And that’s when the barn door slammed shut and Libby’s shout shattered the moment. “Dad! Mom’s here! She says she needs to talk to you about something!”
Michael and Jessy jerked away from each other as if scalded, suddenly awkward. Jessy pulled together her blouse, pressing a hand against her over-heated cheeks, as Michael grabbed his shirt and leaned out of the nest.
“Go on back to the house, darlin’. Tell your mom I’ll be right there.”
Libby peered up at him. “What are you doing up there?”
“Now’s not the time for twenty questions, babe. Go on back.”
Shrugging, Libby gave the swing an idle push and scuffed her way out of the barn. Michael watched her go, waiting for the door to close before looking to Jessy again. She kept her gaze averted from his.
“What’s wrong?” he asked softly.
Jessy shook her head, her hands trembling as she buttoned her blouse. “Nothing.”
“Mmm-hmm. C’mere.” Michael crawled over to Jessy and gently lowered her hands from her buttons, undoing them again as Jessy gaped at him. “You’re buttoning them up all crooked,” he said as he began redoing them.
“What are we doing?” Jessy said quietly.
“Well, until my daughter’s impeccable timing kicked in, we were about to make love.” Michael glanced up at her and smiled. “At least, it seemed that way to me.”
“No—I mean—what is this. With us.” Jessy closed her hands over his, stilling them at her breasts. “Did you mean what you said?”
Michael’s smile faltered slightly. “I’m not following—”
“When you said that you loved me—did you mean it, or were you just saying it to—”
“To what?” Michael’s expression hardened as he slid his hands away from hers. “To get you to go to bed with me? Do you think I make a habit of bringing women up here?”
Jessy’s cheeks blazed. She hadn’t expected him to react with such defensiveness. “I don’t know what to think.”
Michael leaned back slightly, the anger fading from his expression as quickly as it had appeared. He reached out to Jessy, cradling her cheek in one big, warm hand. For a few moments, he didn’t speak, didn’t look away from her eyes.
“I don’t say anything unless I mean it,” he finally said, his voice almost a whisper. He met Jessy’s gaze again. “I love you, Jessy. Question it all you want. Obsess over the intonation and the context and the phrasing all you want. But in the end, it’s just that simple. I love you.”
Before Jessy could speak, before the tears welling in her eyes had a chance to fall, Michael leaned forward and kissed her again. And with that one, gentle kiss, Jessy finally believed him.
They walked back to the house in a pleasant silence, holding hands, nuzzling close.
Everything had changed.
Everything.
Jessy half-suspected that if she looked in a mirror, she wouldn’t even recognize herself. She definitely didn’t feel like herself anymore. Where she had once felt empty, almost incomplete, she now felt a serene sense of calm. All she had to do was look at Michael, see the love in his eyes, and suddenly she was invincible. Bulletproof. Able to leap over tall buildings and perform minor miracles.
Jessy smiled at herself and glanced over to Michael. Without saying a word, he seemed to understand. He grinned, pulling her closer, and she tucked her head against his shoulder as he wrapped his arm around her. She could barely remember the time when she thought Michael and Ann had fit so perfectly together; now it seemed like he had been made for her and her alone.
She held his palm to her lips and pressed a quick kiss against it, her breath warm against his cold skin.
“What’s that for?” Michael asked, smiling.
Jessy grinned and gazed up at him. “I need a reason?”
They rounded the corner of the house and saw Ann’s car, parked haphazardly behind Michael’s Bronco. Jessy felt her good spirits fading.
“Are you okay?” Michael asked, noticing her sudden somberness.
Jessy nodded, forcing the smile back to her lips. “Just gearing up for round two.”
“Well, whatever happens—” Michael bracketed Jessy’s face in his hands and rested his forehead against hers, gazing steadily into her eyes. “It’s me and you. You and me. Don’t let her get to you. Don’t let her make you doubt anything. I love you, you love me—and I sound like Barney the dinosaur so I’m going to shut up now.”
Jessy laughed and wrapped her arms around him, holding him tightly as he stroked her hair and kissed her temple. “It’ll be okay, honey. I promise.”
“I know,” Jessy whispered, voice muffled against his throat. As long as he held her that way, she knew everything really would be okay.
“Sooner we go in, the sooner it’s done,” Michael said, forcing lightness into his voice as Jessy looked up at him again. “After all— I think we have some unfinished business to attend to later, don’t you?”
The memory of what they’d shared in the barn sent a thrill through Jessy’s body. And just imagining what else they could do—
“Yes, I do,” she said and smiled. “Let’s get this over with.”
If Lyssa’s smile had been any more brittle, her face would have shattered.
She met Jessy and Michael at the front door, composed and gracious, but with a look in her eyes that betrayed her true feelings.
Jessy’s first thought was that Ann had come for the children. She had made good on her threat and had come to take the kids away.
“Lyssa?” Jessy reached out to her, taking her hand. “What’s going on? Are you okay?”
“Oh, I’m fine, sweetie. Just fine.” Lyssa’s pleasant tone had an undertone of rage that chilled Jessy to the bone. Lyssa looked at Michael, the smile finally fading. “Ann’s here.”
“What does she want?”
“She wouldn’t tell me. But she brought a lawyer.”
A sudden, sickening sense of foreboding slammed into Jessy. Helpless to control her fear, she followed Lyssa and Michael into the living room. Ann sat perfectly composed on the couch, sipping at a mug of coffee, smiling tightly when Michael entered the room.
“What is this, Ann?” Michael glanced at the man sitting beside her and grimaced. He wore an expensive suit that cost more than the farm’s tractor and looked utterly emotionless. “You brought a lawyer into it?”
>
“What have you done?” Jessy whispered.
“This is ridiculous, Ann.” Michael’s voice was tight with barely restrained anger.
“Is it? You’ve brought a stranger into the house with my children. I don’t want them exposed to your sexual relationship—“
“She’s sleeping in the guest bedroom!”
“And I guess that’s exactly what you want everyone to think.” She looked him up and down, smirking. “Care to explain why you’ve both got straw in your hair and your shirt’s buttoned wrong?”
Jessy felt her face go crimson. “Nothing happened, Ann.”
“Right.” She turned to Jameson, suddenly pained. “She was with my children last week, shopping, and she told them to call her ‘Mommy.’ She told them that their real mommy didn’t love them anymore and that I hated them!”
Jessy gasped. “That’s a lie.”
“Michael, did she tell you about her aunt?”
“What are you talking about?”
“She used to hurt her aunt,” Ann said, ignoring Jessy as she spoke directly to Michael. “I did some digging into her background. Her aunt was taken from her and put into a nursing home, where she died.”
“What?” Jessy suddenly felt as if she couldn’t breathe. She saw nothing in Ann’s expression but pure malice. “No! My aunt had pancreatic cancer. She was in too much pain to stay at home. I had to put her in a nursing home so they could manage her medicine—”
“Thank God I checked her background,” Ann said, casually crossing her legs and sprawling back on the couch. “To think that you’ve allowed this woman so much access to our children—”
“That’s enough, Ann.” A muscle jumped in Michael’s jaw as he looked at his ex-wife. “I want you out of my house. Now.”
Ann shrugged. “Whatever, Michael—dig your own grave.”
“What does that mean?”
Ann’s smug smile widened. “Look at the situation, babe. The farm’s losing money. You’re living with a bimbo who probably killed her own aunt. My children are being exposed to all manner of depravity and sin.” She laughed quietly. “Tell me what judge wouldn’t award full custody to me.”
“You wouldn’t do that to me.”
“You’ve done it to yourself,” Ann said coldly.
“But we’re not doing anything wrong.” Jessy looked to the lawyer, hoping to see some kind of empathy there. He stared impassively back at her. “Ann, there’s got to be some other way to handle this.”
“No, there isn’t.” Ann kept her eyes on Michael. “I’ll take the kids and you know it. I’ll move them to Chicago and you’ll never
see them. Unless—”
“Unless what?”
Ann slowly smiled, but her eyes were cold. “You know what you need to do, Michael. You know my terms.”
“I think it’s time for you to leave,” Michael said quietly. “You’re not welcome here. Either of you.”
Ann grabbed her purse and stood, focusing her anger not at Michael, but squarely on Jessy. She took her time as she walked across the room, never looking away from Jessy’s eyes. Jessy thought she had never seen such anger, such frustration.
“You don’t belong here,” Ann said finally, her voice low and seething with rage. “I don’t know how you’ve managed to delude yourself that Michael has any feelings for you, but I can assure you that he doesn’t. A man will say just about anything when he’s desperate to get laid.”
“That’s not the way it is,” Jessy said quietly.
“Sure, it isn’t,” Ann smirked, looking Jessy up and down. “So tell me, Jessy—have you slept with him yet? Frankly, I’d be surprised if Michael was able to get it up for a fat cow like you, but hey—when you’re desperate, just about anything will do, won’t it? He’s settling for you, honey. And you’re taking advantage of it.”
Jessy shook her head slightly, the faintest trace of a sad smile on her lips. For the first time in her life, words did not hurt her. And for the first time, she knew exactly what to say.
“Ann,” Jessy said softly, with no trace of anger, no hint of rage. “You’re pathetic.”
Ann’s mouth closed with a snap. Glancing quickly to Michael and seeing no support there, she stormed past them. She stopped at the door and turned to face them again. Nothing was said, but Jessy could read the look in her eyes. It wasn’t over. It wasn’t over because Ann hadn’t decided that it was over.
Ann turned to Michael, her blue eyes ice cold. “And I
will
still be here tonight to take the kids to the recital. I still have the right to do
that,
at least.”
Then she was gone. And for the first time since stepping into the house and seeing Ann’s sneering face, Jessy could breathe again.
Hours later, the shock of Ann’s ultimatum had still not worn off.
Lyssa had kept the kids upstairs, busying them by helping them wrap Christmas presents, while Michael had tiptoed carefully around Jessy, so solicitous and concerned that she finally had to ask him to leave her be for a while. She didn’t want his pity. She didn’t want his questions. She just wanted to be alone, to be allowed to sort everything out in her mind. It was bad enough that Ann could even imply that she’d ever try to hurt Aunt Amelia—she couldn’t bear the thought that anyone could actually think she was capable of doing such a thing.
Yet Ann had easily, almost eagerly, lied about it.
What if Michael chose to believe her?
And what if the rest of Ann’s words were true? What if Michael
was
settling for her? Now that he’d told her he loved her, the entire relationship had changed. Now that they’d crossed that boundary the stakes had been raised to impossible heights. Now there was no distancing herself. Now she could be hurt more than she’d ever imagined possible.
Ann had picked up the kids for the school recital at six o’clock, saying absolutely nothing to either Michael or Jessy. The kids had noticed the tension, of course, and remained quiet and timid. Jessy had tried to be cheerful, telling Libby how pretty she looked in her dress and how she’d knock ’em dead with her singing, but Libby had only responded with the faintest of smiles, as if she were afraid to anger her mother if she were friendly with Jessy.
It had been awkward and painful and horrible, and it was a preview of the rest of their lives, if Ann had her way.
Michael stepped into the living room, as if her thoughts had somehow summoned him. The grandfather clock in the foyer chimed, muffled tones ringing out the quarter-hour. Fifteen after ten. Everyone else in the house had long since gone to bed. Ann, once again, was late bringing the kids home.
“Why did she do it?” Jessy whispered, staring into the flickering flames of the fireplace. The dance of light had comforted her, alone in the amber-tinted darkness.
“Fear. Jealousy.” Michael kept his voice low, soothing, as he sat beside her on the couch. Jessy remained cocooned in the couch corner, a pillow under her head, her eyes fixed on the fire. “You threatened her, so she did what she thought she had to do.”
Jessy slowly sat up, turning to face Michael fully. “Are you defending her?”
“No,” Michael said quietly. “What she did—what she’s done—is inexcusable. But it is understandable. She never knew what she had with me and the kids until she saw you taking her place.”
“I’m not taking Ann’s place. I could never—”
“I don’t mean it that way. No one thinks you’re trying to do that.” Michael took Jessy’s hand, holding it loosely in his. “She saw that I could be happy with someone that wasn’t her. She saw that the kids could be happy. And it hurt her.”
Jessy turned her attention back to the fire. “I heard what she said to you last night,” she said softly. She didn’t dare look at him, didn’t dare try to gauge his reaction. “I saw you kissing her.”
Michael said nothing for a moment. Jessy slipped her hand out of his. Suddenly she felt very cold, very alone.
“I know you loved her,” she continued, voice little more than a whisper. “I know you probably still do—a little. Even after all this.”
“Jessy, why does it always have to come back to that?”