Page 56 of Second Chance Fate (Hope Falls: Brewed Awakenings #5)

“I think we should have a code word in case it gets too much.”

“A code word?” Owen’s head fell back as he laughed.

“Yes. We need to think of a word you can say if it gets too much, and I need to initiate an emergency extraction. It can’t be something common that you might accidentally say because the?—”

“Panthers,” Owen shouted out before he even finished.

“Panthers,” Caleb repeated in agreement at the same time the front door to his parents’ house opened. His mom stood in the doorway, waving her hand high in the air like she was air traffic control.

They all piled out of the Jeep, and both dogs raced to Grandma, aka the treat lady, with Owen right at their heels.

“Panther?” he whispered under his breath to Taylor as they trailed behind Owen, Minnie, and Casper.

“It’s the football team from Friday Night Lights,” she explained.

Caleb nodded in recognition as they all headed up to the house.

As they all met for the first time as a family unit, Taylor had to admit Caleb wasn’t exaggerating about the hugs or his parents’ enthusiasm at being grandparents and having a daughter-in-law.

Within five minutes, Caleb’s mom asked if she was feeling up to brunch next week and a manicure and pedicure on her.

And when they walked into the family room, there were more presents than Taylor had ever seen in one place.

It looked like Santa’s warehouse loading dock.

When Annie messaged asking for Owen’s shoe, hat, and clothing sizes, Taylor hadn’t expected him to be going home with basically a new wardrobe, including two pairs of Air Jordans, one retro and one new design.

They’d also gotten him the newest PlayStation and four games.

Oh, and tickets to see the Golden State Warriors and Oakland A’s.

Taylor was amazed they’d been able to shop and get all of these presents in the short time since finding out about Owen less than twenty-four hours earlier.

When she expressed how impressed she was, Annie told her that she’d called in a favor to Kyle Austen Reed and used both his private plane and personal shopper.

They’d flown to Los Angeles that morning.

The personal shopper called ahead, and, using Kyle’s name, the stores opened early and pulled the items. She was able to just pick them up when she got into LA and then fly back. The entire trip took four hours total.

Taylor watched with so much pride at how gracious, kind, and appreciative Owen was.

After each present was opened, he thanked both Annie and George by giving them big hugs, which she could see meant the world to them.

He continually repeated that he didn’t need all the presents and that they could return some of them if they wanted to or donate them to kids who needed them.

His grandma assured him that they did plenty of work for charity and would continue to do so, but that the gifts they’d picked out they wanted him to have.

Owen wasn’t the only one who received gifts.

Halfway through his mountain of boxes, Caleb’s mom handed Taylor several presents.

The first was a gorgeous, delicate gold bracelet that was engraved with the words, I may not have given you the gift of life, but life gave me the gift of you.

She was also gifted a FabFitFun subscription, which was a quarterly box delivered to her doorstep where Taylor could customize the contents from a curated collection of full-size products to try in the health, beauty, fitness, wellness, and home spaces.

Another was a framed photo of Caleb and Owen, which must have been taken when Taylor was in the hospital.

And the final gift was a gorgeous wooden jewelry box with words etched around the edges.

“Oh, it’s engraved,” Taylor observed.

“George made it,” Annie stated proudly.

Taylor tilted her head to the side and had to rotate the box to read it because the words were so small and etched so delicately in cursive.

“What does it say?” Caleb asked.

“It says: created by God, chosen by our son, welcomed, cherished, and loved by our family. You’re stuck with us.” Taylor’s lips pulled into a wide smile as she read the last line.

“George!” Caleb’s mom tossed a throw pillow at him.

“What?!” George held up his hands in faux innocence as he dodged it in his recliner.

“Your father added that last line,” Annie pointed out.

“Well, she is stuck with us. I took some creative license.”

Owen laughed, and Caleb’s dad tossed the pillow at him. “And you are too, kid.”

Taylor felt herself tearing up. “Thank you.”

“Oh, and I added some tunes to it, too. Open it up,” his dad instructed her, motioning toward the box.

“Really? I’ve always wanted a music box.”

When she was young, maybe seven or eight, she lived in a foster home with a girl who had a music box with a ballerina that spun when she opened it. At the time, Taylor wanted one like it so bad. For some reason that box made Taylor feel safe and seen.

Now, she stared down at the oak box, and her hands shook as she lifted the lid. When it was halfway up, the song "We Are Family” started playing, and tears sprang to her eyes, then pooled down her face. It wasn’t the song that made her so emotional, though.

“Oh, Sweet Pea.” Caleb’s mom reached out and touched her hand.

Caleb moved even closer to her on the couch and put his hand over hers, trying to shut the box. “He can take the song out.”

“No, it’s not the song. It’s the…” She turned the box around so everyone could see the inside lid. It was the outline of her, Owen, Caleb, both dogs, and his parents with the word FAMILY above them.

“Oh, George.” His mom got up, walked over, and kissed his dad.

“Now my creative license isn’t so bad, huh?” he teased as he patted her rear and wagged his eyebrows at her.

She rolled her eyes with a smile plastered on her face as she went back to her seat.

“Oh, I have one more for Taylor.” Caleb’s dad pulled out a gift bag from the side of the recliner and handed it to Caleb to hand to Taylor.

“You do?” Both Caleb and his mom looked equally surprised.

Taylor wasn’t sure what to expect as she pulled out the tissue paper. She reached inside and lifted out a candle with a label that read: Daughter-in-Law Welcome to the Family. Then beneath it in fine print it said, No Refunds. No Returns. No Exchanges. All Marriages Final.

She turned it around to show everyone and chuckled when it got a laugh out of Owen.

“When did you have the time to get that?” Caleb’s mom asked his dad.

“I’ve had it for years.” His dad was grinning from ear to ear, clearly proud of himself for having it on hand and having the foresight to pick up the novelty gag gift so many years prior.

Caleb and Annie both just shook their heads. Owen resumed opening presents until his last, which was a baseball glove.

“Do you want to go throw in the backyard?” his grandpa asked.

“Sure.” Owen hopped up, which triggered both dogs to do the same.

Taylor had been watching for any signs of an allergic reaction to the cats, and so far, so good.

They took the party out to the backyard, and Taylor lowered herself onto the porch swing.

Caleb sank down beside her. She ran her hands up and down her arms, and the next thing she knew, Caleb popped up, went into the house, and returned with a hoodie that looked like it had a very cool retro vibe.

The cotton was worn, and she could tell it had been washed a few hundred times.

She wondered if this was a sweatshirt he’d worn back in high school.

“Thanks.” She put her arms through it as he wrapped it around her, the warmth enveloping her as the scent of him wafted from the cotton fibers.

It was going to take some getting used to having someone notice things about her and then actually take care of her.

She’d never had that before. But she liked it.

It just made her a little scared that if she started to depend on it, what would happen if it went away?

She knew it was wrong to think like that, but she couldn’t help it.

“Sorry about the presents. I know it was over the top.” Caleb’s knuckles brushed against her outer thigh before his fingers spread over the top of her leg and rested on her knee.

The way he touched her was so familiar yet exploratory, so firm yet gentle, so private yet brazen.

It was a contradiction in every way, and she loved it.

Even visually, the contrast of his tanned skin against her fair skin was a turn-on.

The size of his fingers and the muscular lines of his forearms stood out in stark contrast to her petite frame.

He was large, powerful, and strong, and he made her feel safe… among other things.

“Hey.” His fingers squeezed her thigh. “If it was too much, I can talk to her and?—”

Taylor looked up at him and realized that she’d zoned out over how good just being near him felt. “No, it’s not too much. I mean, yes, it is. They didn’t need to get him anything, but it’s fine that they did.”

He leaned in closer to her ear, and the heat of his breath fanned down her neck as he whispered, his fingers sliding lower down between her legs, “I’ve been waiting to hear panthers so we can get out of here.”

She wasn’t sure if he meant he wanted to leave because he was tired of being at his parents, or if he wanted to leave because when they did, Owen was going to his friend’s house and then they were going to be alone.

Last night, when they’d gone to bed, he’d kissed her on her forehead, but that had been the extent of their physical contact.

They hadn’t discussed what that part of their marriage was going to look like going forward.

Even though they were far enough away from George and Owen, who were throwing the ball, and Annie, who was taking pictures, this was definitely not the place to talk about it.

“Do you know why he picked that?” she changed the subject.

“I figured it was because he liked the show Friday Night Lights.”

“Last night, when I asked him if he was happy that you were his dad, he told me when he used to imagine who his dad was, he always wanted him to be like Coach Taylor, from Friday Night Lights , because he was the best dad he could think of having. But he said you are even better than him.”

He stared at her for a moment, not saying a word, before he quietly asked, “He did?”

Taylor could see how much that meant to him. It showed just how much he had been worried, either consciously or unconsciously, that Owen would be upset he was his dad. She was so happy that wasn’t the case.

“Son, get out here!” Caleb’s dad bellowed. “Come on! We have three generations of Harrison men playing ball!”

“Are you okay?” Caleb checked in with her before standing up and joining his dad and son.

“Yes, I’m fine,” she assured him.

Since being in the hospital, he treated her like she was fine china, fragile and delicate. As much as she appreciated it, it wasn’t necessary. She’d only had herself to rely on for so long.

He stood and pressed a kiss to her forehead before jogging onto the grass with his dad and Owen, and she noticed her son looked clammy.

It could just be typical sweat, but she pulled up the app on her phone to check Owen’s blood sugar.

It was holding steady at a hundred and ten, but she needed to keep an eye on it because it could drop suddenly when he exerted himself.

As she watched the three generations of Harrison men playing ball, she wondered if Owen would want to change his last name. If she had to guess, she would say yes. Actually, did she want to? She was married, so legally she could.

Thinking back, that should have been her first clue that her marriage to Martin wasn’t on the up and up.

He never cared that she didn’t want to change her name.

For someone as controlling as he was, the fact that he encouraged her to keep her maiden name had always felt strange to her, but she never said anything because she didn’t want to rock the boat.

Now, it made perfect sense. To change her name, she would have had to produce a marriage certificate, which would have been impossible.

But this time, she did have a marriage certificate. If she wanted, she could be Rebecca Taylor Harrison. Or maybe she could lose the Rebecca altogether; she’d never liked it. She could just be Taylor Harrison. Yeah, that had a nice ring to it.