The Cowboy’s Christmas Love Bonus Scene

Brooklyn

It’s a text message that wakes me. I check my phone and as I sit up in bed, I see the soft glow of Christmas lights spilling into the bedroom from the open door.

Without a doubt, Christmas is my absolute favorite time of the year. In the past, it was a holiday of longing for me. As a child, I longed for family. For good food. For gifts and for happy times. I didn’t have any of that.

Now, I have everything.

I yawn and climb out of bed.

Normally, I don’t nap in the evenings, but I’ve been so exhausted lately. I chalked it up to the hustle and bustle of running holiday errands, decorating the house, and working long hours at the computer repair company I launched two years ago.

But now I know better. Being busy isn’t the reason behind my exhaustion.

I smile to myself at the secret I’m hiding from my Adam. I’d wanted to tell him as soon as I found out but then decided to wait, wanting to tell him tonight on Christmas Eve when our home is full of friends and family.

Tomorrow is our fourth wedding anniversary and while I’ve already bought a gift for him, I know he’s going to love the gift I’m carrying most of all.

The door swings open and the center of my heart walks in, smiling in that way that tells me he’s happy we’re together.

“Feeling better?” he asks.

“Seeing you always makes me feel better.” I loop my arms around his neck.

Adam kisses me and I forget that we’re going to have company soon.

He pulls back with a sound of regret. “I should text them all and tell them to show up an hour later.”

“Won’t work. Your mom texted to say they’ll be here in ten minutes.”

Adam makes a face. “Mom and her need for punctuality.”

I adore Adam’s mother, Ruth. If there was an award for the perfect mother-in-law, she’d win every year.

The first year of our marriage, she taught me so many things about life. She’s given me the sweetest hugs and always encourages me.

When I’d tentatively said I’d thought about starting a business but wasn’t sure I was good enough, she’d adamantly said I was and then immediately offered to help me.

I don’t realize I’m smiling or that I have a hand on my abdomen until Adam frowns.

“Is your stomach upset again?”

I shake my head and shoo him out of the bedroom when I hear a car outside. “That’s probably them. I’ll change clothes and be right out.”

He kisses me again and leaves the room.

As I’m getting dressed, I hear excited chatter and laughter. It’s always that way when the family gets together.

Usually, we gather at Ruth and Adam Sr.’s place on Christmas Eve but I’d asked if they wouldn’t mind coming here just this once.

I brush my hair and walk into the living room.

My brother Ford is still carrying in gifts and containers of food.

“Ruth, did you bring your caramel pie?” I ask.

“I did, darlin’, just for you.” She crosses the room and hugs me tightly. “Although I had to hide in the back of the refrigerator to keep it safe.”

“I had one bite. One tiny little bite. Hardly noticeable,” my father-in-law protests. He grins and winks at me before jerking his thumb toward my brother. “Ford had a slice first.”

My brother takes off his coat and drapes it on the back of a chair. He looks at Adam Sr. “Who are you?”

Everyone laughs.

Adam’s sister, Gabriella slips something in the stockings hanging on the fireplace, then notices me watching. She puts a finger up to her lips and I nod.

Every year, she slips something funny in our stockings that never fails to make us laugh.

My friend Madison hands me a warm dish. “I made my mother’s chocolate chip cookies and this year I didn’t accidentally add salt in place of sugar.”

“Those were so nasty,” Ford says, fake gagging.

“They weren’t for you,” Madison retorts, then glances around him. “Where’s your sidekick?”

The tips of Ford’s ears turn red. “She’s not my anything.”

“But you knew right away who she was talking about,” I say, laughing.

Everyone in town knows Callan Archer’s little sister has a thing for my brother and always tries to be wherever he is.

There are a lot of young women in the town flirting with and chasing my brother but he’s not paying any of them any attention.

“No more questions,” Ford says, narrowing his eyes playfully at Madison.

“I have one more question but it’s for my brother. Where’s my new truck you borrowed?” Adam asks.

Grant frowns. “I didn’t borrow a new truck from you.”

Adam snaps his fingers. “That’s right. It was the older one.”

“Nice try.” Grant gives me a how-do-you-put-up-with-him look.

“Are we going to eat now or do gifts first?” Madison asks.

I don’t think I can keep the secret I have much longer. “Let’s do the gift swap if you all don’t mind.”

I get everyone seated around the living room, then direct Adam to a stack of gifts by the tree that I’d managed to keep separate from the rest.

“You got one for everyone?” he asks, surprised as he feels the packages.

“Yes,” I say, taking them from him. I didn’t know until I married him that Adam is prone to feel or shake packages trying to guess what’s in them.

“Wait so that you all open them at the same time,” I direct, giving Adam a look. “Ready? Open!”

I stand in the center of the living room, watching each of them in turn as they open the packages containing the t-shirts.

Adam is first. “Baby’s—” He can’t get the rest of the words out before he lowers his head, trying to compose himself.

Ruth jumps to her feet. “Grandma! Mine has Baby’s Grandma on it!”

Adam wraps his arms around me, and we stand there, hugging each other while the laughter, tears, and joy of family surround us.

“My turn!” Ruth says after a few minutes. Tears run down her face as she hugs me. “I’m so happy for you, daughter of my heart.”

I’m crying now too, and she pats me on the back. “I’ll be there every step of the way whatever you need me to do, darlin’. No worries. Grandma’s on it.”

I laugh and pull back. “Are you going to be one of those grandmothers who will spoil a child?”

“Me?”

“It’s not her that you have to worry about,” Adam Sr. says, coming in for a hug.

“I know.” I wag a finger at him. “You’re the worst at spoiling people.”

“That’s because I have such a soft, mushy heart,” he says.

Ruth rolls her eyes. “Can I tell my friends? Is it okay if I crow about this?”

I laugh. “Tell whoever you want.”

“Hey, Sis.”

I turn and Ford hugs me, and then he slips something into my hand. “What is this?”

He closes my hand around an envelope. “I wasn’t able to do much for you when we were little. I know how you sacrificed for me.”

“Stop that. You’re my family.” I try to give the money back to him, but he refuses to take it.

Adam comes over after Ruth nabs Ford to talk to him.

“My heart can’t get any fuller,” he says quietly.

We stand side by side for a moment until he says, “I have something for you tomorrow but right now, I have something I want to give you.”

He takes my hand, and we slip down the hallway for a moment of privacy.

He takes a small box for the narrow table that holds the poinsettias. “Here.”

I open it to find a sheet of yellow notepaper. “This looks similar to the first letter you wrote to me.”

He shakes his head. “Open it.”

He’d recreated the words from his first letter, the one where he answered when I’d asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up.

Dear Brooklyn,

Today is a good day. I got to go outside. I want to be a pilot. Or a dump truck driver. But it would be cool to be a cowboy, too.

“Look at the next one,” he urges.

“There’s another one?” I look in the box to find a scrap piece of paper.

“I found that in the attic at my parent’s house last week. It was hidden in my old baseball mitt. I forgot I put it there.”

I read the date. “You would have been in high school then?”

He nods.

He’d written, I love you, Brooklyn.

“I didn’t keep the rest of the letter. I didn’t think I had a chance, so I tore up the letter, but that part landed on my bed. When I saw that it was whole while everything else, I’d written wasn’t, I couldn’t throw the words away. I wish I would have found that before our wedding.”

“No, I’m glad you didn’t.” I take his hand to press his palm against my abdomen. “This is the perfect start to the next chapter in our lives.”

He smiles and holds his arms out.

I walk into the circle of his arms.

“Dear Brooklyn,” he says, “Today is a good day. I’m in love with you.”

***

If you loved Wyatt and Lila’s story, you’ll enjoy reading The Cowboy’s Curvy Sunshine with Callan and Madison. Preorder the book now!