Declan just stared at her for the longest year of her life. Maybe it wasn’t actually a year, but it might as well have been. The agitation inside of her grew and grew. “Dec—” she exclaimed just as he said, “Well.”

They both stopped.

“Let me go first,” he said, before she could figure out where she was going with her outburst. She really hadn’t gotten much past “Declan” in her mind anyway. She nodded regally, pretending as if she were bestowing a great gift upon him.

“You and your cat King,” he muttered.

“What?” Her gaze shot over to the hallway that led down to her bedroom, where Milk and Oreo had disappeared.

“Nothing. Listen, I’ll admit it – I hadn’t thought about that. I should have. It’s pretty obvious in retrospect. I’m still wrapping my head around your injuries and what they mean, long-term.”

“Which is exactly my p—”

He cut her off with an exasperated, “Iris!”

She shut up.

She should probably let the man talk.

Even if it killed her in the process.

“Now, you’ve not wanted to talk a lot about your accident and injuries and I get that, but if we’re gonna have a long-term discussion, I need to know certain things.”

“Fair.”

“First question first: Is your balance gonna be off for life? Or are you gonna get better? And how did your little helicopter ride affect things?”

She laughed at that one, and then sobered up quickly. “The original prognosis was that my balance would get better over time, as my brain re-learned to process information in a way that worked even with the damaged brain tissue in there. However, as you’ve already guessed, my little stunt outside didn’t help matters. It was never a sure thing that I’d get my balance back completely, and it’s even less certain now. As any brain surgeon will tell you, the brain is basically one big mystery, and the more they learn, the more they realize all that they still don’t know. So it’s pretty much one big crapshoot.”

He nodded slowly, contemplatively. “Fair enough,” he allowed. “So riddle me this, Iris McLain, is there any reason why we couldn’t have a live-in nanny, who helped you take care of ten cryin’ babies?”

She let out a short laugh and he grinned back.

“Well,” she said thoughtfully, thinking through the suggestion, “first off, I think finding a live-in nanny who’d be willing to sign up for such an adventure would be plenty tough. Second, you seem to think that I can pop out ten babies all at once. Unless we’re some sort of medical miracle in the worst sort of way, the chances are real high that the oldest baby would at least be ten years old by the time we’re pushing out another newborn baby, preferably older than that if you wanted me to stay even slightly sane in the process.”

“I will allow that my ten-baby comment was me joking with my brother.” Oh thank God. “The question still stands though – is there any reason you can’t have one kid, if we also had a live-in nanny?”

She thought on that for a long moment. “Noooooo…” she finally said. “The doctors told me that I wouldn’t have any problems conceiving or giving birth, as long as I didn’t try to do something athletic on top of it, like run a triathlon. Truthfully, I think I should probably stay away from triathlons no matter what.”

“There goes our plans for next week,” Declan teased. She laughed. He grinned and squeezed her hand.

She quickly sobered up. “A live-in nanny could be real expensive, though,” she worried. “I have a lot of medical bills from the accident that I’m still paying off. How would—”

“There you go again, making assumptions,” he teased. She shut up. “Truthfully, I’ve done real good for myself as a farmer. Potato and corn prices have been holding steady for a while, and I’ve stocked away cash. I had half-baked ideas about—well, that doesn’t matter anymore. The bottomline is, I live pretty frugally. The mortgage is just about paid off on the house. I don’t need much. If I had to pay for a live-in nanny, well, I’d just put less into the retirement fund, is all.”

She was quite curious to hear more about his “half-baked ideas,” but decided to leave that topic alone for the moment. She’d press him hard later on. Knowing Dec like she did, she refused to believe that he’d ever had a half-baked idea in his whole life.

Except maybe unleashing the plague of frogs down upon Mrs. Westingsmith’s head. That stunt wasn’t particularly well thought-out.

“I didn’t realize you’d done so well for yourself,” she said softly.

He shrugged, looking embarrassed. “It’s not somethin’ you go around bragging about to every Tom, Dick, and Harry.”

If she had to guess, she’d say he’d bragged to exactly no one whatsoever, but that wasn’t shocking. Declan tended to take a body by surprise; it was easy to underestimate him because of how quiet and completely non-boastful he was. Stupid hick farmer he was not.

She drew in a deep breath. It was time for her to confess her final failing. “Declan, I hate medical coding.”

“You do?” he said, surprised. Or maybe he was just surprised by the topic change. It was hard to tell.

“Yes. With a passion. I’ve gone to the eye doctor twice now, and he’s told me that either I give it up, or expect to go blind in the next year.”

“Blind?!” he yelped. “Medical coding will make you blind?”

Huh. Maybe that statement could use a bit more explanation, on second thought.

“The accident. It threw off my balance, of course, and has made me weak as a baby when it comes to walking or standing for any significant amount of time, but my eyes…screens are the devil. It’s gotten to the point where every screen is slightly doubled, even my cell phone. If I make myself look at a screen for too long, it eventually makes me nauseous and I have to stop so I can puke.”

“Oh. My. God. Iris Blue McLain, how long has this been going on?” Declan practically hollered at her.

Did holler at her.

She shrunk down in her seat. “A little while,” she said in a soft voice.

He glared at her.

“A little lot while,” she clarified.

He glared at her.

“Since the beginning,” she mumbled.

He sank back into the couch, covering his eyes with his hands and mumbling something about “mule-headed women” but she decided to ignore that bit of commentary.

“I thought it’d get better,” she said weakly.

“Is that what Dr. Mor told you when you went to him?” Declan asked pointedly.

Shit.

“Not exactly.”

“So what exactly did he say? Other than you’re working yourself into a state of blindness?”

Suddenly, the sleeve of her sweater was the most fascinating thing she’d ever laid eyes on. She began picking at the small loose fibers.

All right, she was avoiding looking at Declan.

He put his hand under her chin and lifted it up to look at him. She sighed.

“That this may or may not be a permanent state of being. That if I continue to push it, that I may go blind. That if I don’t continue to push it, I may go blind. Basically, the same thing that the brain doctors all say – no one knows. The brain is a mysterious thing.”

She snorted. If she heard that line one more time from a medical professional, she might be tempted to slug ‘em. She’d been an RN for 13 years. They didn’t need to tell her what she already knew – no one knew a damn thing.

Sure, there were more parts that they were less confused about than before, but that was about it. The brain was a giant black hole.

Which, for someone with a brain injury, was not a reassuring reality.

“Okay, Iris Blue McLain, then riddle me this one instead: What if you forgot about, just for a moment, your medical bills and money in general. What would you do instead?”

“Make canes,” she blurted out, before her brain really even realized what she was saying. She clapped her hand over her mouth and sat staring at him, dumbfounded.

Make canes? Where did that come from?

But it was what she wanted. In the depths of her heart, when she was being completely unrealistic and bull-headed about the future, she’d lay in bed and dream. Since she’d started making her own canes, she was getting stopped in the store and on the street, people complimenting her on how beautiful and unusual they were. She loved having something unique and completely her.

Rather than having her cane define who she was in a negative way, it’d become a badge of honor. A sign that she could still do something; was still worth something.

Canes were her independence and talents shining through to the world.

“Well now, Miss McLain, I swear you surprise me every day I am with you,” Declan said with an easy grin. “Canes…it should’ve occurred to me, but sadly, I’ll admit that it did not. Have you done research on selling them? When and where and for how much?”

“No. I never let myself get that far…it’s just a silly daydream. I do have bills, and selling handmade canes isn’t going to do it for me.”

“I don’t think that working yourself into a state of blindness is going to do it for you either,” he said pointedly.

Dammit. He’s right. I hate it when he’s right…

“Have you talked to Dr. Mor about filing for disability?” Declan asked softly.

“I don’t want to be on disability!” she shot back. And she didn’t. She’d rather…well, do something real drastic that she’d think of later, than be on disability.

“Have you ever considered the fact that if you go on to disability now, it may be a temporary state of affairs, until your balance and your vision gets better, and you can work without making yourself sick? But if you continue to push yourself and you go blind, you will be on disability for life?”

Damn him to hell and back. She hated it when people thought of blindingly obvious things that she’d never considered.

No pun intended.

“No,” she whispered, dropping her eyes to her lap, fiddling her thumbs together, avoiding his gaze.

“Iris, darlin’, it isn’t a crime to need help every once in a while, truly it isn’t. You’ve spent your whole life helping other people. Helping me with Spanish. Helping defend your sister against those two hooligans in high school. Helping patients at the hospital in Pocatello. You’ve done nothing but help other people from the word ‘go.’ You have to start letting other people help you. It’s not a character defect to need help in return for all you’ve done for this world.”

She nodded, shutting her eyes tightly. She needed a moment to make herself accept what he’d said as a fundamental truth, even if it went against every bone in her body.

He pulled her to him, and stroked her back softly. “I’m so happy you’re home,” he whispered, and then he was scooping her up into his arms and she was snuggling against his broad chest as he carried her to her bedroom and laid her down on the bed, pulling her against him and drifting off to sleep together.

* * *

His hands were following the curve of her hip as he woke up, need pushing him to explore her body, even in his sleep.

He gently rolled her over onto her back, and began nibbling his way up her side, whispering to her as he went. The shadows in the room kept it private and safe, a place he could do and say what he wanted without any fear.

She murmured, moving her legs restlessly against the sheets, and he wondered if she was awake, or in a dream state. He hoped that if she were dreaming, they were very good dreams.

“I love you,” he whispered into the stillness, running his tongue over her adorable outie belly button. “I love you so much, Iris.”

“I love you, too,” she whispered back. 

His heart stopped. She was awake. And she’d heard him. And she loved him, too.

What a glorious feeling that was.

He pulled himself up so he was hovering over her lips. “You heard me,” he whispered. “I thought you were still asleep.”

“Would you have said those words if you thought I was awake?” she whispered back, laughter in her voice. 

“Probably.” Not. He was a wimp when it came to that kind of thing. He’d put in an 18-hour day on a tractor without blinking an eyelash, but telling a woman he loved her?

Even a woman as amazing as Iris? Even as many times as he’d said it before – years before?

Yeah, it was scary.

But she’d said she loved him back, which had to be some sort of miracle. Now all he had to do was never, ever let her know just how broken he was.

She may love him, but only because she thought he was whole. A real man didn’t have unforgivable flaws.

A real man wasn’t dyslexic.

He kissed her again, running his tongue over her lips before she let him in with a sigh of happiness. “I guess it’s time I showed you just how much I love you,” he whispered, once he pulled back.

And then he did.