“She told you that you can date me.” I shouldn’t be surprised. She really is a great kid.
“She also asked to announce in homeroom this morning, to the whole school, that her grandmother is a jailbird for embezzling money through fake homeowners’ associations, so you might want to be prepared for a bunch of texts and calls this weekend.”
“Oh my God.”
“She says this way, if you stay here and run your retreat for wayward moms when she goes to college and you succeed in convincing your mother to move into the old cabin, she won’t take anyone else for a ride.”
It takes a moment for that to sink in, and when it does, I tip my head back into Flint’s shoulder and laugh.
And I laugh.
And I laugh some more.
Not because it’s crazy.
But because I suddenly feel so free.
“The whole town knows?” I ask.
“If they don’t yet, they will by morning.”
“How’d the kids take it?”
“There were a few who told her they couldn’t loan her lunch money, and a few who wanted to know if she’d been to prison to visit and could describe it—mostly the Dungeons and Dragons crowd, don’t worry, no jailbird wannabes—but overall, they were very supportive and told her anyone who’d judge her for her grandmother’s law-breaking ways were . . . actually, it doesn’t matter what names they used. That’s a problem for someone above my pay grade.”
“She truly is remarkable.”
“She comes by it naturally.”
“Are you flattering me, Mr. Jackson?”
“I’m trying to tell you that I’m madly in love with you, Ms. Spencer, and want to be part of your life and your daughter’s too.”
My breath catches.
He fists the reins in one hand and wraps his other arm around my belly. “I don’t fall, Maisey. I refuse. But with you—I can’t help myself. You’re nothing that I expected you’d be and everything I’ve ever wanted but never thought I’d find. We can go slow. We should go slow. But I can’t walk away from you. I want to be on this journey with you. Ups and downs. The hard times and the easy times. I want to be the man right beside you as you keep reaching for your own stars, and I want you to be the woman holding my hand while I take a few leaps of my own. I always thought I’d be happy being alone, but that was before I knew what it was like to be with you.”
“Flint,” I whisper.
I can’t find words beyond that.
“I love the way you say my name,” he says, low and husky in my ear.
The sky is turning a soft orange over the butte in the distance. Wind swirls around us. Earl is nowhere to be seen.
And I’m safe and warm and loved, on the back of a horse, in the middle of a place that was my escape when I needed it in my teenage years and is my home now.
“Is this real?” I whisper.
“Very, very real.”
“Are you scared?”
“That I’ll fuck up sometimes? Yes. Of loving you? No.”
I twist in the saddle, trying to kiss him, and something lurches wrong.
“Oh God,” I gasp.
But he laughs.
Laughs, and quickly dismounts from Parsnip before we fall, pulling me down into his arms when I flail without him behind me.
Parsnip snorts.
Flint pulls me close, one hand looped around my back, the other holding the horse. “I love you, Maisey Spencer. And I will love you no matter how many horses you get me thrown off of, no matter how many times you tell me Junie comes first, no matter how badly you cook, or how often you demonstrate that you can fix a leaky pipe and paint a wall faster and better than I can.”
Tears are turning into little slushy icicles all down my face, so I bury my head in his chest, listening to that strong, steady thump of his heart while I wrap my arms around his waist. “I didn’t want to love you,” I confess. “I didn’t want to love anyone. But I can’t help myself. Not when you’re so much more than I ever expected you to be.”
“Young and hot?” he murmurs.
And now I’m laughing too. “Yes. Young and hot. And kind and generous and attentive and so, so good to my daughter. When you told her she was the heart of the team? I couldn’t fight it anymore. I just couldn’t. You’re everything she deserves and nothing she’s ever had.”
“She has you.”
“And she deserves more.”
“I hope I’m everything you deserve too.”
“I wanted to find me”—I whisper—“and I think I did. In you.”
“So you’ll give me a chance?”
The hope and the fear lingering in his voice hit a sensitive part of my heart that knows exactly how he’s feeling.
Scared. But hopeful. Knowing you deserve love, that you deserve to be loved, not for who someone wants you to be but for who you are.
I lift my head and take his scruffy cheeks in my hands. “I love you so much,” I tell him. “I thought I wanted—that I needed—to find me by myself. But finding us will be the greatest joy of my life.”
He drops the reins holding Parsnip, lifts me, and twirls me in a circle that ends with more proof that Flint Jackson is the world’s best kisser.
But more?
He’s my best kisser.
And for the first time in years, I know that everything—for me, for Junie, for Flint—won’t be fine.
My life, my future, my family—it will all be so much better.
Epilogue
Flint
For the second time in my life, I’m giving a eulogy for a cow.
Difference is, today I’m standing in front of a newly unveiled bronze statue of her inside the doorway of the newly rebuilt barn at Wit’s End, with the love of my life and the daughter of my heart at my side.
Weather’s a little nippy, even for late spring, so June’s in a long-sleeved Colorado School of Mines shirt and matching beanie. Maisey’s hiding her emotions behind massive sunglasses and a Hell’s Bells Demons ball cap.
Most of the town’s come out for the dedication to the statue of Gingersnap, and I’m proud to say there isn’t a dry eye in the crowd as I wrap up. “So may we all be as fearless and full of life as Gingersnap would’ve wanted us to be.”
Laughter ripples through the crowd, mixed in with the sniffles.
Gingersnap was loved, and she’s now the official cow of Hell’s Bells.
The mayor said so.
Maisey takes my hand and squeezes as I cede the mic to Charlotte, who’ll be directing us all to the refreshment tables around the outside of the barn.
“That was beautiful,” Maisey whispers. “It almost made me want to get a cow.”
“Mom,” Junie sighs.
“What? You’re taking the dog. I’m going to need a new pet.”
“You have Flint.”
They both look at me.
I try to stifle a snort of laughter, which earns me a look from Charlotte. “Is there something else you’d like to share with the crowd, Mr. Jackson?”
The students situated on the temporary stands hoot with laughter.
I clear my throat. “No, ma’am.”
“I thought so.”