New Beginnings Spring 20 Book Box Set
Page 92
He carried her into the bedroom and placed her gently on the bed, then sat beside her and began removing her soiled boots. She gasped in pain, remembering for the first time her injured ankle.
Hunter’s hands were gentle, carefully slipping the boot from her foot and moving her leg so it rested on a pillow.
“Thomas and I were out on horseback all night searching for you all night,” he continued. “We found the campsite, but it had been abandoned. There were footsteps in all directions… we didn’t know where to go. We searched for hours, and it wasn’t until nearly dawn that I…””
“You were looking for me,” Haley repeated, and despite her state she couldn’t help but smile. She felt a warm glow build up inside of her; a sort of affection that she had only felt once before, that night by the hearth.
“Of course I was,” Hunter said. “I never would have stopped looking for you. You’re my wife.”
EPILOGUE
There had never been a spring as sweet and perfect as the one that came after the first winter that Mr. and Mrs. Oakley spent as husband and wife.
Hunter was finishing up the day’s work, coaxing a calf out of the dated barn and into the pasture. The sun was setting behind the farmhouse and the sky behind it was soft shades of warm pink and orange. He glanced up towards and the porch, and then he saw her: his wife.
She was standing on the front porch of the Oakley Ranch farmhouse -- the house he had grown up in, and the house that was now their home. There was look of pride on her face as she admired the fields of vibrant green that had sprung triumphantly from beneath the blanket of melted snow.
He watched her eyes scan the pasture, and then she found him. She smiled and waved, and it was his turn to feel his heart swell with pride as he smiled back.
Love, he thought; that was the feeling. Love, and it burned warmer than the spring sunshine. He loved his wife.
For the longest time, Hunter had defined love as the conflicted sense of emptiness that he had for Ethel. He realized now that those feelings weren’t love at all; they never had been. He wasn’t entirely proud to admit it, but it had taken nearly losing his wife to realize what love really was; to realize how lucky he was to have her, and how close he had gotten to her in their first few months of marriage.
He watched her step across the porch and he place her hands on her stomach, feeling the small bump that was growing under the folds of her dress, and she smiled again.
Love; he thought. Love for his wife, and love for their little baby.
A lot had changed during over the winter, since that awful and terrible day. Haley called it a ‘blessing in disguise.’ And she was right; even though he wasn’t proud of it, that incident had changed their marriage.
Their feelings were only solidified in the long weeks leading to her recovery. He nursed her back to health, bringing her meals in bed and reading to her from her mother’s Bible. They exchanged stories, had the kind of conversations that husband and wife should have… and they developed something more than a friendship; a closeness more than anything Haley ever thought was possible between two people, between a man and a woman.
That was when their marriage became real. That was when Hunter truly became her husband, and Haley was truly his wife.
They saw each other through new eyes, and Hunter felt a sense of excitement for the promise of their life together. And then they learned that there would be a baby, too!
Haley saw the change too. When Hunter looked at her, she saw so much love in his eyes, and it was entirely different than whatever love he had felt for Ethel. That had been a love of sadness, of emptiness, of hollow want… but their love was one of respect, of understanding, of trust and friendship.
Hunter hadn’t even batted an eye when Thomas announced that he and Ethel would be moving west to California with Lucas and Jared. In fact, he had congratulated them… had celebrated them and wished them the best. And when he said goodbye to Ethel, it wasn’t with sadness in his heart, but with resolution and good-will.
Haley would never admit it, but she was happy to see them go. Not because she felt threatened by Ethel; no, her bond with Hunter had grown far too great for her to feel any sense of insecurity or concern. Rather, she felt happy because now she and Hunter were started fresh; they were beginning again, just the two of them.
Hunter left the calf in the pasture, then he ran towards the farmhouse. The setting sun cast a golden glow on his wife, and he blushed at her beauty. She giggled as he climbed the steps, his boots stomping against the painted wood porch, and then he took her into his arms and felt her stomach with his hands. They embraced, their baby between them, and then he bent down and kissed her lips gently.
And they both felt the happiest they had ever been.
The End
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