In that moment, my heart broke for the guy. He had to hide the fact that he had a child with the love his life. I wouldn’t even try to understand how that must feel.
“It’s okay, believe me I understand. Totally understand and I’m sure this is selfish on my part,” I said, glancing over to Ava.
“No. I want to talk about it. I think it will actually do me good.” His hand pushed through his hair as the waitress dropped off his drink. He picked it up and took only a sip this time.
“When Kate told me she was pregnant, I was stunned. We were always careful. None of that really matters now. The fact was we were going to have a baby. We had both gotten our acceptance letters for the University of Montana. As soon as she told me about the baby, I asked her to marry me and she said yes.”
“What in the hell where you going to do? Go to college with an infant?”
Ava kicked me under the table. I needed to keep my emotions in check.
Jackson took in a deep breath and pushed it out. “That’s what we were trying to figure out. We thought we had it all figured out. She was going to tell your family and I’d tell mine. She was due in March and she figured she would go to school up until she had the baby. She had talked to the principle who agreed to let her homeschool after she had the baby to finish her degree.”
Holy shit. The fucking principle of the high school knew our sister was pregnant?
“She knew Kate was pregnant?”
Jackson shook his head. “No. Kate told her that her father was going out of the country and taking the family.”
I pulled my head back in disbelief. “And she believed it?”
Jackson smiled. “I don’t think she did. I think she put two and two together, but never said anything.”
“Okay, so then what were you going to do?”
He looked at Ava. “Wait. Your name.”
“What about it?” Ava asked.
Jackson smiled. “Ava. That was one of the names Kate had picked out if the baby was a girl.”
My head turned to look at Ava. Her face turned white. “W-what?” I could see her chest moving up and down.
“Yeah, she met someone who worked at the movie theater who had that name, and I remember she wrote it down with the other baby names. I think I still have the list at home in a box of things I saved.”
Ava reached for my hand. Jesus. Maybe my sister was in that damn house. I’m never sleeping there again.
Jackson saw the reaction of what he had just said on Ava’s face. She had been trying to keep it in, but a single tear slipped and rolled down her face. “Sorry, Ava, your name just clicked.”
She wiped a tear away. “S-okay.”
“Anyway, I thought we had it somewhat planned. We knew it would be hard, but I was pretty sure we could do it. I was going to take a full load one year; Kate would take a couple classes since we’d have the baby. Then we’d switch the next year. I’d take a light class load and she would take more.” He looked away and I saw the tears building in his eyes.
“Then everything changed. Two days before she … before she died, she called and asked me to meet her at your family house in Helena. She said she wanted to spend the night with me and we had something important to talk about.”
His voice cracked and he took a few moments to get his emotions in check.
Ava reached for his hand and held it. “It’s okay, Jackson. Take your time; I know this has to be hard.”
He nodded. All I could think about was what Kate was about to tell Jackson. You could almost still feel the pain pouring off of him.
“Kate told her parents she was spending the night with a friend or something. We had the house to ourselves.” He smiled as a tear rolled down his face. “She made us dinner and then we went for a walk and I dared to let myself believe that someday we’d be a family and walking our own—”
He closed his eyes. When he opened them he smiled.
Ava and I exchanged looks as Jackson cleared his throat.
“Anyway, after we had … well … spent some time together,” Jackson looked at me and then looked away. “She told me she had gotten a job offer. I remember laughing and thinking it was probably working for your family’s ranch. When she showed me the contract, I was so happy for her. I felt like I was going to burst at the seams I was so damn happy. Then she told me she would have to move to France. At first I thought she was kidding, but I could see the look in her eyes. I remember getting angry. I told her I couldn’t believe she was going to just up and leave me. Take our child and move to another country. I said some pretty hurtful things to her … things that haunt me every fucking night in my dreams.”
I couldn’t imagine what Jackson must have been going through. If Ava told me she was pregnant and leaving for France, I’d blow a fucking gasket too.
Ava held onto Jackson’s hand as she said, “Jackson, you can’t beat yourself up over all of that. Never mind the fact that y’all were so young in the first place.”
He let out a gruff laugh. “Yeah. It sucked. She had to wait until she was eighteen before she could actually go to France and work as a designer, but they wanted four of her dresses. They told her they would easily bring in over twenty thousand and the demand for more of her work would be something they could see. After I calmed down, I told her I’d go with her. That when the time came, I’d move to France with her.”
“What?” I whispered. I was stunned. Beyond stunned. Here I wanted to knock the hell out of this kid this whole time and now he is sitting here saying he would have given up his own dreams so she could follow hers.
“Oh, Jackson. What did Kate say?” Ava asked.
“At first she said no. She took the contract and taped it behind a picture in the master bedroom.”
“That’s where we found it today,” Ava said.
Jackson looked stunned. “You found it? Today? How did you know to look there?”
Ava waved her hand and replied, “It’s kind of hard to explain, but we did find the contract. She hadn’t signed them though.”
Jackson wiped at his eyes again. “No. She didn’t because she said we needed to think things through. She wasn’t ready to let me walk away from my dreams and there was no way she would ever take the baby away from me. So, we decided we would decide in two days.”
The lump in my throat was growing. I needed a break. Standing, I quickly said, “I need a second. Excuse me.”
Turning, I quickly headed outside and dragged in one deep breath after another until if felt like I was able to breathe.
Dropping my head, I whispered, “Oh, Kate. My sweet sweet, Kate.”
JACKSON HAD EXCUSED himself right after Ryder did, except he went to the men’s restroom. I checked my phone and smiled when I saw I had a voice message from Renee. After listening to it, I hit her number.
“Bonjour.”
“Bonjour, Renee, It’s Ava Moore.”
“Ava! What in the hell! You have this whole damn office in an uproar right now, can I tell you that?”
I quickly peeked between the men’s room and the front door.
“Listen, I don’t have a lot of time to talk.”
“Well, you better make time. He wants to talk to you.”
My breath caught. “Does he remember Kate?”
“By the smile on his face, I’d say he does. He rattled off something about her young life ending too soon. My French is good, but when that man rattles that shit off fast I can barely understand him.”
“Yeah, I’ll have to catch you up on that.”
“Oh, Ava, there is one condition. He wants you to fly here … to Paris.”
Ryder walked back in through the front door.
“Holy flippin’ shit balls. Why? When?”
“What are you doing on the second week of February?”
My heart started racing. This is not happening. “Getting married in the Bahama’s.”
Renee busted out laughing. “Better make that Paris.”
“I gotta go.
I’ll call you back in a few.”
“Don’t you dare show those designs to Maurice. Amour Des Lettres has first dibs!”
“Right. Later.”
I hit End and stood when Ryder walked up. “Sorry about that. It’s just all so much hearing this. Knowing my sister had this whole other world planned out that none of us knew about.”
Kissing his cheek, I replied, “I know. It had to have been so overwhelming for both of them.”
Jackson appeared before us and apologized. “I guess we both needed a moment.”
“I guess so,” Ryder said.
After they both ordered another drink, Jackson started back up where he left off. “The day Kate died, we left school early and hiked up River Mountain. We sat for a few hours and talked about what we both wanted. For me, there was only one option, and that was for Kate to follow her dreams. If she hadn’t, I would forever doubt her happiness. All I cared about was her and the baby. We had decided to tell your parents first and tell them about Amour Des Lettres offer to her. She was going to take it. We decided to stick with the plan of finishing high school, and then after we graduated, we’d move to France. She had called and spoke with some guy in France …”
I cleared my throat and softly said, “Michael Blancet?”
Looking at me with a surprised look, he replied, “Yeah. That’s the guy. She called and told him what our plan was and about the baby. He was more than understanding. So much so, I remember Kate saying she had to be dreaming. He agreed to wait, but he told her he wanted her designs. It was all coming together … or so we thought.”
His jaw began to tremble. “We agreed to meet at the stone house and then tell her parents. When I walked in she was … she …” He dropped his head while his body jerked with sobs. I quickly got up and went over to him.
My heart ached. It ached for Jackson and what he lost; it ached for Ryder’s family and what they lost, it ached for Kate and the future that she had that was taken from her. So many broken dreams. I was going to do everything in my power to give Kate those dreams. I could feel it in my heart she knew and she wanted this.
After Jackson regained his composure, I sat back down. My phone buzzed on the table. Ryder and Jackson were now talking about Jackson’s family. It gave me a chance to read the email that just came in.
“Oh my God.”
I wanted to kiss and kill Renee.
“Is everything okay?”
My head jerked up. Ryder was looking at me with a concerned expression. “Um … yes?”
He laughed. “Is that a question to my question?”
I swallowed hard. “Well, you see there is this friend of mine who I went to college with. She works in France. At Amour Des Lettres. As Michael Blancet’s assistant.”
Jackson leaned forward with his full attention on me.
“I kind of sent her a text and asked her to ask her boss if he knew the name Kate Montgomery from Montana.”
“And?” Ryder asked with a confused expression on his face.
“It looks like we aren’t getting married in the Bahamas after all,” I said with a lighthearted chuckle.
Ryder frowned and shook his head. “Why not?”
Pressing my lips together, I replied, “Cause we’re getting married in the city of love instead.”
THE SAINT JAMES Paris hotel Michael had put us up in was beyond crazy beautiful. Ryder and I hadn’t stopped pointing and gasping since we walked in.
“Okay, let’s act like we’re supposed to be staying at this hotel and stop acting like a damn tourist,” I said as we made our way up to our suite. The two grand staircases where beyond beautiful. It was like nothing I’d ever seen.
“We are tourists,” Ryder said.
The moment we opened the door to our room, I knew I was never going to stay at another hotel like this again in my lifetime.
“Oh my.”
Ryder and I walked in and looked around. “It has two floors!” Ryder called out as he ran up the steps. “There is a baby-grand piano up here!” he yelled in excitement.
I tried to hold back my giggles, but failed. I was just as excited. Paris was where I originally thought I would be living. Where I dreamed of designing clothes and wedding dresses people would be begging for.
Ryder came back downstairs holding his phone up. “What are you doing?”
“Rubbing this shit in Nate’s face.”
I rolled my eyes and smiled.
“We have our own balcony. I’m having naughty thoughts!” Ryder said from outside.
“I like the sound of that!” I replied.
Glancing around the room, I took in the beauty. It was classic French décor all the way. The furniture itself looked like it was taken from a palace. I walked up and looked out to see the most breath taking garden I’d ever seen. Even in the winter it was filled with flowers.
This was like a dream come true. Not only were Kate’s dreams about to come true, but mine were as well.
TWO HOURS LATER, Ryder and I were getting out of a taxi and walking into Amour Des Lettres main office. Michael greeted us as we walked in. His English was almost perfect as he spoke to Ryder about how much he adored Kate and how he had never seen such talent until yesterday.
I pinched my eyebrows together at his comment. What an odd thing to say.
Michael turned to me and looked me over and then slowly shook his head. “Kate has blessed me ten-fold.”
I peeked over to Renee who stood there with a huge-ass grin on her face. “Now, come to my office. We have much to talk about it.”
Following Michael to his office. Ryder stopped every now and then and took a selfie with random girl walking down the hall and fired it off to Nate. He laughed every time he got a response. They were all the same.
I hate you.
When we walked into Michael’s office, I stopped dead in my tracks. “My dress!”
Turning quickly, I placed my hands on Ryder’s chest and pushed him as hard as I could. He went tumbling backwards and fell right on his ass.
“You can’t see my dress!”
He looked up at me with a stunned expression. “Why not? I’ve seen it on paper. What difference does it make?”
My heart was beating like a wild horse running in an open field. “You can’t see it.”
Stepping in Michael’s office, I slammed the door shut and made my way over to the dress.
Covering my mouth, I held back the waterworks show. It was beautiful. How Lucy’s friend managed to do this in the short amount of time she had was amazing. No wonder it cost me a small fortune!
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more beautiful wedding gown, Ava,” Michael said while we both gazed at it.
“The end product is breathtaking,” I said with a huge smile. Never mind the fact that Michael Blancet just said my wedding dress was beautiful.
“It is. Now, let me have Renee put this back in the bag so that your poor Ryder can join us.”
My face turned red. “Well, I really don’t want him seeing it until I’m in it.”
He nodded and motioned for me to let Ryder back in now that Renee had zipped up the bag. Ryder walked in and shot me a dirty look. I mouthed, sorry, to him and blew him a kiss.
“Sit, both of you please. We have much to talk about.”
We each took a seat and sat there stunned while Michael said he wanted the original designs that Kate had sent them. He also wanted the five other designs of Kate’s that I sent a few weeks back that were not finished.
Ryder took my hand and squeezed it. Kate’s dreams of becoming a fashion designer were going to happen.
“We already decided the money will go into a scholarship account for young girls in Montana to follow their own dreams,” Ryder said when Michael started talking money.
“I do have one question though,” Ryder said. “Who will be finishing my sister’s other designs?”
My heart sank. I’d have given anything to have been able to finish them.
Michael
sat back in his chair. “Oh, that will be done by our latest designer. She lives in America and is very familiar with Kate’s work.”
Ryder and I both looked at each other. What in the hell is he talking about?
“Who?” I asked a little too hard.
With a wide smile, Michael said, “You, Ava. You will finish Kate’s designs. The moment I saw your dress I knew that my sweet Kate brought you to me to finish the work she had begun, and so much more.”
I was positive I had just peed my pants. “Wait. What?”
Everything from that point on was nothing but a blur.
AFTER FILLING MY parents in on everything that had happened since we got to Paris, I was exhausted. Ava and I had been going non-stop since we landed in France. Between finishing up the deal for Kate’s designs, and then Michael offering Ava a position, things were insane.
Ava had called Jackson to let him know also. We had talked one other time since dinner that first night. I had asked him why he was still single and the only thing he said was no one had moved his heart like Kate enough to make him fall again. Ava was hell bent on making sure Jackson moved on and found happiness again. So much so, she and my mother planned a dinner where they invited a shit load of people, many whom were young and single. Jackson wasn’t interested though. He spent most of the night talking to Jennifer.
The water in the bathroom turned off as I made my way in. Ava was soaking in the tub. She had never looked so beautiful.
“So? What did Maurice say?”
She kept her eyes closed. “Well, after he called me a bitch about six times, he told me he was proud of me and that his little secret weapon would have gotten noticed sooner or later.”
I smiled and made my way over to her and sat on the edge of the giant tub. “You look tense.”
“I’m getting married tomorrow. I am tense.”
Moving my eyes to the faucet, I couldn’t help but notice the shower head was a hand held.
“Then I think it’s time to relax you.”
Her eyes opened as a smile slowly grew across her face.