Page 136 of Bucked Hard

“I’m home when I’m with you. But, yeaup, I’m ready to be back at the ranch. I think the kids are too.”

Not to mention, he’s the world’s most amazing father. He took to diaper changing like nobody’s business and don’t even get me started on how much he enjoys me nursing.

The travel has been amazing. But three years around the world and still spending time at the ranch has taken its toll. We’ve talked about it, and we are going to slow down. We will still travel, but the pressures of the blog, magazines, TV and everything have lost their allure.

We decided to take six months off and just stay put. It was my idea. Travel is still in my soul, but more than anything Garrett and the kids are my everything and I want to see how I feel putting down deeper roots in one place for a while. I guess it’s an adventure of its own, of sorts. And there’s plenty of Montana I still haven’t seen.

“Me too. With you. You are my home too.” I turn my head and he leans to kiss me as the sound of birds and the breeze wafts through the air.

“So,” Garrett starts. “Benjamin and Harriet had good news.”

“Yes they did.”

Benjamin and I still talk almost every day. He called a few hours ago to let us know he and Harriet are expecting their first. They’ve struggled with some fertility issues and so the news is more exciting than it would be otherwise.

I smile as I’m reminded of how lucky we all are. “He cried when he told me.”

Garrett’s chuckle vibrates against my back. “I’m happy for them.”

They live on the back of the ranch property with Malory. Benjamin built the house himself after he came for a visit two months after they met, and he just never left. They’ve had quite their own love story. A bit different from ours, I’ll say. Harriet is a handful and she gave Benjamin a run for his money.

In the end though, they seem to be finding their own happily ever after. Having them both close and part of our everyday lives is just another of a million blessings I count every day.

I didn’t understand love until Garrett and then the kids. I’m a very different mother than my own was, but she did her best. Mom and Dad come to visit a couple times a year and we go to them as well. It will never be the magical relationship I hope to have with our kids, but their hearts are in the right place and they love their grandchildren to death. And that’s more important than any slights of the past.

“I love you, baby,” Garrett whispers in my ear.

“I love you too. More than I knew was possible.”

He wraps his big arms around me.

“You sure taught this cowboy some new tricks. I thank God every day for dropping you from the big Montana sky and into my lap. I can’t imagine my life before you, or without you, Filly. I don’t deserve you. But I’ll keep doing everything in my power to keep you.”

“Thank you.” I swallow back the tightness in my throat. “I love riding into the sunset with you.”

“Good girl. I hope it’s a long ride under that big sky.”

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