Jillian Hart: The Horseman

She placed her hand in the center of his back. There were heroes in real life, men of both strength and kindness. How could she not have faith in him when he had so much in her? Maybe that’s what true love was, a leap of faith. Like swimming out into the ocean and trusting the waves to bring you back to shore.

It was the hardest thing she had ever done to open her heart, to expose the most tender of places and love this man more than she could ever love herself. To love him beyond doubt and fear and uncertainty. To love him as far as her soul could reach.

As if he felt the change in her heart, Dillon pulled her tight to his chest, where she belonged for the rest of her life.

The silvered light of a sickle moon peered behind the edge of a cloud to polish the dark prairie. Snow sheened like a black pearl for miles in every direction, broken only by a dark majestic form watching on a rise.

“Look,” Dillon murmured, against her lips. “The stallion. He approves.”

The Spirit Horse lifted his nose, his mane rippling in the restless wind. It was as if he called for the snow to fall in tiny crystal flakes straight from heaven. They whispered like grace over the land and over the two lovers standing hand in hand.

The horseman saluted him as the horse disappeared into the wind and the night.

Seven years later

Dillon didn’t think he’d ever felt more relieved than when he heard the tiny mewling cries, faint and muffled but strong. Healthy. Was Katelyn all right? And the baby? Did he have a son or a daughter?

“Stay calm, brother,” Dakota advised as he left his wife’s side to put wood on the dying fire. “Doc Haskins knows what he’s doing.

“He’d better.” Dillon paced the floor in front of the stairs, back and forth. Damn it, he was a patient man but he’d waited seven years for this moment. He was likely to explode if this went on much longer.

The instant he heard the bedroom door open, he shot up the stairs and pushed the doc out of the way before the man could speak. Girl or boy, it made no difference as long as Katelyn was all right.

The first thing he saw was her face, radiant and smiling in the golden lamplight. She was more beautiful to him with every day that passed. Relief left him quaking all the way to the bed, where he went down beside her on both knees. His wife, his beloved wife, was safe and well. The fear knotted up inside him began to unravel. He wanted to bury his head in her lap and give thanks.

“This is your daughter.”

His daughter. A pure love so strong it could outshine a summer sun at its height blazed through him.

Overwhelmed, choking with tenderness, he dropped to his knees beside the bed, gazing at his wife and his daughter nestled in her arms. He’d never seen anything more beautiful.

“Are you disappointed?” A faint wrinkle burrowed into Katelyn’s porcelain brow.

Still, she had worries? After all this time? Tears stood in his eyes. Love for her brimmed over in his heart. “I’m overwhelmed. More grateful for this miracle than I know how to say.”

“She is a miracle. I can’t believe after all this time. How lucky we are.” Katelyn leaned the curve of her face into the palm of his hand as he touched her. Sighed with fulfillment when he kissed her tender and true. “I can’t believe this is real. The doctor said long ago this was impossible.”

“For seven long years, he was right.” Dillon swiped the dampness from her eyelashes before her tears could fall. Happy tears, he knew. Thankful beyond measure. It was how he felt, too. “Sometimes love can make miracles.”

“You are my miracle.”

“Nope, darlin’, I’m simply a man.”

“A good man. My man.” Katelyn kissed his cheek.

The love she felt for him was endless. He had loved her faithfully and truly for the seven happy years of their marriage. Every day had been better than the last. True to his word, he’d loved her with everything he was, everything he had.

And she had loved him in return the same way, with her entire soul. Their love together had been enough.

The doc had been clear. This child was miraculous, and they would have no more. This little girl she cradled in her arms was more than a dream she’d never thought would come true. This newborn with her curls and angel’s face was Dillon’s child. Love, sweet and strong as eternity, glowed within her, for this man and now this daughter, for both were her entire life.

“You know what this means, don’t you?” She paused, savoring his sweet, tender kiss. “It means now we are really going to live happily ever after.”

“That, darlin’, is a certainty. Because we already were.”

Dillon eased onto the bed beside her and his solid, wonderful presence stirred her soul. As he always did. As he always would.

Katelyn savored the comfort of his arm around her shoulder, the closeness of his cheek against hers. And the gift of his love that would shine forever.