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Then she gasped and her face went white.

Jax sat Jill down gently, and they were both at Maggie’s side in an instant. Alarm rang over Jill’s skin.

“Is it the baby?” she asked at the same time Jax said, “I’ll get the truck started.”

But Maggie shook her head.

“No. I’m okay, but it looks like someone else is welcoming the next generation to their family.” She pointed to the puppies under the table, and sure enough, the first small head had emerged.

“Oh my goodness, Lily! You’re going to be a mom,” Jill cooed.

“I’ll be right back,” Jax said, kissing Jill. “I don’t want Ren to miss this.”

“I was just going to suggest the same thing. I’ll be right here waiting for my boys to come home.”

He kissed her again, this time with so much promise, it made her dizzy.

When he walked away, Jill didn’t feel the acute sense of loss she usually did when he left. Because now, he was going to keep walking through those doors every day for the rest of their lives.

“Okay,” she said, bending down under the table. “Show me how I can help, Gander.”

Chapter Thirteen

Jax set the last of the puppies beside the happy couple. “Five puppies, Lily. You’re a rockstar.”

She purred almost feline-like, and Gander nuzzled her neck. They looked pretty darn happy for a mutt of dubious upbringing and a city purebred. He glanced over at Jill and smiled.

He understood the attraction to a city woman who, on paper, was as different from him as a gelding was to a barn kitten. But there was so much more there, so many threads tying them to one another that were stronger than the pull of any disparities.

Jill sat next to Ren on the ground, petting Gander and Lily respectively, both of them beaming. She didn’t wear a lick of makeup, and her curls were wildly framing her face. The baggy pajamas she wore showed the events of the morning on them. In his eyes, she’d never been more beautiful. Not even when she was in cropped jean shorts and a tank top the day she’d been fixing the mower.

“I love you,” he said.

She looked up at him and smiled wide. Then her cheeks turned pink like they always did when he embarrassed her. The problem was, she looked so damn adorable when she flushed with mortification, he wanted to keep at it.

Her eyes darted to Ren, who, save the crutches leaning on the chair behind him, didn’t look like anything had happened.

“He’s fine. You don’t think I didn’t run everything by him first, did you? He knows I’m madly in love with you and that the three of us are gonna make a go of it in Deer Creek together.”

“Is that okay?” she asked Ren.

The boy smiled down at her like he’d won a rodeo. “Heck yes. I love it here, and to be honest, I didn’t ever want to live in Austin anyway. My dad said he’ll teach me ranching on the weekends, and I can help Lily and Gander raise the puppies. Well, train ’em anyway. Ooh, and I’ll get to go to high school here where they have an AAF program.”

“FFA,” Jax corrected. “Future Farmers of America. Your uncles Bennett and Matt both graduated from that program.”

“When will Matt get here?” Maggie asked, still nestled on her old couch. Her hand rested on her stomach, and her soft smile said she was at peace.

Jax felt that on a cellular level. Only his oldest brother’s arrival cut through the calm. He and Matt had always gotten along, but Bennett and Matt had bickered like two feral cats every chance they got. Things were gonna be interesting, that was for sure.

“Should be back from Outcrop by the end of next week. Just in time for Ren to go back to school and Manny to take over the Austin gig.”

“Nice. I can’t freaking wait. I’ll get another uncle, you two will get married, and I’ll get to be a cowboy.”

Jax laughed. The kid was 100 percent his, no doubt about it. Jax sent up another prayer of thanks to the universe for keeping his people safe, for bringing this little motley crew together for him. It wasn’t conventional, maybe not even what Jax had hoped for growing up, but damned if it wasn’t perfect.

Thank goodness the universe hadn’t answered his requests when he was seventeen.

“Speaking of, there’s one thing we didn’t cover earlier.”