Page 104 of When We Met

I make a disgusted face. “No it’s not. He’s being stupid.”

Lillian rolls her eyes as Sev crawls off her lap and onto the floor to color. “Your heart is black. Open the envelope.”

I do and shake my head. It’s the divorce papers again. This time I turn to the exact page I know the parental rights is on.

And there it is. Full custody. She signed over her parental rights to the girls.

For him.

Fucking cunt.

There’s a sense of relief knowing that part of my life is closed, but one door is still very much open, and the wind is getting colder by the day.

I miss Kacy.

Sev hands me a drawing. “It for you.”

I glance at it. It’s a bunch of black scribbles. “What is it?”

“Yous black heart.”

Later that night as I’m getting the girls ready for bed, Camdyn senses my mood is off. It’s been off for the last three days, but it’s now when she chooses to finally say something. After spending the day with Morgan, she’s finally talking to me.

“What’s the matter, Daddy?”

I pull Camdyn into my arms, freshly bathed, hair braided, and with the firelight dancing on her cheeks. “Nothing. You should be in bed.”

She stares at me and then sighs, holding my face in her hands. “You weren’t finished, were you?”

I search her innocent eyes. “What?”

She brushes my hair back from my forehead like I do for her. “You weren’t finished loving Kacy yet. That why yous so sad.”

Perceptive, aren’t they?

When you think of a love story, you think of two things. When they met, and when they fell in love, am I right?

So when did I fall? I know it was after the sun went down.

Was it the night we met? That night in my truck in the snowstorm when she begged me not to stop? What about seven days later when I couldn’t let her go? What about that night by the fire, a week before Christmas when I knew without a doubt, she had a hold on me?

It wasn’t any of those in particular. It was all of them combined.

Kacy, she was like a mixed drink. Ounce of batshit crazy, splash of city, and mix that with no logic, too much determination, and top it with a pair of wild blue eyes, and you got a drink that goes down easy but packs a wicked hangover.

After I get the girls into bed, I lay on the couch watching the fire dwindle down and think of Kacy. Truth is, I haven’t stopped thinking about her since she drove away. And I’m not sure it’s going to stop anytime soon.

A perfect stranger crashing into our lives and invading our home. It should have been messy. It should have been awkward and uncomfortable. But it wasn’t. It was natural. Easy. Comfortable. Most of all, it was scary. Why would a perfect stranger want to stay with us when the one person who was biologically related and legally connected to us wouldn’t?

She left California to find herself and she deserves to have the chance.

It doesn’t stop me from wishing there was a small chance the life she was searching for was right here on this ranch, with me and my girls.

I think about calling her. Maybe check in. Make sure she’s not lost. Ask if she’s thinking of me. But I don’t. Instead, I grab that bottle of Southern Comfort and wallow in my pride.

Did you see this coming?

BARRON

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