Page 77 of Easy On Me

“And as I’ve said before . . . that little girl's seriously delusional. If she gets convicted and she ends up in front of Judge Holton? He’s not going to play with her.”

And that might be the best thing to happen to her. She was still playing stupid games, posting negative rants and running her mouth around town. The thing was that sure, she had a small audience who ate up the gossip and drama, but locally, people knew Jase for who he was and respected him. They—the people who counted—were tired of her antics. Even Gail at the Hickory House had called her out in public, had asked her to leave the restaurant after refusing to serve her, and that was saying something, apparently.

So we remained in limbo with both the custody case and the legalities of what she’d done to Jase, but our baby was healthy and growing.

Our relationship did the same, each challenge drawing us together even when we didn’t quite agree on how to proceed.

Outside the office, Jase handed me into the truck’s passenger seat, although I wasn’t that pregnant yet and could get in fine all on my own. Still, the caretaking was part of him, and even though I didn’t need him sheltering me, I loved it.

I loved him.

He kissed me, while snapping my seatbelt, then grinned at me before closing the door and jogging around to the driver’s seat. Behind the wheel he tucked the strip of sonogram photos behind the visor, folded to a shot of our boy curled up in my womb.

He fired the engine, letting the AC run, and a warm palm landed on my thigh. “So, sugar dumpling, we both have the rest of the day off. What are we gonna do?”

An irresistible smile tugged at my lips. I tilted my head toward Scott’s office. “Well, you’ve already done the hard stuff–”

“I’ll show you hard,” he muttered, winking, and I laughed.

“Take me home, Jase, and I’ll show you easy.”

He leaned sideways to kiss me again. “Sugar, everything’s always easy with you.”

Epilogue 2

Elizabeth

“Ms. Hall, you have been found guilty of . . .”

The words blurred together, muffled, like someone speaking above me while I floated underwater. The seal on the dark bench wavered, in and out of focus.

A man. Of course. Always a man.

In my belly, a soft wave of movement, bumping along the right side, but I didn’t move, didn’t press a hand on my skin. A girl, the last thing I wanted, innocent and powerless and vulnerable.

A cough behind me, well, behind the other lawyer’s table. Jase. Even drowning, water filling my ears, I recognized him. She’d be safe with him. She was his, and he’d be a good father, a good daddy. She’d be safe. He’d make sure.

My heart folded in, pressure and pain in my chest. I’d always been safe with him. Tate, too, probably the only two men I could say that about. Daddy, maybe. So three.

At the corner of my eye, movement flickered . . . Tate folding an arm around Hannah’s shoulders. I didn’t move, staring at the white and blue seal, the way it wobbled in a circle. Of course she was here. And Tate was here. And she was here, next to Jase, holding his hand, sitting beside him in the space that had always been mine.

I swallowed, muffled drone fading in and out of my ears.

I closed my eyes.

None of them mattered. Hannah had left me, so I was alone with Mama, alone with–

No. I wasn’t thinking about that. About him. Or the one after him.

I didn’t think about Jase if I could help it, either. He’d left me, after promising.

Men. Always men.

Mama, like always, had been right.

That movement again, and I ignored it.

The muffled voice, never stopping, and I ignored it.