Page 99 of Where We Burn

The boys each grab one of their little sister’s hands, tugging her eagerly toward the living room, where presents wait under the tree wrapped in red and gold paper and topped with bows.

I haul my wife into my arms, pulling her close, and kiss her slowly, my lips brushing over hers.

“You didn’t have a single complaint about my filthy mouth this morning,” I whisper against her lips as my hand slides down to squeeze her ass. “Not when I was calling you my good girl while you were riding me.”

Piper leans in, her breath warm against my neck as she whispers back, “Don’t act like you didn’t love every filthy word I said either, cowboy.”

Spontaneous sex isn’t always doable when you’ve got three kidsunder nine running wild through the house, but once they’re asleep and I’ve got her all to myself again, I’m going to make her forget the whole world exists.

“They’re kissing again!” Chase announces with a dramatic sigh, and Presley lets out a sweet little giggle. “Can we do presents now, pleeease?”

“Go ahead,” I say, watching Piper as she heads toward the tree ahead of me, barefoot and beautiful as ever, the very picture of everything I’ll never stop wanting.

I sink onto the couch, tucking my wife against my side, with my arm around her as we watch our three kids tear into their gifts with all the joy in the world.

They’re good kids—grateful and kind, the way we’ve raised them to be—but what they really love isn’t the shiny boxes or the new toys. It’s being out there on the farm. It’s early mornings and feeding the horses with sleepy smiles and muddy boots. It’s climbing onto the old tractor, feet dangling because they can’t reach the pedals yet, and pretending they’re running the whole place anyway. It’s chasing each other barefoot through the fields until their laughter echoes off the mountains.

They’re living the kind of life most people only ever get to dream about, and every time I watch them, I realize they don’t just live here; they belong here. And watching them now, laughing and shouting as they pass presents around, I know deep down, without a shadow of a doubt, that despite everything—despite Travis’s resentment, despite the way he’s still got a chip on his shoulder after all these years—I’m doing something right with these three.

And so much of that is owed to the woman curled under my arm.

I hold Piper closer, close my eyes for just a second, and breathe it all in—this home, this love, and this beautiful life I never even knew how to dream about until she walked into it.

THE END