Page 61 of Due North
“And I’m sorry,” I said, biting my lip. “I should have.”
“Yeah, you really should have,” he agreed. “You know I don’t hurt people, Cece. At least not intentionally. Sleeping with one woman while running around with another is not who I am.”
I nodded, biting my lip harder to fight back the tears threatening to fall. “I wish I could take back the words I said and replace them with the right ones, but I can’t do that.”
He sat up against the headboard and held my gaze. “What are the right ones?”
“That I love you, and I trust you. I know you always have my back, and I should always have yours. That you’re the kind of dad Poppy Rose deserves, and no one will ever be better. You’re also an empath who feels what others are feeling. That means sometimes you can’t stop yourself from offering them a piece of your soul to help them through a tough time. I should have looked at it through that glass than one of jealousy and fear.”
“I still don’t understand why you’re jealous of Tobi or what you’re afraid of.”
“Ha!” I said, tossing up a hand in frustration.
“Cece, talk to me.”
“It doesn’t matter. Tobi and I straightened it out,” I said, shifting uncomfortably on the bed.
His hand darted out to take mine before I could change the subject. “I think it does matter, and I want to know.”
“It’s just that she’s so knowledgeable about horses and running a ranch. I don’t know a filly from a colt. Tobi can talk circles around me about ranching while I stand there with a plate of biscuits. We won’t even go into how I’m a single mom, and she’s living the single life. She lives in your world, but I’ll always live on the outskirts of it.”
“You’re wrong,” he said, leaning forward to take my chin. “You are my world, Cecelia Douglas. You and that baby girl over there are all I’ll ever need in this world to be a man. I’ll need nothing else ever again if you’re in my life. Do you understand me?”
“You have to admit I’m right, though,” I said, pushing for some sense of validation for my feelings.
“You’re right in the respect that Tobi knows horses and ranching. You aren’t right about any of the rest of it. She’s just one of the hands to me. That’s how I think of her. She’s just one of the guys who gets an assigned job in the morning when she’s not on roping duty. Eventually, that might change if we collaborate on the therapy school, but she will be my business partner and nothing else. What else were you afraid of?”
“Everything,” I finally whispered with my eyes glued to the bed. He had red plaid flannel sheets, and they were soft under my hand when I rubbed it over them. “Losing you. Losing the family that I’ve built around me here.”
He tipped my chin up. “Losing the only family that you have now?” I nodded, and he gathered me into his arms before I could speak. “You're still grieving, baby. It’s natural to feel this way. Especially when you take into consideration that the people here have been part of your life for years too.”
“Not as many years as you’ve been part of the family, though, and that scares me,” I admitted. “If this doesn’t work out between us, they’re always going to pick you.”
“No,” he said, the one word so strong and adamant I couldn’t ignore it. “They don’t choose sides here, Cece. They mend divides. They admit their mistakes. They work together. They help each other. They love each other through hard times and laugh with each other through the good ones. That is the very definition of a family: blood or no blood. The very moment you stepped foot on this land, you became family—the same for my little Poppy Rose. Any one of those men out there, including myself, would have died to make sure she was back in your arms. Do you even understand that?” he asked desperately, his lips to my temple. “Tell me you understand that.”
“I do,” I promised, wrapping my arm around his on my waist. “I know they would have taken that bison on themselves if it meant protecting our little girl.”
“That’s right. She’s our little girl. She’s not just yours anymore, sweetheart. She’s ours—both in the sense of you and me and the rest of the family. You’re not a single mom. You have so many other moms, aunts, and uncles helping you raise her. But, most of all, you have me. I can’t tell you how much,” he paused, and I glanced up at him, but his gaze wasn’t on me. It was on the playpen across the room where a little bundle lay sucking her thumb in a happy dreamland.
“How much what, Caleb?”
“How much I want her to be mine. How much I want you both to be mine. I want to be part of your lives for the rest of mine, even if that means as nothing more than being part of the same extended family. As a rough and tumble cowboy, I shouldn’t be undone by two letters, but I am. Every single time she says Ba, I’m a goner.”
My hand came up to stroke his face, and a smile filled mine. “Caleb, I know you think you’re this big tough cowboy, but nothing could be further from the truth. You are a cowboy, but you’re the softest, most understanding one on this land. You have a way with the animals and people here that doesn’t earn you respect—it earns you reverence. I’ve seen it one hundred times over. You’re starting to see it too, aren’t you?” I asked, rubbing his eye that was starting to droop. “You’re getting tired. I can tell. We should rest.”
“I’m past tired,” he said, lowering his lips closer to mine. “But I have to know you understand how much I love you and want you in my life.”
“I do, Caleb,” I promised, my hand sneaking into his locks to curl into them. “I do understand. I love you so much that it scares me, but I’m going to stop being scared and start trusting in our love.”
“Good,” he whispered, his lips almost on mine. “Because I’m not going anywhere, and you’re not leaving my bed. If I can move past my fear of what this disease can do to us, you need to stop trying to give up on us. Is it a deal?”
“Not until you seal it with a kiss,” I said, watching until his lips touched mine and wiped everything from my memory but how sweet it was to be loved by a rough and tumble cowboy.
Epilogue
Three months later
A few months ago, the idea of turning twenty-five was paralyzing. I had no idea where my life was going, and I worried that I was missing out on something out there in this big world. Tonight, walking to dinner with the love of my life and our daughter, I was where I was meant to be. I was Poppy Rose’s Ma, and there was no title in the world that made me prouder.
