Page 44 of Mad About Her Cowboys

“River,” Madison rasped.

“Yeah?”

“Hug.” It was hard to say more than a word or two.

River bent over her and embraced her gently. “I’m so glad you’re okay. I love you.”

“Love, too.”

Then all at once her men were there along with her baby girl. They were together. They’d all be okay. It would all be okay.

“Thank God, you’re back. The doctors kept saying there was no reason you couldn’t make a full recovery. But the head trauma… Head trauma is still an unknown,” Connor said, his voice trembling with emotion. “But you’re awake now. You’re going to be okay.”

She nodded, tears filling her eyes at his barely contained emotion. “I love you,” she told him.

“I love you, too. So much!”

“Do you want to see our daughter?” Franklin asked.

“Yes.”

Connor helped to prop her a little, and Franklin brought the baby—Mandy—close to her, so she almost cradled the child in her own weak arms. “She’s beautiful,” Madison whispered.

“She looks just like her mama,” Franklin said. “I love you, darlin’. You did so good. Now you just need to get better, so we can have that happily ever after we promised each other.”

“I will. I want to go home, and be with my cowboys and our daughter.”

“I know,” Connor said, kissing her temple. “You’re just mad about cowboys.”

“No, I’m just mad about you.” And she knew she would be for the rest of their lives.

Epilogue

Eleven Months Later

Madison watched Franklin as Mandy held his fingers and took stumbling little steps, moving fast in her haste to get to the dog a short distance away. She knew a few things full well. Mandy would drop down and crawl if Franklin wasn’t holding on to her. Madison had never seen a baby crawl so fast.

She also knew Buster would take off before Mandy got to him. The collie loved the baby, but more from a distance when she was laughing the way she was. It usually signaled she was wanting to play rough, and their gentle canine wasn’t down for that. It was part of why Franklin was taming their daughter right now. He had proven to be a great dad, one-hundred percent all in. In fact, in the first days after her birth, while Madison was still hospitalized, he’d insisted on being the baby’s caregiver while Connor took care of her.

She looked up at Connor who stood beside her. He smiled, shaking his head as he watched their daughter. “They say girls are sugar and spice and everything nice, but I have a feeling our daughter is sugar and cayenne pepper with a dash of jalapeno—sweet with a bite.”

“She’s perfect.”

“She is,” he agreed. His hand cupped her slightly rounded belly. “This one will be, too.”

“With you and Franklin as dads? He’ll probably be a super-protective brother, even though he’s younger.”

“Barely younger. They’ll be close.”

“They will be.” As for the parents, they were still in a little bit of shock that they were expecting another baby so soon after Mandy. They’d been careful. Connor had always worn a condom to make sure. Then she’d turned up pregnant. Turned out, Franklin’s swimmers weren’t as absent as he’d been told.

And none of them were unhappy about it. It was another miracle for them. They were racking them up and keeping track.

“The next one will be yours,” she said.

“All of them are mine,” he growled.

Madison grinned. They were. Sometimes, she wondered if that bothered him, that biologically he wasn’t the dad. But by blood didn’t really matter. Family came in many forms. The Quist family proved that; so did their own smaller portion of it.

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