“I’ll be here to pick you up when you’re discharged Sierra, and if you even think of running, so help me, I’ll make you regret it.” Then because I could, I captured her mouth in a searing kiss that would let her know that we weren’t through yet. We weren’t even close to being through. “See you tomorrow, babe.”
Sierra
So much for wanting to talk.
Jack picked me up from the hospital just as he promised, but threatened was a better word for it. His touch was kind as he helped me dress in fresh clothes he’d brought from the ranch, and handed me into the car like I was a delicate flower. That thought was enough to make me snort. No one would ever consider me a delicate anything, and no one but Jack would dare to treat me as such. I could admit to myself that it was nice to have someone taking care of me, even if it was because of the little life growing inside of me.
Jack was unusually quiet and I knew I should feel grateful, but all I felt was unsettled. “Thanks for the ride.”
“My pleasure.” He was grumpy and that made me smile because Jack Winchester let everything roll off his back.
“Right,” I snorted. “I know you have a million things to do at the ranch, and I appreciate the ride, but I can take care of myself.” I had been taking care of myself for a long damn time.
“Yeah Sierra, we all know you’re capable of handling everything on your own, but you never stop to think that you don’t have to.”
“Don’t act like you know me Jack. You haven’t known me for a really long time. I do have to handle everything because if I don’t, no one will.” Especially now that my best friend, my sister of the heart, had her own growing family to worry about. I couldn’t run to Sage for everything anymore. I had to do it myself.
“That’s where you’re wrong. I do know you. Every damn letter you sent told me more about you. As you matured and grew, you changed from a bright eyed little girl into, I don’t know, a beautiful but cynical woman.” He made a noise I couldn’t quite decipher, and laid a hand on my leg. “I know you better than you think.”
Well, damn. I sat in stunned silence as he pulled up behind the Double Barrel and hopped out, jogging around the front to help me. “Jack, I’m fine. I’m pregnant, not broken.” Well not physically broken, but my heart still felt pretty damn shattered.
He lifted me from the car and carried me up the stairs. Tears sprang to my eyes again. Why couldn’t Jack love me? Was there something wrong with me that made me unlovable? No man had ever treated me like this, and good lord, I craved this treatment. Then again, no man had ever shouted quite so clearly how much he didn’t love me. “Jack.”
He kicked open the door and set me on my feet inside the empty apartment. “I know those beautiful legs of yours work just fine, but I like holding you Sierra.” Before I could say another word, he did it again, ambush kissed me. Slow and drugging with enough heat to set the whole building ablaze. The way he held my face, so gentle, the scrape of his beard against my skin. I absorbed it all, savoring every sweep of his tongue against mine, the feel of his hard chest pressed against mine. His broad, strong shoulders under my hands. All too soon he pulled back with a wistful smile. “There’s food in the fridge. If it’s not gone tomorrow, I’m going to force feed you.”
“Okay.”
He grinned. “Okay?”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Good,” he said smugly and walked out.
He walked out. Just left after kissing the hell out of me.
“Bastard.”
I didn’t know what kind of game he was playing, but I refused to fall for it. That kiss was ill advised because I still loved him and I probably would for a good long time. But I had to let go of the hope that we would be anything more than friends and co-parents.
That depressing thought led me to the shower to rinse hospital gunk off me. Feeling better than I did when I woke up yesterday, I went for the promised food in the fridge. I smiled at the Dolly’s bag that greeted me and pulled it out greedily. Ready for some real food and not tasteless hospital crap. I had two options, eat standing up at the counter or eat in bed.
Bed won out. I crossed my legs and eagerly dug in to the box, frowning when my hand touched on a stack of paper that was too heavy to be napkins. It was a stack of letters. Two stacks, to be exact.
“Oh my god.” Letters. Years and years of letters addressed to Jack in my swirly handwriting.
I couldn’t believe he’d kept them. I mean, I know he read them because once in a while he would respond, but god, I had no idea he’d kept them. My inner teenager couldn’t resist opening them up and reading some of them. And cringing at some of the things I talked to him about. Nail polish, the harvest festival town and my first kiss.
“I wish you could have been my first kiss, Jack. But you only like me now because you don’t have to respond right away. That’s okay. I just hope you’re safe. Love always, Sierra.”
I spent hours reading the letters, crying and laughing and feeling like a fool. The man had been fighting a war and I bothered him about my teenage life. My boring, hormonal teenage life.
“I don’t think I should have sex with Bobby Langston just because he asked me to prom. He’s not even my boyfriend. And he’s not you.”
I’d been fooling myself to think it was anyone other than Jack. It had always been Jack, as these letters proved. Which meant there was no getting over him. Not in a few months and not in a few years. I couldn’t spend the rest of my life being in love with a man who’d very publicly made it clear that he didn’t love me.
But keeping the letters had to mean something, didn’t it? He wouldn’t have lugged these letters all around the globe if they didn’t mean something, would he? “No. I can’t go there.” I couldn’t let myself get caught up in reading more into this one action than what his words said. I would take him at his words.
I had to.
No matter how much it hurt.
Jack
“She told you.” Sage dropped her pregnant body into the oversized recliner meant for me.
“That she’s having my baby? Yes, she told me.” I spent all day after leaving Sierra’s house wondering if she really would have told me about the baby, or would she have waited until it was too obvious to ignore. But I knew now, and that’s what I chose to focus on. At least for now.
“And how do you feel about that?” She rolled her eyes at me, already exasperated. “This is like pulling teeth, Jack!”
“How do I feel? I’m happy and scared, and pissed as hell that she told me I could be involved if I wanted to. What the hell kind of shit is that?” Even thinking about it pisses me off.
“You’re upset because she’s giving you an out that she doesn’t have? You can walk away and forget if you want Jack. She can’t.”
“What the hell kind of man walks away from his child?” No man at all, that’s what kind. I would be around for Sierra and our child, no matter what she thinks. I’ll just have to prove her wrong. If she ever talked to me again.
“Millions of men, Jack. Millions in this country alone, never mind the rest of the world. I haven’t seen her since you shouted, ‘I don’t love Sierra!’ But I can tell you what she was thinking. You’re a man who doesn’t want commitment, and a child is a much bigger commitment than a woman. She loves you and wanted to give you the out she thinks you want.”
My sister’s words hit me like a goddamn ton of bricks. She didn’t say that because she thought I would be a shit father, or because she was punishing me, but because she loved me. How is a man supposed to process that? She thought letting me go and raising the child on her own was giving me what I want. “Shit, Sage.”
“Yeah,” she said sympathetically. “It’s pretty damn humbling to be loved so much.”
I nodded, rubbing at the warm, ripping sensation in my chest. Like my heart had been ripped open to bleed all over my insides. It hurt like hell, but there was also a weight missing that had been lodged there for longer than I could remember. Like ack
nowledging that kind of love had, I don’t know, freed me. I couldn’t articulate it, even to myself. “What the hell am I going to do?”
“You’re a big strong Army Ranger and you’re scared of a little bit of feelings? Come on, big brother. Man up. Go get the girl.”
“The wheels are in motion, Sage.” I needed Sierra to be in a place where she was willing to listen to me so we could have a conversation. “Did you know she wrote to me while was in the service?”
Her wide-eyed stare told me she hadn’t known. “Really?”
“Yep twice a month for every month I was gone.”
“Damn,” she let out a long low whistle. “That’s a really long time, Jack.”
“Yeah, I know.” That was a lot of years. A kind of dedication I couldn’t fathom, despite my dedication to the Rangers and my unit. “I gave them to her.”
Sage nodded as she listened and froze. “Wait, you did what? You kept the letters?”
“I did.” I should have been embarrassed to admit that, but those letters were precious to me. I hoped like hell she didn’t burn them.
“Why?”
My smile was sheepish, maybe even slightly embarrassed to admit it to my baby sister. “I was homesick and those letters kept me sane. Safe. I looked forward to them and I worried if I didn’t get one.”
Sage’s familiar blue eyes widened again as she rubbed her belly. “Oh my god, you do love her! You’ve loved her all along. Holy crap.” With a satisfied smile she shook her head, thick brown hair so much like my own, fell around her shoulders. “You idiot.”
“Thanks for that, sis.” My tone was bitter, but I couldn’t help but laugh at the way Sage could boil it all down so simply. I was an idiot.
“It all makes sense.” She shook her head, palming her forehead like it all made sense.
Well it didn’t to me, dammit. “What?” My heart sped up and I inched closer to the edge of my seat, eager to hear a woman’s analysis of…well, every damn thing.
“Why you slept with her in the first place. I mean she was hot on Halloween, but no hotter than any other night in her skintight jeans and fitted tank tops that showed off double D’s. But that was just your excuse. To do what you wanted to do all along.”
“You don’t have to look so damn pleased about it.”
She laughed. “Oh, but I am. Come on, Sierra has always been a sister to me and it looks like I might get the chance to make her my sister for real.”
“Settle down, kid. She’s not even talking to me right now.”
“Go! You have to make her listen.”
“Calm down, or I’m calling Mason to come get you.” I eyed her belly as a reminder that she was supposed to stay relaxed. She leaned back with a pout.
We sat in a long, protracted silence, both of us lost in our thoughts while the fire crackling in the hearth provided the only sounds in the room. A car sounded in the distance, probably Mason to pick up his pregnant wife. “He hovers like a little hen,” I joked but Sage wore a silly girl-in-love expression.
“He does. Something happens to a man when he’s got a baby brewing that turns him into a super protector, or something. You’ll see.” She tried to stand but the ever-changing center of gravity thanks to my next niece or nephew made it difficult. I stood to help her when the screen door smacked shut.
“Why did you keep these?” Sierra stood there, red hair wild like a halo of fire around her beautiful, pale skin. In her hand was an impressive stack of letters written over more than a decade. She could barely wrap her hand around the stack and that was just a small fraction of them. “Answer me! Why did you keep these?”
“They were, they are special to me. You were my tether to Lucky Flats, to home. Your words, god Sierra, they were everything to me while I was in one god forsaken desert or another.” Sage sat back down and I went to Sierra, grabbed her free hand in mine and held it to my chest. “Sometimes we would move and it would take weeks to get another letter from you and I’d worry that something bad had happened. I thought maybe you’d just forgotten about me. Then another letter would arrive.” I smiled, thinking about the relief that washed over me when I realized everything I was fighting for back at home was still there. That life was moving on.
“You read some of these multiple times.”
I nodded, guilty as charged. “I always got a good laugh out of hearing how you kicked Bobby Langston in the nuts when he forgot that no means no. Your fears about opening up the Double Barrel, and then your excitement when you signed the sale papers.” I held her face cradled in my hands, forehead pressed to hers. “The Blackjack. The guys got a kick out of that, called me Hollywood because I got a drink named after me.”
“Jack,” she said on a half-moan, half-sob. “What does it mean?”
I sighed, heart racing faster than a bullet speeding across the flat desert, faster than a wild stallion across Lucky Flats. Despite that tension, anxiety pulsing through me I also felt calm. Like the moment your shot is lined up and you know it’ll hit the target. Free.
“It means Sierra,” I grabbed her other hand and set the letters on the table so I could hold her close. I needed to have her close to me for this. She laid her hands flat on my chest and a small sigh escaped. “I am in love with you. I love you, Sierra and I’m so damn sorry I didn’t realize it before now.”
One lone tear slid down her cheek, but her lush lips parted in a seductive smile that only reinforced how I felt about her. “You do? But…you said that-,”
“I know what I said,” I told her, pressing a finger to her mouth, unable to hear her remind me of what I said. “It was bullshit. I was scared and I lashed out.”
“Scared? Of what?”
I laughed. “Of being in love, what else?”
“You mean it? You love me?”
“I do.” Another smile crossed her lips at my words, her shoulders relaxed as her body leaned into mine. I couldn’t let another moment pass without putting my mouth on hers, letting my tongue slide across her bottom lip and then her top lip. Tasting her full, lush mouth from corner to corner before sweeping in to lash my tongue across hers, dancing together in a tango we’d done many times before. The kiss heated up and her hands tightened, grabbing the fabric of my shirt along with a few hairs and I speared my fingers through her hair. “I love you,” I groaned against her lips.
Sierra pulled back, green eyes wide and wet but her mouth smiled like the clouds had parted just for me. “Well that’s good Jack Winchester. Because I love you too.”
Epilogue
Sierra – 1 year later
“Finally, she’s asleep.” I crept into the bedroom Jack and I had been sharing for the past year, talking as quietly as possible because our daughter, Gabby, slept like an assassin. Always ready to wake up and jump into action.
Jack smiled up at me from his spot on the bed, wearing nothing but boxer briefs as he leafed through a cattle ranching magazine. “I can’t blame her.” His gaze heated and he pulled me closer, wrapping a hand around my waist. “A few minutes of those beautiful breasts and soon I’m knocked out too.”
I laughed, shivering when his tongue slid across the tops of my baby boobs. Yes, pregnancy had made my already gigantic boobs even bigger. “Maybe, but I’m especially happy today because this is our day.” He looked at me in confusion but I knew he remembered because he’d walked around all day with smile. And whistling. The hands had given him hell at lunch at the way he practically burst with happiness. But I was ready to play the game because playing with my man was the best thing ever, so I took his wrist and guided his fingers between my legs to where my panties clung to my wet pussy.
“Ah yes,” he groaned and slipped one long digit deep. “I remember now, our day.”
Two full months had passed since I gave birth to Gabby, who was a spitting image of her daddy with a shock of chocolate curls and the biggest, bluest eyes you’d ever seen. She was the most beautiful baby in the world, at least as far as I was concerned. “I thought you might,�
� I told him as he scooped me up and laid me out on the bed, blue gaze raking over body hungrily.
“I’ve been looking forward to today for a long, long time sweetheart.” Jack bent over me, pulling the silk ribbons keeping my nightgown together to unleash my breasts. Big hands kneaded the pale round globes, pulling a moan from deep in my throat. “You’re so beautiful, Sierra. Absolutely stunning.” He kissed me everywhere as he pulled the nightie off, leaving no inch of skin untouched by his mouth.
“Jack,” I moaned because there was nothing else that existed in the moment other than this man. My heart. The love of my life.
“These panties are so wet, let me help you out of them,” he said, hooking his fingers through the sides and pulling them down my legs. “That’s better. You’re so pink and wet. Just for me.”
I nodded. “Just for you, Jack.”
There were no more words for the next hour, just panting, groaning and moaning, not to mention the sounds of our slick bodies slapping together in a frenzied joining that exposed every nerve ending. My heart soared and my body pulsed with orgasm after orgasm until I couldn’t stand it. “Sierra, baby.” His grunts turned me on. I loved watching Jack come undone and as soon as I could make my legs work, I planned to lick him all over. “I love you, sweetheart.”
I grinned because hearing that never got old. I pulsed around him and he grinned. “I love hearing you say that,” I moaned.
“What? That I love you? Because I do, love you Sierra.” He punctuated his words with a kiss behind my ear, a pinch of my nipple and a swipe of a tongue across my nipple.
“Mmm, I love you too, Ranger.” We kissed, caressed until we were both too sated, too tired to keep our eyes open. I was pretty sure I slept with a satisfied smile on my face because loving so hard that we fell asleep was about the happiest I could get with this man.
Our life together so far had proven what my girlish heart had always known. Jack and I were meant to be together. He was made with me in mind and I’d been created just for him. Despite our hectic work schedules, we managed to have dinner together every night, which had gotten easier in the later stages of pregnancy when standing for long periods of time became impossible. I’d taken that time to work on becoming a better mom—and hopefully wife—by learning how to cook more than fried chicken and salad.
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