A round of cheers went up before the clattering stopped again.
“Since everyone we love is here, we have something else we’d like to share with you,” I heard her say.
“Jud, you should be in there. With your family.” I needed him to walk away. To leave me there like he had Wednesday night.
Only he inclined closer instead, his breath caressing my face, his hand coming up to touch my jaw in that way that slipped like comfort through my veins. Fire streaked through the connection. “Yet, here I am, with you.”
“We’re having a baby.” Emotion wobbled through Eden’s distant voice.
Surprise and excitement banged through the space.
Jud’s eyes went wide, and I was taking his moment of stupor to duck out from around him because all of this was too much. “We should go back in.”
I rushed for the doors like the man wasn’t single-handedly wrecking every boundary.
I felt him behind me, meeting me step for step.
Longing slipped from his fingers as he brushed the small of my back as he passed by and edged around the table.
Shivers raced.
What did he want with me? He’d already shown he didn’t want anything to do with Juni. My one purpose, and that was never going to change.
Gage jumped to his feet on his chair, shouting around the cupcake he had shoved in his mouth. “I get a new baby and a new mommy?”
“You do,” Eden whispered. Adoration poured from her being. Wave upon wave.
I stumbled back to my chair and dropped to the seat. Juni was on her knees. She jerked at my shirt. “Mommy! Gage gets a news baby!”
I chose to focus on the devotion that poured through the room and not the man who was stealing the air from it. “That’s wonderful.”
Trent scooped up Gage when he scrambled off his chair and went running to them. “It’s the best day of my whole life.”
“Mine, too, Gage, mine, too, and every single day that I get to spend with you.” Eden choked over the words.
A band of devotion wrapped the three of them tight.
Oohs and awws filled the room.
It was beautiful.
Real.
I touched Juni’s cheek, and she smiled over at me. “I likes it here, Mommy.”
“I know, Juni Bee. I know. I like it here, too.” Probably too much.
Gage clamored down and went racing for his uncle Jud who had stood and hugged Trent tight, clapped him on his back and uttered something low.
Trent squeezed his shoulder.
Their loyalty fierce and true. There was no mistaking it.
I struggled to breathe.
Jud glanced at me once before he hoisted Gage into his arms. Joy and pain split through his expression.
It pierced me in the chest, and I tried to look away, but my eyes couldn’t help but see deeper. To the sorrow, to the grief, to the torment written underneath.
Don’t do this, Salem.
Don’t fall. Don’t fall.
Tenderness took over his ferocity when he tossed Gage onto his back. Gage laced his arms around his thick neck and shouted, “I’ll take you down, Uncle!”
“Not a chance, Gage in the Cage.” He wrestled around with him.
Before I could stop her, Juni hopped onto her feet and blazed around the table.
“I’ll help you, Gage!”
She threw herself at Jud, too.
My heart sank to the pit of my stomach.
But he caught her and tossed her onto his opposite shoulder.
They shrieked and held on tight as Jud playfully roared and spun them. He had both hands on their backs to keep them steady. To ensure they wouldn’t fall.
Dread thudded through my veins, taking this stupid hope with it.
“Hurry, Juni Bee, we gotta get him. Chokehold!” Gage shouted.
Juni laughed and wrapped her arms around Jud’s neck, too, and Jud dramatically fell to his knees, careful as they all toppled in a pile onto the ground.
They flailed around, pinning him.
“Victory!” Juni shouted.
My chest clutched and my head swam.
Torn between the urge to rush for my daughter and steal her away from this place.
Where it wasn’t safe.
Where we were treading into unknown territory.
Into territory where our hearts were at stake.
All while every cell in my body clutched in a swell of longing.
I jumped when a warm hand covered mine where I had a death grip on the arm of my chair. I looked to the right to find the sympathy written in Gary’s gaze.
“Sometimes the scariest journeys are the ones where the lost finally find the right path to lead them home.”
My brow curled, and my head shook.
He squeezed my hand tighter. “It’s okay to be afraid. The courageous always are. They just understand taking the chance is worth the fear and the risk.”
Emotion locked in my throat, my spirit a disorder, and I was jerking again when Juni and Gage were suddenly jumping at my side. “Guess whats, Mommy? Gage just asked me if I wanna have a sleeps over at his house, and his mommy said YES! Oh please, oh please, oh please.”