by K. L. Donn
At dinner, she’d watched all three men banter back and forth with a sense of love she envied. They could joke and tease with a familiarity that she had a hard time understanding. It had been so long since anyone had cared about her. Had just been there for her.
Now, here was Dom. He made her think he wanted to take care of her, maybe have a relationship with her. But he had yet to say the actual words. She felt like she was in limbo. Not really belonging here, but not belonging anywhere else either. She always thought she’d lose this feeling once she was back in Dublin. Now? After seeing this pure love they shared, she doubted it.
She loved her mam, but it had been years since she’d seen her. Only being allowed to speak to her on her birthday, they didn’t even know each other anymore. They’d written letters in the beginning, but somehow that slowed down, too.
The creaking from her bedroom door brought Deedee out of her depressing thoughts. The first thing to hit her was fear. Had her dad found her? Was he making her go back to England? But then she knew no one would get past Dominic’s intricate security system that even she didn’t understand.
A small body slipping through the entrance had her relaxing. Looking at the clock on the bedside table, she saw it was nearly five a.m. already. Shocked, she looked back to Jaxson as he made his way to her bed.
“Pincess?” he said in a loud whisper that had her laughing silently.
“Yes, sweet man?”
“I have ta know. Are you a weal pincess?” If she had a little boy of her own one day, she sure hoped he would be as sweet as this one.
“No a stór, I’m not,” she told him. Calling him the name her mom used to call her had shock rendering her speechless.
“What does dat mean?” he asked crawling in the bed with her.
She had to think for a moment. She’d asked her mam the same thing around his age. “A stór is Irish for my treasure.
“Oh. Why don’t you jus’ say my trwesure?”
“I don’t know. Me mam used to call me that when I was your age. It always made me feel special,” she explained, remembering how much she loved it.
“Me mam? You talks funny, pincess.” He giggled.
“I suppose I do. But Mam means Mom.”
“In Iwish?”
“Mmhmm,” she started rubbing his head softly, hoping he’d fall asleep. It couldn’t be normal for such a young one to be up so early, could it?
“I do’n have no mom to make me peel special,” he whispered sadly.
Kissing his forehead lightly she told him, “One day, Jaxson, you’re going to have a mam so amazing your heart will burst with happiness and love. One day, she’ll give you hugs bigger than mountains and kisses sweeter than sugar.”
“I wiss you was my mom, pincess,” he whispered falling asleep and stealing her heart.
*****
“Daddy!” Darting upright in bed just in time to catch Jax as he jumped on him, Dom wasn’t sure whether to laugh or yell from being woken out of one of the best night’s sleep he’d had in years.
“What’s happening, bud?” he asked, voice thick with sleep.
“Pincess made panpakes,” he said excitedly.
“She did, did she?”
“Uh huh, and they hab bananas in them.” The excitement on his son’s face was contagious.
“Alright, let me take a leak and I’ll be down. Don’t let Uncle Casey eat them all!” he shouted as Jax ran from the room screaming in excitement.
Jaxson was the biggest surprise in his life. He’d never dreamed of having kids, but when Brooke dropped him on his doorstep—literally—he’d instantly fallen in love. Knowing without a shadow of a doubt, he would love and protect the boy with everything he had.
Nearly four years later, and Jax was thriving. He knew that Jax often wondered why his friends had a mom, and he didn’t. Thankfully, he hadn’t asked the hard questions yet. But he had a feeling with Deedee around they might start coming.
Finishing his business in the bathroom, he made his way downstairs to hear Jax talking about leprechauns and castles. “What’s this about castles?”
Dee jumped when she heard his voice. “Shit,” she mumbled.
“Pincess, you said a bad word.” Jax reprimanded her.
“Yes, a stór, I did but don’t you go repeating it.”
“A stór?” Dom asked her.
A blush crept up her cheeks as Jax answered. “It means my tweasure.” Pride shone from his chubby cheeks. He was clearly loving the fact she had a special nickname for him.
“That so?” he asked grabbing the coffee Deedee handed him. Black, the way he liked it. Raising an eyebrow in question, she smiled shyly.
Leaning down, he lightly grabbed her chin placing his lips on hers murmuring, “Thank you,” before kissing her lightly.
When he pulled away, she looked confused. “For what?”
Turning to see his son coloring happily at the table with a plate filled full of his banana pancakes and sliced apples, he told her simply, “That.” He pointed to his boy. “He’s happier than he has been in a long time, Deidre. You took the time to do things he likes. Not many women would. And that’s what makes you so extraordinary.”
“Oh. I didn’t really do anything, though. He said he was hungry. Only seemed fair I feed him.”
She really didn’t understand how much she had done. His son could be picky at the best of times and downright stubborn at the worst. He refused to eat apples unless they were sliced. Never before had he liked the idea of bananas or anything else in his pancakes, yet he was scarfing them down like a starving man.
“How did you get him to eat the pancakes?”
“I don’t understand. He asked for them; I told him I liked them with bananas,” she explained.
“And the apples?”
Confused about his line of questioning she told him, “It was how my mam gave them to me. Did I do something wrong, Dominic? I won’t cook for him anymore if you don’t like it.” She seemed stressed that she had somehow screwed up something so simple. Little did she know she was perfect.
“No, Princess, that’s just it. You did everything right. He’s never shown an interest in bananas in his pancakes before, and he refuses to eat apples if they aren’t sliced.” Smiling, he pulled her into his arms wrapping one around her shoulder; she cuddled into his chest.
For the first time in years, he felt content. Like everything was lining up the way it was supposed to. His son was infatuated with the woman he planned to make his, and she adored the single most important person in his life. Life couldn’t get better than this.
Until Case came crashing through the back door.
Six
Jumping nearly a foot in the air from fright, Deidre was glad Dom had his arm around her or she might have fallen. “Jesus, Case,” Dom laughed at his antics.
Leaning up to his ear, she asked, “Is this normal?”
“Princess, there ain’t nothing normal about head Case here.” He laughed leading her towards the table to sit with Jaxson.
“Hey! I resent that,” Casey grumbled.
“Shouldn’t you be sleeping or something?” Dom teased him.
“Wellll, ideally yes. But then I thought to myself, “Hey Case, there’s a woman around now, maybe she’ll cook! Turns out she does!”
“Pincess’s panpakes are for me,” Jax told him smugly.
“That so, kid? You don’t wanna share with Uncle Casey even a little bit?” Casey whined.
“Ummm….”
“You gonna let me starve, kid?”
“Oh, I ‘pose not,” Jax told him mournfully, eyeing the stack of pancakes in the middle of the table. “But my pincess first,” he said sternly as Casey went to grab some, making them all laugh.
“Oh, sweet man, it’s okay. Uncle Casey can go ahead. I ate while I cooked.”
“Are you sure, pincess?” Nodding her head, he let Casey start eating.
Wh
ispering in Dom’s ear she told him, “He’s adorable.”
Once breakfast was finished and she and Jax got the dishes cleaned up—that was a chore in itself—they went out back where he was showing her all the animals they had.
In the barn were a beautiful golden mare and her colt. “Dat’s Goldie and her baby, Honey. Daddy let me name them,” Jax told her proudly.
“What breed is this horse?” she wondered aloud, not really expecting him to know.
“A ‘merican coter horse.”
Thinking his words through, she practically had to transcribe them before it hit her. “American Quarter Horse?”
“Yup, dat’s what I said.”
“Do you ride?” she asked him.
“Only wiff Daddy or Unca Casey. You would wook wike a real pincess riding Goldie,” he told her in awe.
“Oh, I don’t know about that. I like my feet firmly on the ground.” Watching the new mother and her foal interact was an experience she wouldn’t soon forget. Everything the mother did for her baby was out of protection. She watched the young with eagle eyes, making sure she never stumbled. Nudged her in the right direction with her long face when she got too wobbly.
A loud bang a few stalls over got their attention. Walking slowly and holding tightly to Jax’s hand, they came upon a beautiful black horse. He was huge and magnificent.
“What’s his name?” she asked in a low voice so as not to spook the animal, knowing instinctively it was a male and had to be Dominic’s horse.
“That’s Raine. He’s Honey’s daddy,” Jax told her.
She was mesmerized by him. He was enormous, bigger than what had to be normal for a horse. His muscles rippled with restrained energy, yet he was calm and inquisitive. He had his head over the stall sniffing at her trying to figure out who the new person was.
She lifted her hand slowly, not wanting to scare him and brought it to his face where he nudged it like he was looking for something. Giggling had her looking down.
“He wants an apple,” Jax told her pulling her to a bin on the far wall that held them.
“Am I allowed?” she asked him wondering if it would affect his diet. Were horse’s supposed to have fruit? She’d never been around anything other dogs and cats, so she didn’t know. “Maybe we should wait for your da,” she suggested.
“It’s okay, the horse always gets one after brefkast. But you hab to give it to him. I’m not allowed,” he told her reasonably.
Grabbing an apple, they went back to him holding it out the way Jax showed her with her palm and fingers flat. She giggled as Raine ate it; his whiskers tickled her hand. Rubbing his nose gently, she was amazed at how gentle he was for such a big animal. He was majestic in his own right, far more so than Jax seemed to think she was.
“C’mon, I wanna show you da chickens, too!” Jax pulled tightly on her hand.
Laughing, she followed him out of the barn and to the chicken coop that was off to the side of the barn. “We hab fifty chickens! And they all have eggs!” he exclaimed excitedly.
“Do you collect them?”
Puffing up his chest, he told her, “I hold the bucket for Angie.”
“Such an important job.”
She listened with half an ear as he told her the cute names he’d given each chicken. And told her all the facts he knew about them, and about how the rooster woke them up at sunrise. Every kernel of information he had, he happily told her about.
Looking around the farm, she realized it wasn’t as small as Dom had tried to make it sound. It was actually quite large. He didn’t have many animals but acres of open land. She could see herself happy here. Peaceful. If only her father would leave her be.
*****
Dom watched as Jax pulled Deedee happily behind him from the barn to the chicken coops, talking animatedly. She seemed to listen to every word, too. Never in his wildest dreams had he thought this moment would come. But here they were, and his two favorite people seemed to genuinely like each other, and it couldn’t make him happier.
“She’s a keeper,” Case said behind him.
“Yup.”
“You’re not letting her go, are you?”
“Nope.”
“Gonna marry her, huh? Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Yup.”
“I’m happy for you, man.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ll leave ya to it then,” he said making his way out the way he came in.
“Later.”
What he was feeling for Deidre may not be love yet, but he was old enough to know a sure thing when he found it. And he found it in spades with her. He looked forward to having everything with her. A life filled with happiness and as many children as he could possibly put in her.
The way she accepted Jax, even though she was pissed at him, showed him more than she would ever know about how she felt about children. She loved them unconditionally. He hadn’t worried about Jax loving her, he knew his son would. But with how much he’d opened up to her it amazed Dom.
Ever since Brooke dropped him and ran, there has always been something missing in Jax. A need to be loved by a mother. Every boy needed it. A father could only do so much. There was no doubt he loved Jax with everything he had, but there was only so much he could do to fill the void she had left.
When he’d hired Angela to take care of the house shortly after Jax had arrived and just before Case did, he didn’t expect her to fall in love with his son and want to take care of him the way she had. But she’d helped fill the role of mother as best she could. He was happy she could let that position go and be more grandmotherly now.
Case had been a godsend. He’d helped keep Dom sane on the sleepless nights of colic and teething. Things neither of them were prepared for and had fought like a battle. When Jax had fallen while learning to walk at eleven months old, he’d tumbled down the porch steps they had just finished fixing. Jax thought it was funny, Dom and Case panicked when they saw blood from a scratch on his arm and rushed him to the hospital like he was losing a limb. It was his first real injury—certainly not his last —and they’d been more upset than Jax.
The doctors and nurses had laughed at how worried they were for such a small cut but assured them it wouldn’t be his last, which was true. Since then, they’d made three more visits to the ER. Twice for stitches because he couldn’t seem to run without falling, and once for a bump on the head they’d worried could be a concussion because he’d hit the bottom rung of the paddock.
They didn’t freak as much as they used to, but the worry never dulled. Nor was there ever a dull moment with a toddler around. However, neither of them would change a thing. He just hoped that once Case found a woman, she would accept the relationship he shared with Dom’s son.
Deciding it was time he went and joined his family, he walked out back to find them collecting and counting the eggs from the coop. He smiled at how well she got Jax to say his numbers.
*****
“How many, pincess?” Jax asked looking in the bucket they’d just finished filling with eggs.
“What was the last number we said?” she asked, hoping he’d remember.
“Uhhh…firty-seben?”
“That’s right! But we say it thirty-seven.” She enunciated each sound slowly for him.
“Thirty-seben?” He asked hopefully.
“Very close, a stór, those V’s are quite tricky to say.”
“They are,” he told her seriously.
As they were rinsing the eggs off at the small wash basin just outside the coop, Jax took off when he heard the back door slam closed. Spinning, she watched as he jumped into Dom’s arms laughing. Seeing them together had her smiling. Nothing sexier than a man who loves his son.
“Jaxson is very informative of the role’s these animals play. You’ve taught him well,” she told Dom as they approached.
“He likes his animals. He tell you the chicken’s names?”
> “Yes. I’m afraid I didn’t catch them all, though.”
“You’ll hear them every time you come out, don’t worry,” he told her laughingly.
She’d figured as much. He had seemed so proud of the names he’d chosen. “I gave Raine an apple. I hope that’s alright?”
Shock registered on his face before looking towards the barn. “He let you near him?”
Not sure if that was good or not, she hesitated in her answer. “Yes.”
“And he didn’t try to bite you?” he asked grabbing both of her hands, inspecting them for injury.
“No. He seemed happy for the attention.”
“Huh.”
“Did I do something wrong?” Now she was apprehensive. “Jax said that he always gets an apple after breakfast. And he kept butting me with his head, so I assumed that meant he wanted me to pet him. I won’t do it again, Dom, I promise.” She was near tears now thinking she’d done something wrong. Maybe he was a wild horse, and she wasn’t supposed to pet him?
“Princess,” Dom called sternly, placing both hands on either side of her neck to gain her attention. “It’s fine. Raine doesn’t take to new people. Hell, he barely tolerates Case. But if he was grabbing for your attention, that’s fine. Just please don’t ever go into his stall unless I’m with you, yeah?”
Nodding her head in agreeance, she replied, “He’s gorgeous, Dom. And so sweet.”
“Sweet, huh? Don’t let him hear you calling him that.” He joked, placing a kiss on her forehead. “Jax show you Goldie and Honey?”
“Yes. They’re perfect.”
“Hey, kid!” he called Jax before he could chase after the chickens.
“Yeah, Dad?”
“Go on up to Uncle Case’s. I gotta talk to Dee for a bit.” A puzzled look crossed the young boy’s face before he did as he was told. Running across the field, she watched as he stumbled his way to the house she’d missed that must belong to Case.
“Is everything okay, Dom?” She worried, turning to him.