Juniper Hill (The Edens, #2)

by Devney Perry

“Do you know how many five-gallon buckets I filled this year? Six. I’ve spent forty years picking apples and coring apples and freezing apples. I’m so sick of these damn apples, I can’t see straight. You know what kind of pie I want to make? Peach. Or cherry. Or chocolate.”

“No. You can’t have it.”

“Do you need to get going?” Mom asked. “Or can you stick around to take this pie to Memphis?”

“Memphis? My Memphis?”

She arched her eyebrows. “Your Memphis?” Shit. “You k...

“She’s a beautiful woman, insi...

“Ever since Gi⁠—” Mom held up a hand, cutting me off. “Do not say her name in this house.”

“You’re a good man.” “Am I?” Because I probably shouldn’t have kissed her last night.

“I can’t lose another baby.”

Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes narrowed in concentration. She was entirely too attractive to resist.

“My mom made you a pie. It’s not charity either. She makes pies for people she likes.”

“This job is not charity. You’ve earned it. You’ve kept it. You. Got it?”

“I’m not one for complicated these days.”

“I don’t want to be your mistake.”

She’d been someone else’s mistake.

“When I lived in San Francisco, I was dating a woman. Gianna. We were together for about a year. And during most of that year, she was pregnant.”

“It’s not what you think. Gianna has a child. A son. His name is Jadon.”

“Thought he was mine. We started dating and she got pregnant. Neither of us expected it, certainly wasn’t planned, but we made the best of it. Gianna moved in. I went to the doctors’ appointments. Tagged names in the baby-name book. Helped her decorate the nursery in our cramped apartment. Held her hand through labor.”

“I was the dad. After we got home from the hospital, I spent long nights walking the baby back and forth across the apartment.”

“Jadon was two weeks old when it all fell apart. Gianna took him in for a doctor’s appointment. I came home from work four days later and she told me that he wasn’t mine.”

Then she’d taken my son. She’d changed my life.

“She cheated. At the beginning of our relationship, she slept with a guy she knew from college. She suspected Jadon might not be mine but chose not to say anything. She told me she’d hoped I was the father. But then he was born and . . . she wanted the truth.”

“I would have stayed in San Francisco,” I told her. “Been there for Jadon.

But Gianna and I were done, and she made the decision that if we weren’t going to stay together, it was better to call it quits. She moved out. And I . . .” “Came home.”

“Getting attached to you is risky. Getting attached to him is . . .” I swallowed hard. “It’s petrifying.”

Knox was a good man. He was as reliable as the sunrise. As breathtaking as the Montana sunsets. He was the type of person I wanted Drake to become.

And I would not be the woman who took another child from Knox.

“Ohmygod.” The air rushed from my lungs. He’d slept through the night.

“Her biggest priority is finding a new daddy for her baby.”

“Are you surprised she’s already dating? I think she was seeing this new guy before the divorce was even final. I told you I saw them at Big Sam’s that one night.”

“Have a good day, baby. I love you.”

Jill spun him so that he was out of my reach.

“Yep.” Jill popped the p, the disdain in her voice as bright as the yellow color on the walls.

I cringed. This was what people were saying about me? That I was after Knox for his money? Humiliation crawled up my skin, red and itchy. My cheeks flamed.

“What’s wrong?” I jumped at Knox’s deep voice.

“I think it’s best if we stop this, whatever this is, before it goes any further.”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “I know what’s on the line, Memphis. But I’m standing here anyway.”

“Did I ask you to take him out of focus?” “Well . . . no.”

“I don’t want to let Drake down. I can’t let him down. I’m all he has.”

I’m not asking you to tell me about Drake’s father. But I’m promising you that if you want to give me that trust, I won’t betray it.”

“Standing on your own doesn’t mean you have to be alone. There’s a difference.”

“Don’t use him as an excuse because you’re scared. You wanting me doesn’t mean Drake has to suffer.”

“Figure out what you want. You know where to find me.”

I saw no Jill. And no Drake.

“Oh, he’s not here.” I blinked. “What?” “Jill had to run a quick errand and she took him along.”

“Excuse me?” What. The. Fuck. “She just lives next door.” The woman pointed to the wall. “She’ll be back in a minute.”

Jill came inside with Drake on her hip. Her smile faltered for a moment when she spotted me.

Like she had done to me this morning, I twisted and pulled him out of her reach when she tried to touch his hand.

“I’d prefer it if Drake wasn’t taken out of this building.”

I was so tired. Mentally. Physically. But mostly, I was tired of being alone.