Life's Next Chapter (33 page)

“Luke, you gave me my dream, and now I want to give you yours…well ours. It just took me a while to realize it.”

“What’s that?”

“That I do want another baby. I want us to have another baby, or more babies. I want a family with you. I want our family to be huge.”

“Really? You want to try for a baby?” he asks as he kisses my forehead.

“Yes, and we can try tonight. I’ve been off birth control for a couple weeks. Who knows, maybe I’m pregnant right now.” I say with a wink.

“Damn, baby. Have I told you how beautiful you look today, and how fucking amazing you are?”

“Yes, but you know I won’t get tired of hearing it.” I laugh into his chest.

“I’m going to love loving your forever,” he mumbles to me.

“Same here, babe, same here.”

...
ABOUT 10 MONTHS LATER ...

I LOOK OVER at my sleeping wife. She’s so tired and has been up most of the night. So, I decide I’m going to let her sleep in. I scribble a quick note of where to find the kids and me. I get out of bed before the girls come screaming into our room.

As I am walking down the hall, the girls come barreling out of their room. “Good morning, Daddy,” they both squeal together as they run into the other bedroom. They immediately know to run to where I’m heading.

“No, Daddy, I want to, you said I could today,” Julia whines to me.

“Alright Julia, you can do it. Go get ready.” I watch her run across the room, sit down, and get situated.

I bend over the crib and pick up my handsome son. John Luke Ashton is three weeks old and the spotlight on him isn’t fading. He’s completely adored by his big sisters. I hold John in my arms as I walk to the rocking chair where Julia is awaiting to hold her brother. I place him on the Boppy pillow and wrap her arms around him. “Gentle, Julia,” I remind her.

A couple months back, Kate’s Granddaddy had a heart attack and he didn’t think he was going to make it. He begged Kate that if we had a boy to name the baby after him. The stubborn mule pulled through everything just fine. I think it was all a ploy to have a great-grandchild named after him. It didn’t bother me and it fits. John is a strong little guy. He’ll need to be, especially with these big sisters of his. After a few rocks, I take John from Julia’s arms and ask the girls to go get dressed, because we were going to go for a walk. “Shh, you have to be quiet. Momma is sleeping.”

They both put their finger over their lip and tip toe out. I change John’s diaper and quickly run down stairs for a bottle. I grab a bag of breast milk and place it in the warm water to warm up. The girls are downstairs as soon as I’m done making John’s bottle.

“Girls, grab a Pop tart and a juice box and get your shoes on,” I softly instruct. I’m in a hurry to get them out of the house before they wake up Kate. She’s such a light sleeper these days. They grab their breakfast and slide on their shoes, while I grab a blanket for John, and we walk. We walk towards the creek. It’s been a while since we’ve been to the creek. Since John was born, Luka has been on my mind a lot.

I gave Kate everything I told her I would. I planted a garden box of beautiful flowers. And every now and then we see our yellow and black butterfly around the flowers. It gives us peace. I also built a wooden bench, so we have a place to sit. The girls run around ahead of me as I slowly take my time with John in my arms and a bottle in his mouth. We approach the creek and the four of us sit. The girls nibble away on their breakfast, and I enjoy having my children all around me.

The girls’ being quiet doesn’t last long and they start throwing rocks in the creek. John has fallen back to sleep, and I’m totally content.

I stare off and reminisce on how far we have come in two years. Finding out about Luka and then losing her; Kate and me broken then healed; our wedding and amazing honeymoon in Tahiti. Right after our wedding Keith was released from jail. He wrote a letter to Kate and his daughters, explaining he was sorry for everything he caused in their marriage, for hurting her while we were dating, and for the cause of Luka’s death. He doesn’t have a reason for doing it he just blamed the drugs. He wrote a letter to the girls telling them he loved them, but couldn’t live in Florida, and he was going to help his dad with his business in New York. He promised to visit and talk often. Kate read the letter to the girls, and it relieved us both to see them not bothered by his actions.

One year after Luka’s death was hard. Kate had discovered a couple weeks before that she was pregnant with John. We spent the evening on a blanket next to Luka’s cross talking about the short time we had with her.

Looking down at my son, I smile remembering his birth. After ten hours of labor and thirty minutes of pushing, the most miraculous moment transpired in front of me. Watching Kate push our son into this world nearly brought me to my knees. When I saw him take his first breath and then scream, I believe I exhaled and cried with him. Kate is my hero; I might have done some heroic things, but she brought life into this world, she brought my son into my life. I have an almost twenty year old, six-year-old daughters, a three-week-old son, and a beautiful wife, and I’m complete.

I hear the grass crunch behind me and I know Kate is walking towards us. Once she is behind me, she wraps her arms around my neck and kisses my cheek. “Thank you for letting me sleep,” she mummers against my cheek.

“No problem, I thought I would bring John down here and introduce him to his other big sister.”

“I think that is a great idea. What does he think of the place?”

“Not sure, he’s been very quiet.” I laugh as I place the sleeping baby in Kate’s arms. Seeing her hold my son has got to be one of the best feelings. She’s a natural. It’s truly amazing to watch the two. The most intriguing bond to see is when she nurses him and his big green eyes are focused on her, just staring away, as if he can’t get enough of her beauty, like his old man. He’s definitely my son and knows a beautiful woman.

“Luke, we need to come here more often. These last few weeks have been crazy,” she tells me.

“I know, I know. We should make this a Sunday tradition: pop tarts, juice boxes, a bottle of milk, and Luka. What do you think?”

“I think it’s a great idea. This tradition goes down in our book,” she says as she leans into me and kisses me hungrily.

Read Ethan and Leah’s Story Next in

Book 3 in the
Life Series

COMING late Spring 2014

FIRST AND FOREMOST, I want to thank my husband and children. Thank you for being so patient with me, and giving me the time and space I needed to write. To my children, I am so sorry that summer 2013 was the “worst” summer ever because we did nothing fun but watch me write. I promise to make your next summer break more enjoyable. To my husband, thank you for your support and help through this journey. Know that I love you all so very much and I couldn’t be prouder to be your wife and mother of our children.

Thank you to my family and friends. Thank you to my family for your support and encouragement through this journey. To my best friends Kristan and Erica, I cannot thank you enough. Girls, you truly are my heroes and my walls that keep me up. Kristan, for your support and cheerleader attitude to me. You pepped me up every time I felt like crashing down. To Erica, thank you for being my personal “Beth”, “Kate”, and “Ella” all in one. Your guidance, support, and listening ears helped me in ways you will never understand. I love you both to infinity and beyond. I hope you two can see why I also dedicated this book to you. Thank you so very much!

To my editor Raelene with word·play by 77peaches: You are my saving grace. Words will never be enough for saving this book and me. If it weren’t for you this book would have never happened. You are such a blessing. You have a true gift. You picked up this book, never knowing any story behind any of my characters, and you got them head on. You knew exactly where I wanted Kate’s personality to be. You just got it! Rae, you have a way with words that blows me away. I couldn’t believe how beautiful you made this book and I can’t thank you enough. I look forward to working with you more. Thank you so much, Rae!

Thank you to Dee with Book Designs by Dee who captured exactly what I wanted in a book cover. You are extremely talented and you took my ideas and created a beautiful cover. I am so in love with it. I look forward to working with you again and seeing what you will create next. You are awesome and I love ya!

To Julie with JT formatting, first off I have to thank you for your patience with me. I know formatting this book didn’t go planned to schedule. But you were so understanding and patient and I can’t thank you enough. Second, thank you so much for creating a beautiful book that my readers can read and fall in love with. Thank you for answering all my questions, for being there, and helping me write better as a writer. You are so talented and creative. I thank you so much!

To Ricki with The Book Pimp, you are proof of what a small world we truly live in. The moment we talked, I knew fate brought us together. Thank You…Thank You for your help with these books. To think I was looking for a book pimp and I got a friend instead. Love you!