“I guess the imperfections make it a little more perfect,” I surmised.
“For us, everything is perfect.” He pressed a kiss to my hair. “Even if it looks like a murder scene.”
My jaw fell with a gasp, and then I grabbed my red-coated paintbrush and smeared it down the side of his face. The streak coated not only the entire left side of his face but also a portion of his mustache and lips. He sat there, frozen, with his mouth pressed into a thin line.
I couldn’t help the giggle that left me, a snort following in its wake. The sound had him cracking a smile, but when he quickly turned serious again, it wasn’t hard to guess what he was thinking.
I scrambled to my feet, moving faster than ever to make headway before he inevitably caught up to me, but it was no use. Before I could take a single step, his armswrapped around me and he pressed the white paintbrush down my neck.
“Beckham!” I shrieked. “That’s cold!”
He made a shushing noise in my ear. “You’re going to wake the baby.” Yet he still dragged the brush lower until it hit the top of my overalls.
I warily glanced over at our son where he slept in his bassinet. We brought it out on the porch often, the fresh air the easiest way to calm him when he was fussy. “Nothing’s waking that baby.”
I spun in Beckham’s arms, grinning wide at the sight of his half-red face.
“What’s so funny?” he asked, smirking.
My head bobbed back and forth as I reached up to wipe a bit off his mustache. It still felt surreal sometimes to have Beckham in this way. Over the last eleven weeks, we’d grown so much not only as individuals, but also together. Poop explosions and sleepless nights will do that to a couple. “I’m just thinking about how lucky I am.”
His tongue darted over his lip, and his expression flashed sour as the taste of paint likely hit him. But his smile was back in a split second. “Well don’t think too hard. You might start to come to your senses.”
I set a palm on his chest, shaking my head. “All my senses are right here, and they’re completely obsessed with you.”
“Obsession doesn’t even begin to describe the way I feel about you,” he murmured, inching his face closer to mine. His eyes turned hungry, his hold on me changingfrom playful to possessive. “You really think he’ll stay asleep?” he whispered in my ear before pressing a kiss right behind it.
I nodded, tilting my chin up ever so slightly to give him more access. “Yes.”
His arms fell from around me. “I’ll wheel him in. You go get undressed.”
He moved so quickly, I couldn’t help but laugh at his impatience.
“We have thirty minutes before we need to go,” I reminded him.
“I know,” he said hurriedly, waving at me to hurry inside.
With our paintbrushes abandoned and the bookshelf drying, we were quiet as could be as we headed inside. Each bump of the bassinet had us bracing for his eyes opening or his body moving, but the one thing I had to give our son credit for was his ability to sleep like the dead.
Then, with him safe in his nursery and the baby monitor on, Beckham showed me all the ways he loved me. He kissed every inch of me, murmured sweet and dirty words into every crevice of my body, and trailed a heart around my healing scar.
Twenty minutes later, we were quickly scrubbing the paint off ourselves before dressing. I fed the baby while Beckham prepped the diaper bag and got everything we needed into the truck. We left late, but that was our new norm.
Thankfully, I didn’t think the person we were going to meet would mind.
When we arrived at the Bronsons’ ranch, Bucky was tied to the pasture fence like Bailey had promised. There wasn’t a person in sight as we climbed out of the vehicle and wrapped the baby in a lightweight swaddle. We made our way over to the fence, slipped past the gate, and came up beside Bucky.
A coo sounded from my arms, and I looked down to find the love of my life with his big eyes on the horse beside us.
He’d been curious about horses since the day he was born, and anytime he was around them, he’d light up like he was the happiest baby in the world.
Beckham slid Bucky’s halter off, then wrapped an arm around my shoulders and led us deeper into the field. Bucky followed alongside us, just like he always did—except this time, he glanced over every few steps, intently focused on the bundle in my arms. At one point, he stuck his nose over and sniffed the baby’s feet.
We didn’t walk far, but from where we eventually came to a stop, the Bronsons’ house and barns were a speck in the distance.
We’d been meaning to come out here sooner, but with the colder months and me healing from my C-section, waiting was the best choice for me and our baby. But now, as I watched Beckham’s shoulders visibly loosen, and how he turned his head to the sky with his eyes closed, a breeze rustling his growing hair, I regretted not coming weeks ago.
We stayed standing, looking out at the setting sun and the vibrant orange it cast across the moving fields. Rather than grazing like he typically did, Bucky aimed his full attention on our baby. His ears were perked, his nostrils flaring as he inhaled his sweet scent.
