AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She just wished Jack was a bit more …? Maggie sighed because she was really at a loss when she thought about her husband. Her feelings for him were as conflicted and complex as the man himself.
She had taken a gamble on Jack when he had offered her a chance at a better life. He had convinced her that he was one of the good guys. And in his own way, Maggie supposed that he was. To be fair, Jack was still Jack; it was Maggie who had changed. Somehow, despite the demands of providing for a home and a family, Jack had still managed to maintain his Peter Pan way of looking at life. And Maggie realized it was exactly that kind of whimsy that had drawn her to Jack in the first place: the big dreams, the wandering minstrel, the child within the man.
Well, that’s one way to look at it,Maggie thought wryly. Another way might be juvenile, reckless, and alarmingly unreliable.
Together they had made Raine, so Maggie would never say that taking a chance on Jack was a gamble that she had lost. But she was pretty sure that what they had together wouldn’t qualify as a big win either.
After proclaiming that he needed someroad time, Jack had gone on an extended vacation, leaving Maggie and Raine alone to fend for themselves.
Again.
No real surprise there. And the irony of it all did not escape Maggie either. No matter what her resolutions had been and her mindful determination to the contrary, Magaskawee had married a man just like her father. At first, that realization horrified her. But after the epiphany sat with her for a while, Maggie realized that that wasn’t completely true. Jack wasn’t a drunk like her father had been, and he’d also stay at home for months at a time, working at odd jobs and providing for his family until the next time the road called his name.
In all honesty, Maggie had begun to mind Jack’s absences less and less. She still had the money that Tanka had given her hidden away, so she knew that no matter what happened, she and the baby would be okay. For the time being, Maggie had everything she needed. She had a roof over her head, good, rich soil beneath her feet, and the open sky above her. Her garden yielded gorgeous vegetables, and just beyond the fence line was a berry patch and a cool, clear creek that pooled into a small, rock-lined basin. On hot days, she would take Raine down there to play in the water and feed her plump red strawberries.
Magaskawee Whitefeather had come a long way from the Badlands, and she would always love Jack for giving her that—even when he disappointed her.
Maggie had just finished putting Raine in for a nap when she heard the distant roar of Jack’s Harley thundering down the long country road that led to the house. Her stomach knotted with apprehension since he had only left two days ago. For Jack to come home this soon, there must be something wrong. Maggie stood on the front porch with her hand shading her eyes and watched as the bike flew towards her in a cloud of dust and gravel.
The rider was about a few hundred yards away when Maggie realized it wasn’t Jack after all.
Prosper.
Although they had gotten the odd postcard or phone call once in a while, Prosper had not been back to see them since the morning he’d left.
The strong and immediate surge of unmitigated joy at seeing him filled Maggie completely. It was all she could do to stop herself from running down the porch steps and racing down the road to greet him. It felt like forever before he stopped the bike a few feet away from her. Then he swung his leg over the seat and stood tall and strong before her. Prosper had a wide grin splitting his handsome face.
Maggie hesitated a minute, then ran to him with slender arms wide open. She placed them around his hard torso and nuzzled her cheek against his muscular chest. And then with only a slight hesitation, Prosper wrapped his arms around Maggie and held her for a long moment, tighter than he had ever done before.
Prosper held Maggie like he never wanted to let her go.
They sat at the kitchen table and caught each other up on all the news in the way that friends do. Maggie talked about her garden and the baby. She told him how Jack had gone on a road trip and how sorry he would be that he had missed Prosper.
Prosper told Maggie about some of the places he had been and gave her a few small presents he had picked up for her along the way. Maggie marveled at the colorful woven scarf from Mexico, the little tin of sugared pecans from Texas, the jar of sweet, thick peach jam from Georgia, and a keychain made of blue quartz from Alabama
Maggie was touched by Prosper’s thoughtfulness and was pleased because the gifts meant that he had been thinking of her.
Just as she had been thinking of him.
“Mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma.” The sound came from down the hall and was accompanied by a strange kind of thumping and rattling.
It sounded to Prosper as if a little motor was revving itself up.
“That would be Raine.” Maggie laughed at the expression on Prosper’s face. “Her favorite thing to do when she wakes up is to call me repeatedly while shaking the daylights out of her crib. She hasn’t tried to climb out of it yet, thank goodness, but when she does, I know there will be trouble!” Then Maggie hurried down the hallway to her daughter’s bedroom. It wasn’t long before she emerged with a little girl held tight in her arms. Raine had her head on her mother’s shoulder and her thumb in her own tiny mouth.
She looked at Prosper with bright blue eyes full of curiosity.
Prosper was spellbound the moment he laid eyes on Maggie’s child. With her honey colored skin, patch of thick black hair, and eyelashes so long you could sweep the floor with them, she was a perfect miniature of her beautiful mother. But those bright blue eyes that stared so inquisitively at Prosper? Those eyes were all Jack.
“She’s a beauty, Maggie.” Prosper smiled at the little girl, who had begun to squirm in her mother’s arms.
“Dow!” Raine demanded as she pointed to the floor.
“Down what?” Maggie looked at her child expectantly.
“Dow, pwease!”
The moment Raine hit the floor she made a beeline in Prosper’s direction.
