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“Cold now, huh?”
“I’m so sorry,” she said as she pushed her head into my chest and I wrapped my arms around her.
“It’s okay, beb.”
“No, it’s not,” she said hoarsely. “We haven’t slept in weeks. I’m losing it, Jack. I know I’m acting a damned fool.”
“Beb, you’re a million weeks pregnant. I love you. I love the colorful asshole growing inside you.”
“HEEEYYY,” she said in offense as she smacked my chest.
“Just making sure you still love him,” I said with a chuckle.
“I do,” she said. “God, I can’t wait to meet him,” she murmured with a hiccup. “Now would be good.”
I turned on the bedside lamp as I rubbed her back in an attempt to sooth her. “Let’s read some.”
“Now? You work tomorrow.”
“I’m done,” I said, giving her wide eyes. “I’m officially on leave until this kid comes out and then some. We can do lunges together.”
“You ass,” she said, smiling up at me. “You totally saw it all.”
“Mais now, beb, jaw close,” I said as I picked up our book. “One chapter left. Why don’t you read it?”
“Me? You’ve read the whole thing,” she said as she took it from me.
“Well, get on it,” I said, placing my hands behind my head on the pillow as she burrowed into me further. I listened to the voice I loved to hear on the other end of the phone, the one that had turned my world upside down, and the voice that would eventually shape and soothe my son, and smiled as she turned each page. I looked down at her light eyelashes and her slightly widened nose—a side effect of pregnancy—and had to press down the urge to push her beneath me.
God, I loved her. Everything about her: her spunk, her passion, her temper, her walk, the cluster of faint freckles just above the tip of her nose, the way her toes curled when she came, the way she looked at me across the dinner table. I’d sta
rted the greatest journey of my life a year ago, and as she read the last page of the book and looked up to me in surprise, I vowed to make sure this one never ended.
“Jack?” she said as she pulled the ring from the adhesive I’d placed at the back of the book then looked at me with tears in her eyes.
I took my cue and kneeled down in front of her as she struggled to get her emotions under control.
“The greatest adventure of my life has been loving you, Rose. This is one trip I don’t ever want to come back from. Will you marry me?”
She leaped into my arms—well, as much as a severely pregnant woman could—with an enthusiastic “Yes!” I spent the next hour thanking her for that answer until we both fell asleep.
Later that night, I woke to a new kind of alarm. This one was eleven pounds two ounces and twenty-inches long.
Rose
6 Years Later
“Tucker!” I called out as I looked at my watch. I had surgery in an hour and a full day ahead of me. Tucker came running across the open expanse of the park with his most prized possession in hand: a red Frisbee my mother insisted I’d loved as a child.
“Five more minutes, Mommy!”
“No, buddy, not this morning,” I said as I grabbed his hand. I hated disappointing him, but I knew once his daddy was off he would take him fishing at our pond. It was their Friday routine.
Jack had merged his business in New Orleans with my brother Paul’s. Together, they’d created a monster. The center had been recognized as one of the most effective in the U.S. within three years of opening, and Dallas and I had been running ever since. Jack refused to let our life’s work overrun our time with our son or our marriage, and I’d never been happier.
I looked back at my blond-headed son, who looked everything like his father and nothing like me. I was sure it was karma for making fun of Dallas for the same thing. I pulled into the bustling parking lot of the center as Tucker told me all about the last fish he caught with his daddy. I listened carefully as we passed the house I used to occupy and honked as we saw Grant in the yard playing with Annabelle.
Jack and I had built a new house near our naked meadow. It hadn’t been his decision; it had been mine. Dallas and Dean were thrilled to take up residence. Their commute had been their biggest issue when it came to the center.
