Six months later…

Planting season was a real bitch. Dad and I worked until we were too tired to continue, usually around 9 p.m., when we’d shut off the tractors and call it a day. We’d go home, tumble into bed, and start again about six the next morning. I didn’t mind the work, but I did mind it was taking time away from my family. I pulled to a stop beside Ella’s Escape and stepped out of my truck with a groan. Abby was probably already in bed.

I opened the door and stepped into the trailer Ella and I shared. “Daddy!” Abby cried.

Like Ella telling me she loved me, no matter how many times I heard Abby call me Daddy, I never got tired of it and it always made me smile.

Three days after I’d beaten the shit out of Steve, I ordered a home paternity test kit. Abby and I swabbed the inside of our mouths, sent them in, and waited on the results. We didn’t tell a soul what we were doing, and we’d told Abby we were checking her teeth for cavities.

I still didn’t understand how it happened. My best guess was the condom had leaked, but Abby was my little girl. Ella and I kept the results secret for another couple of days as we planned what we wanted to say to our families, and to Abby.

“Hey, Munchkin. Miss me?”

“Uh-huh! Mommy said you could read my story tonight.”

“I can do that. Let me say hi to Mommy first, okay?” I kissed her on the cheek and put her down.

We decided it was only fair to tell Abby I was her father first and then announce it to our families at the same time. That had been a little tricky. Ella and I had reconciled with our parents, but we weren’t sure our parents had reconciled with each other yet, so we decided to meet on neutral territory, Dolly’s.

Dolly didn’t have a private room we could rent, but Ella arranged to hold the small section for our use to give us as much privacy as possible. I arrived at eight with Abby, and Ella and I sat down and told her I was her daddy. She was too young to understand what we were telling her, but she was a smart girl and would figure it out over the next few months as I became an enduring part of her life.

While our announcement to Abby had been a non-event, I couldn’t say that about our parents. They’d agreed to meet us at 8:30, which gave us a half-hour before Dolly’s closed. We’d planned it that way in case the announcement went off the rails. Our parents were polite but cool to each other when they arrived, still unsure of where they stood, but clearly wanting to patch things up, for our sakes. If what we were about to tell them didn’t do it, nothing would. As Abby ate a cookie, Ella and I, hand in hand, broke the news.

My mom’s squeal of excitement could have been heard in Abilene, and Helen actually turned her chair over in her rush to hug me. The commotion brought Dolly, but it was clear the disturbance was excitement and joy, not anger. Mom couldn’t seem to stop hugging Ella, or touching Abby, and Helen must have touched me fifty times over the next thirty minutes. Mom had two grandsons, one by Rebecca and another by Kamron, but Abby was her first granddaughter.

Abby was put off by the whole affair and clung to me or Ella. I could tell Mom was dying to hold her, but she understood Abby needed some time. Abby’s family had suddenly doubled in size, and it was going to take her a few weeks to adjust.

As we’d hoped, the news had almost instantly healed any rift that remained between our families, and by the time we left Dolly’s, everyone was chattering excitedly as plans were made for the upcoming holidays.

“How’re you doing?” I asked as I gave Ella a quick kiss.

“I got an ‘A’ on my biology exam!” she said, beaming in pride.

“Congratulations! That deserves a little something extra I think,” I said as I leaned in and kissed her more fully. She placed her hand behind my head and held me in the kiss before slowly drawing back.

“As soon as someone goes to bed, I think you and I need to examine the workings of the human reproduction system, don’t you?”

I smiled, my exhaustion disappearing in an instant. I was like that around her. No matter how tired I was, I was never too tired to make love to her. “You know I’m always willing to help you study.”

Her eyes sparkled as she smiled at me and drew her hand along my face. “And I appreciate it more than you know.”

Two weeks after our announcement, I’d moved out of my parents’ home and into the trailer Ella was renting. It wasn’t much, but I didn’t need much. It wasn’t where I lived, it was the two women that I was living with that made the small trailer home. Ella and I talked about moving into another place, but the trailer was the only home Abby knew and we didn’t want to disrupt her life any more than it already was.

The day after I moved in, Ella turned in her two-week notice at Dolly’s. Word had traveled around town that Abby was my child, so I don’t think anyone was surprised that I’d moved in with Ella, or that she was quitting Dolly’s.

She was still working at Goodall Equipment, but she spent her evening at another job, taking online classes for her BSN. In a year or two, she would have to attend college for the hands-on portion, but for now, she could take all her prerequisites online and get those out of the way. Once that was complete, we’d figure something out. It was only two hours from Hamlinton to Wichita Falls. Maybe she’d go there for a few days at a time and then come home. We didn’t know, but we knew, somehow, we’d make it work.

“Let me go get one of my girls in bed, and then I’ll see what I can do about getting the other in bed.”

Ella smiled. “I predict you’re going to have more trouble with one than the other.”

I snickered and kissed her again before I turned to the back of the trailer. I found Abby sitting on her bed ‘reading’ to Theodore and Shnoodle, a bright blue, plush elephant.

“What are we reading tonight?” I asked, as if I didn’t already know.

Abby held up the book she was ‘reading.’ Goodnight Moon had been replaced by Silly Sammy and his Jammie Whammy as the bedtime story of choice. The book, a story about Sammy and all the trouble his independent minded pajamas got him into, was much more advanced than Goodnight Moon. It might still be children’s book, but I found Sammy’s problems almost as funny as Abby, and the illustrations were fantastic. It had taken weeks before I could get through the entire book without chuckling, and there were still sections that made me snicker if I studied the illustrations.

I tucked her in before I sat down on the edge of her bed and began to read. She didn’t even make it to the part where Sammy’s Jammies dumped his milk on the dog’s head before she was out cold. That was too bad because I nearly always chuckled at the look on the dog’s face.

I gave her a soft kiss. “Goodnight, Abby,” I whispered before I snuck out and switched off the light.

Ella was in the kitchen, putting away dishes as quietly as she could. That was the worst thing about living where we did, the walls were paper thin. At least we had the bathroom and small utility closet between our bedroom and Abby’s so we didn’t have to be dead silent when we made love. Good thing too, because we sometimes absolutely wrecked each other with pleasure.

I stepped up behind her and kissed her on the neck and shoulder. “You ready to study your biology?”

She ignored me as she put away the two glasses and turned in my arms, her smile charging me up like a battery and starting my cock hardening. “God yes,” she breathed. “I didn’t think you were ever going to get home.”

Our kiss was explosive as I pinned her against the kitchen counter, her soft moan of desire making my blood run hot and fast. When she was randy like this, usually after a success like making an ‘A’ on an exam, I’d have to labor long into the night to satisfy her, but I relished the challenge.

Over the past months, we’d learned just how to please each other, and our love-making had become incredible. Not only that, but as the truth about what happened to her came to light and people started expressing support over what she’d endured, she’d blossomed into the woman she was always destined to become, self-assured, beautiful, and strong. She’d put her past firmly behind her and had embraced her future.

Not everyone in town liked the new Ella, or me, for that matter. Not that we cared. Amanda Calhoun went out of her way to make her displeasure with us clear to all, but nearly everyone ignored her. She and Steve were almost pariahs now. Where Ella had hunkered down, and the town slowly forgave and forgot, Steve and Amanda weren’t helping themselves with their sneering attitudes and Steve’s continued insistence he’d done nothing wrong and it was all Cat Meyer’s fault. Likewise, Janice Meyer refused to accept her daughter had drugged Ella and that she and Steve had engaged in a conspiracy of self-protection. It was the largest scandal in town in decades, and the Meyers and the Calhouns seemed unable to let it die.

As word spread through town that not only had Ella been telling the truth but that I’d kicked the shit out of Steve, the two events fed on each other. For the next few weeks, Steve stayed pretty close to home and wasn’t seen much around town, a change in behavior that hadn’t gone unnoticed. I’d heard from people that had seen him that his face was one big bruise and he couldn’t stand up straight, where I didn’t have a visible mark on me. When his mother had gone to the police and demanded my arrest for assault and battery, that had only further diminished him in the town’s eyes. I made sure the townsfolk didn’t know how much my back hurt for a week afterwards, and the teasing Steve took in his absence had been merciless. Ella and I refused to join in, but we smiled in private. Ella, especially, derived evil pleasure that he was experiencing what she’d had to put up with for years.

Several weeks later, when we announced that Abby wasn’t Steve’s child, but mine, the teasing was even worse. Some variation of Steve Calhoun can’t even get a girl pregnant right, was a common theme. We’d gone to court and asked that I be declared Abby’s legal father. Even though he’d never done a thing for Abby, because I wanted it, Steve contested it. A court ordered paternity test had quickly decided the matter and it was done.

After the matter was settled, he’d come after Ella for back child support. I was prepared to pay it, but he’d wanted ten-thousand dollars, instead of the $5,200 he’d actually paid, as damages for Ella accusing him of being the father when she knew he wasn’t. We’d gone back to court, and our lawyer had argued that the $5,200 that Steve had payed was little enough restitution for the harm he’d caused Ella, he’d signed the papers stating Abigail Michelle Johnson was his child, and Ella was on record at the time stating the sex was non-consensual. In a twist of irony, even though I was willing to refund the money, the judge ruled what Steve had already paid stood, though he was no longer required to pay additional support. Because he’d been an ass and Ella didn’t have to, I withdrew my offer to refund the money. I agreed with the judge: $5,200 wasn’t much considering the hell Ella had gone through.

But all that was behind us now. I had everything I wanted right here in my arms. I slowly ended the kiss and led her to our bedroom. We took our time undressing, our lips exploring each other’s bodies until we tumbled into bed. Ella was in my favorite kind of mood tonight, the kind of mood where our love-making was incendiary but loving at the same time. We rolled and tumbled, gasping in pleasure and effort as we gave and took pleasure in equal measures.

“Come on, baby,” I murmured into her ear as I pounded into her hard and fast, our flesh damp with our sweat as she clung to me.

“Don’t stop,” she gasped.

I forced myself up onto my hands, but she refused to let me go, her arms wrapped tight around me as I pulled her shoulders up from the bed. I loved it when she wrapped me up like this, holding me tight as we moved together as one.

I knew she was as close to her rapture as I was. I pushed against my rising tide of pleasure, trying to time my release with hers. I felt her clamp down on my manhood like a velvet vise as she squeaked softly in my ear and her body tensed.

Her orgasm was my undoing. I snarled softly as I splashed into her, unable to refrain my pleasure another moment. She released me and fell back to the bed, putting her hands against the headboard and pushed as she moaned, writhing slowly, her face a mask of pleasure. I shuddered out of my climax and slowly lowered myself over her, wanting to feel her flesh against mine and taking her lips for my own.

“I love you so much,” I whispered as our lips parted.

“I love you,” she whispered in return, her gentle smile touching and warming me deep inside.

We kissed and touched as we settled into our cuddle. My back was hurting from where her fingers had dug in. She’d finally stopped apologizing for hurting me in the throes of passion, apparently finally believing I gladly traded the occasional battle scars for the pleasure we gave each other.

My exhaustion returned. I’d been working my ass off with Dad, but the last field had been prepped and all it needed was planting. Starting Monday, I was shifting over to helping the Johnsons get their crop in. But tomorrow, I was taking day off. I had something else I had to do. I smiled as I closed my eyes, sleep slowly pulling its veil of slumber over me.

“Levi! You’re late!”

Ella’s voice penetrated the fog. “What time is it?” I mumbled. I wasn’t late, I’d intentionally turned the alarm off.

“Almost seven!”

“Good, we don’t have to get up yet,” I murmured as I pulled her back into my arms.

“Isn’t your dad waiting on you?”

“I finished with Dad yesterday,” I mumbled. “Tomorrow I start helping your dad, but today, you’re going to have to put up with me.”

She sighed as she settled back into my arms. “Oh no, what will I do?”

“Sleep,” I muttered.

We got another hour before the blonde cannonball landed in the bed with us. “I want breakfast!” Abby said, staring down into our faces.

“Later,” I said, my eyes still closed as a tiny smile tugged at my lips.

“Now!”

Ella and I groaned and stretched. “What do you want?”

“Eggs!”

“How about a frog sandwich instead?” I asked.

“Eggs!” she cried again, adding a bounce for emphasis.

“Worms?”

“Eggs!”

“I know,” I sighed. “How about baked porcupine? That’s your favorite. Then we can use his quills as a toothpick.”

“Dad!” she giggled, the sing-song in her voice making me smile. “Get up! I want eggs!”

“Okay, eggs it is. Go get dressed. I have to kiss your mother.”

Abby bailed out of the bed and ran down the hall to her room. We had about a minute before she’d be back. I made good use of the time.

“Good morning,” I whispered after kissing Ella thoroughly.

“Mmmm…” she purred. “I could get used to waking up like this,” she said, groaning as she stretched.

I was rock hard, but this morning was not for love. I didn’t mind, at least not much. We tumbled out of bed and threw on some clothes. It didn’t take long for Ella and me to whip up a breakfast of eggs and ham. Abby bathed at night, and I generally did as well, but I’d hadn’t taken one last night, at least as far as Ella knew. I grabbed a quick shower, and we were off.

It was a perfect Texas spring day. We dropped Abby at my parents so Ella and I could enjoy a little time to ourselves. It didn’t take her long to figure out where we were going, and we reminisced about our time there. She was still smiling as I turned the truck down the rutted path, returning to our secret place. I’d been afraid whoever owned the farm road would be working today and ruin my plans, but the field had already been planted. No one would disturb us.

“We haven’t been here in a long time,” Ella commented as we gently bounced along the road.

“I know. I thought it was time we came back.”

“I’m glad,” she said. “I have a lot of good memories of this place.”

I smiled. “So do I.”

We walked down to the water under the Cottonwoods. Everything was so green, new life abundant all around us. I turned her to me as I surrounded her with my arms and kissed her slowly. This was where the second part of my life began, the place we came to be alone as we fell in love, the place where Ella had made me a man. It was going to be the place where the third phase of my life began.

We’d dropped Abby at my parents because I was afraid Ella would know something was up if she saw her parents this morning. Last night, I’d showered at my parents’, changed into clean clothes, and stopped by the Johnsons. Ken and Helen had been surprised to see me, but that surprise paled to their surprise when I asked Ken for his permission to marry his daughter. It had been gladly given, and now I was going to find out if the woman of my dreams would take me as her husband.

I stepped back from the kiss and pulled the tiny black box from my jacket pocket. As I held it in my hand and opened the lid, Ella’s hand covered her mouth as she stared at first the ring, then my eyes, then back to the ring.

I removed the ring from the box, took her left hand, and carefully slipped the ring on. “Mary Ella Johnson…will you marry me?”

She didn’t actually say yes, but when she nodded, began to cry, and flung herself into my arms, I took that to mean she would. I smiled as I wrapped her in my arms and held her close, my future as bright as the Texas sun.