by Liz Isaacson
“We hope our mother and father enjoyed the six weddings they just watched,” he began. He smiled, but Momma had looked into that face so many times, and she saw the wobble in her son’s bottom lip. “All of us sons love our parents very much, and they didn’t get to see very many of us enter into this illustrious thing we call matrimony.”
“Oh, boy,” Tripp said under his breath. “Who let him get up there again?”
Momma ignored him and kept her eyes on Skyler, even as Conrad tried to get down. “Stay here, buddy,” she whispered.
“Daddy,” he said, and Rhett turned around. Momma let the boy go, and he went up the aisle to his father.
“I’m not going to say anything today,” Skyler said. “Micah and Simone have vows they want to say as part of their ceremony, so I’m going to turn it over to them.” He went to sit beside Mal, and Micah and Simone turned toward each other and faced the crowd too.
“Micah,” Simone said, looking at him. “We’ve had our fair share of ups and downs, over what felt like a long time. I know life can be bumpy, and scary, and hard sometimes. And there’s no one else in the whole world I want to be with through all the speed bumps, anything that scares me, and all the hard times than you. I love you.” She paused and swallowed. “I love you with all I have.” She nodded, a final punctuation mark to what she’d said, which was simple and beautiful and pure.
“Simone,” Micah said. “I’ve painted your house. Snuck into your workshop. Spent days mourning that I couldn’t text you or talk to you. Begged you to go out with me. Talked to you on the porch when I was dating someone else. Mourned with you. Laughed with you. But the best thing I’ve ever done is allow myself to fall completely in love with you.” He reached for her hands and held them in both of his. “I love you, love you, love you, and I will do everything in my power to make sure you’re the happiest woman in the world.” He dropped one of her hands and lifted the other one into the air.
Everyone started cheering, as if they’d been given instructions to do so. Obviously, they had. Momma pressed her hands to her chest, because her husband and boys could make plenty of noise without her.
As they cheered, Micah kissed Simone, his very real wife.
Momma looked around at the crowd of people there. They were her world. They epitomized love and forgiveness. She felt removed from them, basking in their warmth, their life, their love.
Gideon took her hand and said, “Look what they’ve become, Penny. Aren’t they wonderful?”
“Yes,” she said, coming back to the moment, back to her precious Gideon, to their family. “They’re all so wonderful.”
Keep reading to find out who my favorite Walker brother is - maybe we’ll have the same one?
Also, I have a brand-new family of cowboy brothers running to Whiskey Mountain Lodge from their high-profile family in Colorado…read on to meet Colton Hammond in HER COWBOY BILLIONAIRE BIRTHDAY WISH, which is coming soon!
I love how Micah wants to try on marriage like a pair of cowboy boots - and that he and Simone got their real wedding, and that Momma and Daddy got to see ALL of their sons walk down the aisle with the woman they love. If you liked this book, please leave a review now.
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Author’s Note
To my dear friends and readers,
Wow! What an amazing journey we’ve had with the Walkers. Hopefully, you’ve seen yourself in one or more of the people in this series. I know I have. I’ve poured my heart and soul into this series in a way I’ve never done before.
I’ve never written more of a family saga than just a straight romance, but that’s what Seven Sons turned out to be. It’s part women’s fiction, part family drama, and part romance. I love all of those things, and I love that we got to spend time with the individual family members for longer than we normally do.
I love Rhett’s strength and family loyalty. I love his drive to be the best big brother he can be, and the best father to those three boys and one little girl. I love that the other brothers look up to him, and that he doesn’t know any better than them. Don’t we all feel like that sometimes? I know I do. People looking at me like I know what to do, and I’m really making things up as I go.
I love the twins. They formed early in my mind, and I love that we see them start out as a bit more fun-loving. Quipping with each other and the other brothers. But as they face serious things in their lives, they grab them by the horns and hold on.
I love love love Liam’s devotion to Callie. When I wrote him wandering out by the fence between their two properties, just hoping to catch a glimpse of her…that sums up Liam for me. He’s loud but quiet. Strong yet soft. Serious, with a quick laugh.
And Tripp is different in some ways, and identical in others. He knew from very close to the beginning that he wanted Ivory to be happy and that he’d do whatever he had to do to make it so. He reminds me so much of my husband, who also deals with difficult in-laws, children who are quite far apart, and concern for those around him. Tripp is helpful and present, and I love that about him.
You’ll notice I skipped Jeremiah. I know that. In thinking about who my favorite brother is, I decided it was Jeremiah. Then I thought Rhett. Then I was like, “No way. It’s Wyatt.”
Or maybe it’s Skyler, with his depth, his growth in his faith, in accepting who he is. He didn’t only accept it, he embraced himself. And I love that so much about him.
And now that I’ve written Micah’s book, I actually considered Micah for my favorite brother. In writing this book, I had to go back to several of the others and read sections of them, and every time I did, I fell in love with that brother.
So my favorite is definitely Liam.
Okay, it’s not. It’s Tripp. I mean, I just said he was like my husband in a lot of ways!
I love Micah because he dreams big dreams, and he’s not afraid to go after them. I have no doubt we’ll get to see him in future books I write in Three Rivers, because he’s going to be the best premium builder and cabinet maker in the county. (And yes, there is another series coming to Three Rivers. It’s the Shiloh Ridge Ranch series, and Bear Glover will get his happily-ever-after! So don’t fret that you didn’t get to see Micah’s creation for Bear and Shiloh Ridge. You will!)
And now I’m down to the two brothers I think I connected to the most, personally. Jeremiah and Wyatt. In this book, they get in a little argument, and that was such an important part of the family saga for me. I wanted to show that even the best families have problems they have to deal with. They have misunderstandings. They say things to hurt each other, sometimes unintentionally, sometimes on purpose.
But the Walkers have learned to forgive one another, and that is admirable to me.
I love Wyatt with my whole heart. His book was completely the love affair that had started a few books before. I love that he was this big, tall, ultra-rich and ultra-popular man, but he didn’t have what he wanted most.
Love. A wife. A family. He was not complete just because his bank account was big, or that a lot of people knew his name. I loved creating his hat wave for his daddy, his family, and his fans. It was my love story with my readers, and Wyatt to me just flows from me as if he is part of me.
And you know who else does? Jeremiah. I understand Jeremiah on such a deep level. He is perceived as superhuman, and he likes it. He wants to be seen that way, and he works hard to know what he knows and do what he does.
At the same time, he has a lot of insecurities. He has a deep fear of failure and abandonment. He struggles beneath the tough surface. That speaks to his need to take care of other people, feed them, and welcome them to the ranch he’s spent years turning into the type of ranch that wins Ranch of the Year.
I honestly wish he could feed me!
And let’s not forget about the Foster sisters. How much do we love them? And Marcy? Mal? Ivory? Whitney?
Did you notice I brought all these strong, smart, and yes, sexy women into the fo
ld, and all of them needed exactly one thing: a family.
Mal has no one in the country. Marcy has lost both of her parents by the time her book begins. Ivory has parents she hasn’t spoken to in years, and she’s under the threat of losing her son. The Foster sisters haven’t had a mother for decades. Whitney has family in Three Rivers, and she might be the outlier here, though she still needed somewhere safe to belong.
And I gave them this loud, obnoxious family of all boys. Haha.
And then, I gave them Momma. (Cue crying here.)
I actually think Momma is my favorite member of this family. She is everything I hope and wish to be one day. Patient with her adult children, prayerful, loving, accepting, and faithful. I love her relationship with Gideon, and her relationship with all of her sons as individuals, that she brings the women together and helps them see how they each have the exact spot in the family they’re meant to have.
I gave them Daddy, complete with his love of miniature horses and his incredible faith.
I did this, because I believe everyone needs a Momma and Daddy in their lives, and I wanted these women to integrate into the family, find a place to belong within their core families, within the larger family, and ultimately, with each other.
Ah, the Walkers.
I am now a Walker. You are too.
Welcome to the family.
~Liz
PS. Read on to see Micah and Simone and their baby boy in the first two chapters of THE MECHANICS OF MISTLETOE, the next Three Rivers Romance, coming in October. You can preorder it now on any retailer.
Sneak Peek! Her Cowboy Billionaire Birthday Wish Chapter One
The life and energy of Whiskey Mountain Lodge pulsed through Annie Pruitt as she climbed the steps from the basement to the kitchen. The door at the top of the steps had been slid closed, but as the family gathered in the kitchen burst into laughter, no barrier could contain the sound.
Annie smiled, because she loved the Whittaker family, and all those that had come to be included in that family. Herself and her girls included.
She paused on the top stair, her fingers scrambling for the divot to latch onto so she could slide open the door. It moved easily, because everything at Whiskey Mountain Lodge now ran like a well-oiled machine. Not that it hadn’t before, but Graham and Beau had worked together over the course of eight months to bring the lodge out of retirement and back into a full luxury vacation destination in the beautiful Teton Mountains.
They’d hired four more people to work at the lodge, increased Annie’s hours to full-time, and made every room available for nightly stays, even the master suite. Beau and Lily had moved down the canyon to the town of Coral Canyon, and the brothers had built a cabin on the hill in the backyard for the manager who now ran this place.
Annie liked Patsy Foxhill a lot, and she ran a very tight ship for someone so petite and a decade younger than Annie.
“There she is,” Graham practically yelled as Annie entered the kitchen. “Celia was just suggesting we come down and get you.” He grinned at her, his eyes bright and glinting.
Annie shook her head. “You said dinner was at six. It’s quarter till.” She glanced around at everyone gathered at the table. Tonight was the first night they’d all gathered to the lodge for their annual family Christmas celebration.
Over the course of the next six days, they’d transform the lodge into Holiday Central, with a tree-cutting expedition planned for the day after tomorrow.
For starting tonight and continuing for at least the next twenty-four hours, Mother Nature would be dumping snow. At least according to the forecast and the National Weather Service. In fact, the family wasn’t supposed to gather to the lodge until tomorrow night, but they’d come early to avoid the weather.
All of the guests had left that morning, and Annie was supposed to have two days to clean the lodge from top to bottom before the Whittakers and Everetts arrived. She’d had four hours.
As Eli and Meg arrived, then Andrew and Becca, then Beau and Lily, they’d simply put their bags in the rooms where they’d be staying, and Annie had stripped beds and scrubbed tubs around the luggage.
Lily’s sisters and parents had become an integral part of the Christmas traditions at the lodge too, and Vi and Todd and Rose and Liam had arrived that day as well. Fran and Jack Everett had come after Annie had finished the upstairs rooms, as had Amanda and Finn, her new husband, and Celia and Zach.
Annie’s thoughts lingered on Amanda and Celia the most these days. She’d watched them find their second chance at happily-ever-after, and she wanted it for herself. She’d been out with a couple of men in the past couple of years as the lodge went through the changes, but neither of them had panned out.
She found herself stuck in the middle of her life, taking each day one at a time the way she’d learned to do after her husband’s death, alone. She didn’t want to be alone forever, and she certainly didn’t want to be a burden to anyone.
“Where’s Bree?” she asked. “Everyone’s not even here yet.”
“Happy birthday,” Amanda said, appearing in front of her and hugging her.
Annie giggled as she hugged the woman a couple of decades older than her. “Thank you.”
“I know it was a couple of weeks ago,” she continued. “But Finn and I haven’t been down to the lodge in that long.” She extended an envelope toward Annie, who looked at it with love and appreciation for Amanda and Finn streaming through her.
“You didn’t have to get me anything.” She glanced to the table, where several others still loitered. A couple of kids ran into the kitchen, excitedly asking Celia for just a pinch of the chocolate bread she’d made that day. She shooed them out, and Annie still hadn’t taken the envelope from Amanda.
“We got you something too,” Graham said, setting a bright red package on the counter that separated the large kitchen from the dining area, where most people sat to visit. More gifts appeared, and Annie pressed her hand against her heart. Tears threatened to spill down her face, but she pushed them back.
Maybe she was simply closer to fifty than forty now, and her emotions couldn’t be controlled as easily, because one tear managed to slip out of the corner of her eye. She swiped at it, and said, “You guys. You didn’t have to.”
“But we wanted to,” Eli said, standing up as he picked up the slim, blue package someone with less clumsy hands than his cowboy fingers had wrapped. He nearly shoved the gift at her, and Annie finally took it and the envelope.
“Well, I appreciate it,” she said.
“You don’t turn forty-six every day,” Amanda said. “It’s a good year. One of my best.” She smiled, and it sat beautifully on her face. Annie would’ve never guessed she had turned seventy years old that year, and she could only hope she looked as good as Amanda in twenty-four more years.
The thought made her stomach clench. Twenty-four more years. Would she have to spend all of those days with a sponge in her hand, her two cats the only living things waiting for her at home?
She reminded herself that both Emily and Eden still lived at home, though they were both adults, as she looked down at the envelope. Before she could open it or the gift, a child screamed from somewhere in the house, and someone came through the back door, yelling the words, “The storm is starting already.”
Bree poked her head around the corner as she removed her hat, which bore enough snow to shake to the floor and gather into a fist-sized ball. Annie frowned at it, because she knew she’d be the one to clean it up.
“It’s coming down out there,” she said. “We barely made it up the path.”
“Good thing we’re all staying here tonight,” Celia said, and Bree ducked back around the corner to hang her winter gear in the mudroom off the back entrance. The chatter picked up again; Rose left to discover the source of the screaming, assuming it to be one of her triplets. She and Liam had two boys and a girl that had just entered their terrible two’s, and they all possessed a healthy set of lungs.
“Everything’s ready,” Sophia said, putting a large pot on the counter. She’d been hired as the full-time cook at the lodge, which offered breakfast and dinner to its guests. Celia worked weekends now, when they only offered a brunch, choosing to spend the rest of her time in Dog Valley, on Zach’s farm with him.
Annie wondered what that life would be like. Working a few hours a day, and living in a beautiful, modern home with the man she loved. Her chest tightened again, and she gathered the gifts from everyone, keeping her smile cemented in place.
Annie had learned long ago to smile, to find the silver lining in any situation, to make the best of what she’d been given.
But would it be so hard to give me someone to grow old with? she wondered, directing her question up. Up through the ceiling. Up through the storm. Up, up, up and hopefully, all the way to the Lord’s ears.
“Thank you,” she said to everyone, nodding and smiling. “Thank you so much.” She hurried into the family room and put the gifts in a pile on the armchair there, reaching for the two tweens sitting on the couch. “Come on, guys. It’s time for dinner.”
Bailey and Stockton were the oldest of the Whittaker children, with mostly children under the age of six to play with. So they tended to stick together, talking about their friends or looking at things on their phones.
They got up and Bailey wrapped her arms around Annie. “Oh,” she said, patting the girls’ head. “What’s that for?”
“Happy birthday,” she said, smiling up at her. Bailey had always been a sober child, and she’d matured into a fourteen-year-old with the same calm demeanor as her mother.