Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 25316 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 127(@200wpm)___ 101(@250wpm)___ 84(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25316 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 127(@200wpm)___ 101(@250wpm)___ 84(@300wpm)
We stumble toward the ranch house, both of us exhausted from the night's events. Would we enjoy our first night as husband and wife together in a more traditional, carnal sense? Or would we bilk cliché and simply go to sleep? I had read that the latter is more common than people believe, given weddings are surprisingly exhausting.
Jack sweeps me off my feet nonetheless, and carries me across the threshold, all while I giggle like a lunatic. “You didn’t need to do that.”
“Hearing you laugh is absolutely why I did need to do that.”
I slap him on the chest. I love him. And with the way he looks at me? It’s absolutely mutual.
Our union would be eternal ecstasy forevermore, a love that would never burn out.
12
JACK
SIX MONTHS LATER
“And there we go. It’s official. The Perry and Thomas ranches are now one,” Sarah says, as she finishes laying down her signature.
It’d been a long fight to get all this done. Even when arraigned for all of his crimes, Max hired lawyers to snap back at his daughter, and things got messy. Thankfully, Sarah’s lawyers had more than enough cunning to win over the judge, so Sarah got her inheritance, while Max got twenty years.
She negotiated pretty hard, wanting to make sure everyone and everything was taken care of. This included having me hire all the wranglers and other workers who were employed by the Perry ranch and honoring all the contracts, they had made, to the best of my ability for a few years after the fact. Then on top of it all, Sarah gets a little bit of a nest egg to take care of her for the rest of her life if she’s smart about it.
“And you’re free of your father and your future as a rancher,” I reply, stroking my chin. “Off to wedding-planner college or whatever you need to do to be a professional wedding planner?”
She laughs. “No. Not just yet. It’s weird, but I’ve never really not been bound to the land. My father was always too much of a control freak to ever leave the ranch for too long, so the only vacations I ever got were at an amusement park a county over. So I think it’s time I remedy that.”
“Off to see the world, huh? Where to first?”
“Where our supposed honeymoon would have been.”
There’s a smile on her face suggesting I should have known where that was. Which is fair, given we were engaged. But I truly remembered nothing, and instead stare at her like I’m a deer in headlights.
“Italy, Jack. We were going to go to Italy.”
“Oh. Right. That did seem kind of fun. If only for the food.”
Lily and I had spent two weeks in the Bahamas. Nothing too exotic for a honeymoon, but I did gain appreciation for fried alligator in between spending most of my time there in a room with Lily.
Sarah closes up her folders and sighs. “It’ll probably be a bit before we ever see one another again.”
I let out a deep sigh. “Yeah. We have no official reason to be around each other anymore. No sham of an engagement, no business meetings, no running into one another in town.”
“No pointless family feud. The idiotic thing that brought us together in the first place, I’ll remind you.”
I smile. “You’re always welcome here, Sarah. This is still your home, even if I technically own where you grew up.”
“Never doubted it. But you ought to invite me back sometime, and not just rely on me getting homesick.”
“Invite you back for what?”
“I don’t know. Your and Lily’s fifth wedding anniversary? The anniversary of us ending this dumb feud?” Her eyes narrow at me. “Or how about your kid’s first birthday party?”
More laughter from me. “What, just writing off that maybe Lily and I want to be child-free?”
“You’re so full of shit, Jack. And if you weren’t, that’d be a shame, because you’re going to be one hell of a father.”
She heads out the door. I’m surprised how good of a friend she’s been. Absolutely no romantic feelings for her, no, but definitely something platonic.
I head out the door and find Rush. Misty is out of her stable, letting me know Lily is out somewhere on the ranch. Which means I get the joy of finding her, and if she’s somewhere remote enough, the joy of enjoying her.
Married life has been a dream. Even the most monotonous days being a rancher are fun when Lily is there beside me. And when all the horses are fed and taken care of, the nights are an even greater treasure. Long rides into the sunset, gathering around a fire simply talking, about anything and everything. Our favorite movies, books, music, all about our hopes and dreams, and trying to make our plans for the Desert Sky Ranch into a reality.