Page 56 of The Scars We Heal

I set her down on the ground, taking her hand with my free one and leading her over to the table. “We can’t put chocolate on the stick. We can have a hot dog, though.”

“I want chocolate,” she whined.

“Give the girl some chocolate, Mom,” Colter teased, and I scowled at him.

Before I could scold him for enabling my daughter, Reid interjected. “Look at this, Whitley.” He held up his skewer, a hot dog placed on the end. “Isn’t this cool?”

“No.” She wrinkled her nose in disgust.

“But look.” He moved closer to the fire, putting his uncooked hot dog in the flames. After a few minutes, he pulled it back out, the meat perfectly browned and cooked. “See. Now you can eat it.”

“Whoa.” Her eyes lit up as he plated the hot dog and gave it to her.

I shot him a grateful look, mouthing the words, Thank you.

“Let’s get some toppings on that dog, Whit.” Hayden took over, and soon the guys were helping Whitley with her dinner and cracking jokes to make her laugh, taking the weight off my shoulders for a moment.

A few hours later, after we’d eaten dinner and stuffed our faces with s’mores, Jake and I were the only two remaining around the fire. I’d put Whitley to bed with surprising ease, considering she’d inhaled a ton of marshmallows. Our friends had also gone home to retire for the night, so I felt like I could truly relax.

“This was nice,” I said. “I needed this.”

“I know you obviously had Colter before moving back here and have built a friendship with Ellison, but it does make me really happy how well you fit in with the group as a whole.”

I nodded. “I know I say this about a lot of things, but I was really missing that close friend group in Washington. I’m just glad you all have welcomed me and been so helpful through all this.” The wind blew over my shoulders, and a shiver crept up my spine.

Jake immediately picked up on it. “Are you cold?”

I nodded, hugging my arms close to my body. “A little.”

“Hang on.” He bounded up the steps to his house, disappearing inside before emerging with a blanket. Jake wrapped it around my shoulders, and I offered him a grateful smile before taking a deep breath, inhaling his scent. The fire was still going strong, and little embers rose into the night sky as the wood crackled beneath the flames.

“Better?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

He cleared his throat, wringing his hands together before taking a seat. “So, we’re going to be out of town for a week to go to Oregon.”

I hummed. “It’ll be so quiet around here without you all.”

“Well, that’s the thing.” He raked his hand through his hair. “One of your bucket list items is to take a solo trip, right? So, why don’t you go while we’re gone? I know of a cabin you could stay in, and I could reserve it for you.”

“O-oh,” I stammered. “I couldn’t do that. I’d be leaving Whitley all by herself.”

“I’m sure your mom would love to have her for the weekend,” Jake pointed out. “Why don’t you ask her?”

My gaze darted to the ground. “She’s already done so much, I don’t want to keep asking her to take care of my daughter.”

Jake hummed, nodding like he understood. “I get it, but it’s your mom we’re talking about here. I don’t think she holds it against you at all. Just something to think about.”

“Yeah. I’ll have a conversation with her, maybe.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

jake

Icouldn’t decide if I was at a rodeo or a lovefest. Colter and Ellison were inside their trailer with Levi, Isa had flown in to support Reid and the two of them were sharing a chair, Juniper and Mikey were sucking each other’s faces off by his pickup, and Sierra and Hayden were playing fetch with Pancho.

That left me—the lone ranger—all by myself. I swore I could hear someone playing a tiny violin in the distance. The only thing I would be kissing tonight was a bottle.