“Okay?” he asked.
I nodded; the word stuck in my throat. I was more than okay. For the first time in longer than I could remember, I felt peace. “I want more with you, Jesse,” I murmured. “I want forever, Cowboy.”
He leaned in then, awkward, and I moved in the saddle—Sadie steady as a rock—and he kissed me. “I can live with that, Lucas.”
We carried on to the gravestones, all of them exposed now that the snow had pulled back, and Jesse helped me down from Sadie. I rubbed her nose, murmured my thanks, and let her stand while we walked the last few steps on foot.
I stopped in front of my grandparents and didn’t know what to do with my hands. I went back to Jesse, who’d stayed with the horses. “Can you leave them? The horses, I mean?”
“Sure—”
I didn’t let him finish, gripped his hand, and tugged him with me.
“I’m sorry I never got to meet you, Grandpa,” I said when we reached them. “And you, Grandma.” The words felt smaller than the weight of emotion inside me, but they were all I had.
Jesse squeezed my hand and looked down at the stones. “Hey, Walter,” he said, voice rough but steady. “I’m gonna tell Lucas about you now. About how you were good people.How, when I was a kid, and my dad was loud and hurtful, when Hoyt was gone more than he was home, you were there for me instead.”
He glanced at Isobel’s name. “I didn’t know you, ma’am, but Walter loved you dearly and would bring flowers here every Sunday.”
“I’ll do that,” I murmured.
Jesse smiled at me, then focused back on the stone. “Thank you, Walter, for teaching me how to sit on a horse properly when Abel didn’t care. You didn’t rush me or shout, just waited till I figured it out. You gave me Boone and trusted me with him.”
His hand tightened around mine. “You were stubborn, quiet, and complicated as hell. But you were a good rancher. A good man. Everything I know about this place, about doing things right, I learned from you—not Abel Knox. I don’t exactly know why you kept my dad on, but in my heart, I believe you used what skills he had, ignored the bad, and keeping him had a lot to do with making sure I had a home and was looked after. I came out this week, told everyone, not that any of them had a word to say about it, and I’m with your grandson, Lucas. He’s staying here with me, alongside me, and we’re gonna get a dog, and I’ll get him a horse, and teach him to ride. You’d love him. He’s just as stubborn as you, old man, and just as wonderful.”
I swallowed hard and stared at the headstones, trying to imagine the man who’d never held me and a love that had existed one generation too early.
“I wish you’d known me,” I said to the ghosts in thestone. “I wish I’d come to Snow Creek anyway and found you.”
Jesse turned then, cupped the back of my neck, resting his forehead against mine. “He would’ve loved you as a kid and as a grown man,” he said.
Something inside me cracked open. I leaned onto him, breathing him in, letting myself grieve for people I’d never had and a childhood that might have been different.
“I’m here,” Jesse murmured.
I closed my eyes and let myself believe him.
I was home.
When we got back,Jesse got called away, and I was bubbling with emotion, and as if he knew it, my cell buzzed with a message from Dalton.
Dalton: Hey!
Lucas: I told him
Dalton: Told him what
Lucas: That I love him
Dalton: And??
Lucas: He loves me too
Dalton: I know
Lucas: You did not know
Dalton: Please
