“But, yeah. That was me. Hawk told me you were working at your parents’ shop. I know what you get like when you’ve got a project. All sense about taking care of yourself goes out the window. I panicked that you weren’t eating. Weren’t taking care of yourself.”
“A doughnut isn’t a healthy option. Shouldn’t you have been sending me salads? Smoothies? Protein shakes?”
“Sometimes, it’s just nice to have something that’s good for our souls. Isn’t that what you always told me?”
“Yes.”
“I wanted to send something that would make you feel happy. Even if it lessened the pain for only a few minutes each day. I wanted to do that for you.”
“But my ass gained at least ten pounds from those damn things,” she whined.
“What an incredibly beautiful side effect I hadn’t even thought of, but am now so fucking glad for.” His hand slid off her waist, grabbing a handful of her ass. “This is perfection, Mae. You always have been, and you always will be in my eyes.”
It was all too much. But in the most perfect way. Wave after wave of peace washed over Mae as she walked through their house. It felt like home. Stone felt like home. It was the thing she’d been missing so much while she was gone. This sense of being right where she belonged. And it was there, in that beautiful house.
“Come on. There’s one more space I want you to see.”
Her breath caught as they walked up the stairs and straight into one of the bedrooms. Not the master. He hadn’t shown her that yet. But there was no doubt in her mind exactly what this room was for.
Because in front of her was the most precious nursery, complete with a beautiful white swan cradle that looked hand carved. Her hand reached out, hovering not even an inch above the wood.
“That took me forever to finish, but I think it was worth it.”
Her heart swelled. “You carved this yourself?”
Stone nodded. “I worked on it a little each night after I did whatever big project was on the schedule for the house. I’d put on an episode of Dr. Quinn and carve away. It was nice to think about our babies all sharing it as the years go on. And I figured when they have kids one day, it will be a nice heirloom to pass around.”
Mae finally allowed her fingers to run against the wood. It was sanded down to a perfectly smooth finish. Everydetail so lovingly attended to. Her eyes wandered to a leather bound book, placed on the mattress inside the cradle.
“What is this?”
“I kept a journal. I wanted to have a place to tell you all the things I couldn’t actually tell you over the last year. Everything is in there Mae. The process of renovating this place. The blood, sweat, and tears. How my therapy sessions went. How much I missed you every morning and every night, when I would finally let my mind wander to where you were and what you were doing.”
Mae put the book back in the cradle.
“No. It’s yours. I want you to have it.” Stone picked it up and handed it back to her. Mae flipped through the pages.
I miss you, Michaela. I picked out the tile for the backsplash in the kitchen. It’s not exactly the same as the one you had saved, but if I actually ordered them from Italy, they wouldn’t have gotten here for another eight months. I’ll make it up to you.
She smiled as she flipped to another random page.
Sat down in therapy today and spent the whole time talking about you. Hawk mentioned you were teaching dance class, and fuck, Mae. I had to stop myself from jumping in my truck and driving all the way there to see that with my own eyes. Because I just know you’re loving it. You deserve it. To be happy. To feelwhole again. And then I feel like a bastard, because I’m scared to death you’ll find your footing there and never come back to Silver Springs. You’ll choose to never come back to me. I’m scared, Michaela.
The ink was smudged on that page, and it wasn’t until her own tear fell on the paper that she realized Stone must have been crying as he wrote that entry. She flipped to a new page, another entry with stained pages.
It’s the middle of June, and I’m sitting here… wishing I could hold you. Wishing I could hold our baby. This is right around the time they would have been born. I know they would have had your gorgeous features, and your big personality. How could they not?
“How did you find time to do all of this?
He shrugged. “I took a leave of absence from work.”
“What? Hawk didn’t tell… no one told me.”
“It wasn’t just about the house. I wanted to go to therapy, and I got my EMT certification. I wanted to be the man I said I was going to be when you came back. So, I worked on myself, and I accomplished my dreams, and I tried to make sure our dreams together were still fostered during that time, so we could get back on track.”
“How did you know? How did you have that much faith in us to keep going with this? How did you know thateverything you picked would be what I loved? What I always hoped for?”
Stone chuckled. “There were a lot of questions there. Where do you want me to start?”
