?”
I didn’t mean to say it. The pronoun slipped out, easy and natural, the way they’ve been living in my head for weeks and the way I talk about him with Aiden and Beckett.
“Yeah, it’s a boy.”
Mom breaks. Her face crumples first, her mouth pressing into a line that can’t hold, and then the tears come fast and messy. She presses her hand over her mouth and her shoulders shake. All I can do is stand here in my kitchen and watch my mother fall apart over a picture on my fridge.
It’s not because I don’t want to comfort her. I do. It’s because I’ve never seen her like this. Not when her parents died or when we said goodbye to the family dog she loved practically as much as she loved her children. Never once have I seen her break so completely.
“I’m sorry.” Her voice cracks. “I’m so sorry, Madison. I know it’s not an excuse, but I was caught off guard. All I could think about was how sad it was that this baby wouldn’t have a mom and a dad.”
Indignation rises in my chest and I open my mouth to scream, but she doesn’t let me.
“I know how stupid that was.” She shakes her head, wiping at her cheeks with the back of her hand.
“I know that doesn’t matter. All that matters is how much you love this baby and how much all of us are going to love this baby.
And Madison, I already do. I already love him so much, simply because he’s part of you.
” Her voice breaks on the last word. “I’m so sorry, Madison.
I love you and I just want you to be happy. ”
I wish we could go back to Sunday night and she could say all these words then, when they mattered most, but time travel doesn’t exist and you can’t take back the words already said.
My gaze shifts over Mom’s shoulder, to the same ultrasound that broke her. It would be ridiculous to think I won’t make mistakes as a mother. That I don’t make mistakes now as a daughter or sister. To pretend otherwise would be living in a world of fantasy and I don’t want to live in that world.
Mom’s words don’t change what she did, but they prove she knows she made a mistake and how can I not forgive her for that.
I close the space between us, taking her hand in mine. “I’m happy, Mom.”
“You are?”
“I am.” I swallow. “But I’m also terrified.”
She squeezes my hand, silently asking me to continue.
“Most women get at least eight months to figure out how to be a mom. I found out so late I’m getting half that. I’m running out of time, and I don’t know what I’m doing. Every time I think about it, I feel like I can’t breathe.”
Mom laughs, the sound a little wet and broken, but it’s real.
“Oh, Mads.” She shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter how much time you have.
Once that baby gets here, you’re going to realize that years wouldn’t be enough time.
You can’t figure out how to be a mom, it just happens.
And even then, you’re going to screw up. ”
I laugh too, because she’s right and because the tears blurring my vision make it impossible to hold anything back. “That’s the most honest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
“It’s the truest thing I know.”
She pulls me in and I press my face against her shoulder the way I used to when I was small enough to fit there. My belly presses between us, and for a second I wonder if the baby can feel it—the pressure, the warmth.
“I love you, Mom.”
“I love you too, darling. So much.”
We stay like that for a long moment before I pull back, wiping my eyes with the heel of my hand.
I look at her, at the mascara smudged under her eyes and the clip half falling out of her hair, and decide I don’t want to waste this opportunity, not when this is one of the most honest conversations we’ve ever had.
“Can I tell you something?” I ask tentatively.
“Of course.”
“The backhanded compliments…” She blinks and I keep going before I lose my nerve. “The ones about me being an old soul and my love of history.”
Her brows furrow. “Those aren’t backhanded compliments, Madison. They’re just little quirks, things we all love about you.”
“Mom, that right there, the ‘little quirks,’ that’s a backhanded compliment,” I say gently, the way you say something you’ve been holding for a long time.
“It sounds like a compliment, but underneath it’s pointing out a way I don’t fit.
I know you’re not trying to be hurtful, but that’s still how they feel. ”
Mom stares at me and I watch her face shift, the surprise giving way to something heavier, something like understanding and sorrow.
“I didn’t know.” Her voice is small, and I hate that I’ve caused it.
“It was never my intention. I swear, Madison. I know that doesn’t matter if you’ve been feeling hurt by it, but I promise to pay more attention.
I never want you to feel like that.” She reaches up and smooths a piece of hair behind my ear, her fingers trembling. “I love you, darling.”
“I love you too, Mom.”
She holds my face for a second, her eyes wet and steady, and then she lets go and turns back to the counter.
Picking up the casserole dish, she moves to the oven, opening it with a dish towel and sliding the casserole inside with a kind of efficiency that says her body is on autopilot while her heart is still catching up.
“That guy of yours is a good one,” she says, almost more to herself than to me.
“What?” I ask, afraid I misheard her.
“Your man, he’s a good one.”
My brows pinch. “I don’t have a man.”
She looks at me, one eyebrow raised. It’s the look she gives me when I say something so ridiculous she can’t believe it came out of my mouth. She straightens and gestures toward the front of the house, toward the cottage where we both know Beckett is. “If Beckett isn’t you man, then what is he?”
“A friend?” I don’t know why it’s a question, but I regret it the second it’s out.
Mom laughs, a real one that has her shoulder shaking. “Beckett Stone is not your friend, Madison. Not with the way you two look at each other, and not with the way he protects you.”
Something tightens in my chest. “What do you mean the way he protects me?”
Her eyes widen and her body stiffens. She spins back to the oven, adjusting the temperature dial. “Nothing. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“Mom.” It’s a simple word, but it says so much.
It takes her a moment to bring her attention back to me, but when she does there’s contrition in her voice. “He came to the house on Monday morning. He wasn’t rude, just honest. Showed your father exactly the kind of man he is.”
I stare at her, the words not quite making sense.
And yet they do. Hearing them sounds exactly like something Beckett would do.
My gaze lands on the coffee maker, the origami flower he left earlier today sitting right there, and I can’t stop my mind from racing.
My eyes move back to Mom, she hasn’t moved and the concern is more than evident in her eyes.
“Madison?”
“We agreed to try something,” I blurt. “The day of the accident. We were going to start exploring a relationship.” I swallow. “And then I found out about the baby and I told him we couldn’t.”
I don’t know what makes me tell her, but a lightness comes over at finally letting the words free.
“Why would you do that?”
I scoff, the sound sharp and bitter. “How could I ask someone like Beckett to start something with a woman carrying another man’s child?”
Her expression changes from concern to fierce protection. “What do you mean, someone like Beckett Stone?”
“Mom.” I sigh. “Beckett deserves so much more than I can give. I’m a small town inn manager with a load of baggage.” I gesture to my growing stomach. “I have a baby who isn’t his, an ex who—”
“No,” she cuts me off, her voice firm. “Anyone, including Beckett Stone, would be lucky to have you. Do you hear me?”
I want to believe her. The way she says it, the way her eyes hold mine without wavering makes me want to believe that the things I carry don’t make me less. That the baby growing inside me isn’t a weight someone else has to bear.
But wanting to believe something and believing it are two different things, and I’ve never been very good at the second one.