“Then take it back. All of it. Start living for yourself again,” I suggest.
“Is that what you do? Live for yourself?” she asks.
“I try. The farm helps. It’s my space, my project. No one can tell me what to do with it.”
“Tell me about the farm,” she says, shifting to look at me. “What’s it like?”
And so, I do. I tell her about the old farmhouse that needs work but has good bones. About the barn I’m slowly renovating. The land that stretches out for twenty acres, most of it wooded. The creek that runs through the property where I sometimes fish in the summer. The chickens.
“It sounds beautiful,” she says wistfully.
“It is. You should come see it.”
“Yeah?”
“I want you to see it,” I say it casually, but my heart is pounding.
“I want to,” she says immediately. “I want to see where you live. Meet your family. See this farm you love so much.”
The tightness in my chest eases. “Good. Because I want to show you. I want to take you on hikes through the woods. Make dinner in that old kitchen. Watch the sunset from the porch.”
“Idyllic.” She sighs.
We sit in comfortable silence for a while, just holding each other, and I let myself imagine it. Sloane at the farm. Her meeting my brothers. The woman in my space, making it better just by being there.
“The storms really calmed down,” she observes, looking out the window.
“Want to go outside? We could walk around the property, get some fresh air.”
“Really?”
“Why not? I promise not to leave you out there to freeze this time.”
She laughs and swats my chest. “You’d better not.”
She’s bundled up in every layer we can find, stepping out into a transformed world. The snow has stopped completely, and weak sunlight breaks through the clouds, making everything sparkle.
“It’s beautiful,” Sloane breathes, her face lit up with wonder.
“Yeah, it is.” But I’m not looking at the snow. I’m looking at her.
We walk around the cabin first, and I show her where I fixed the generator shed and the propane tank, pointing out all the work I had to do in the storm. She listens intently, asking questions, genuinely interested.
“You saved us,” she says quietly.
“Just doing what needed to be done.”
“Yeah, like going out in a blizzard in the middle of the night to fix a generator shed.”
“Someone had to do it.”
“You could have woken me. I would have helped.”
“I know. And I should have. But you looked so peaceful sleeping there, and I just ...” I shrug. “I wanted to keep you safe. Protected.”
She reaches up and cups my face, her gloved hands gentle. “You’re a good man, Jax Reid.”
“I’m really not. I’m selfish as hell. Because standing here with you, I’m thinking about all the ways I can convince you to stay. All the arguments I can make for why you should give this, give us a real shot.”
