Always Love You

  Copyright © 2016 by Megan Smith Production LLC.

  All Rights Reserved.

  This book may not be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. All characters and storylines are the property of the author and your support and respect is appreciated. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  The following story contains mature themes, strong language and sexual situations. It is intended for adult readers.

  Cover Design: Sommer Stein, Perfect Pear Creative

  Photography: Big Stock Photo

  Editor and Formatter: Elaine York, Allusion Graphics, LLC/Publishing & Book Formatting

  Table of Contents

  Jaylinn

  Hunter

  Jaylinn

  Hunter

  Jaylinn

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Other Books by Megan Smith

  Always listen to your heart, because even though it’s on your left side, it’s always right.

  ~ Nicholas Sparks

  This is for you, Karin Lee, and all my other readers who never want the Love Series to end.

  Jaylinn

  “Jaylinn,” Hunter shouts followed by the front door slamming shut. I cringe hoping he doesn’t wake up Brooklyn with his big mouth. If she wakes up now I won’t get her back down for her morning nap and I’ll never get to take my shower.

  Standing at the top of the stairs with my hands on my hips I look down at my brother with an ‘are you kidding me right now’ look. “What?” I whisper yell. “I swear to God if you wake Brooklyn up you’re dealing with her moody little ass while I take my shower.”

  He chuckles while reaching into a box that he has hooked under his arm and holds up a book. “Found this at Mom’s.”

  My eyes narrow in on the book that I’ve seen before. I walk down the steps to examine it closer. It’s black with white lettering that’s been so rubbed off you can’t make out what it says anymore, the corners are worn and the cover is cracked along the spine. Whispering as I look down at this gem, “Mom’s diary.”

  “Yup.” Hunter looks away before meeting my eyes again. “There is a whole box of them. Think we should read them?”

  I take the book out of my brother’s hands, flip the cover open, and rub my pointer finger over my mom’s name. Walking into the living room, I set the worn diary down on the coffee table. I take a seat on the sofa staring at it while imagining my mom calling my name. Chills break out across my skin. “I don’t know.” I answer honestly. “Do you think we should?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I came here.” Hunter places the box of books he was holding on the table next to the diary then sits down next to me. “Elle said that we should if and when we’re ready. She knew that Mom was writing in it, she had to help her toward the end when it became difficult for her to write it herself.” He shrugs. “Mom’s life stories are on those pages.”

  I nod, keeping my eyes trained on the diary. My heart is hammering against my chest and I’m sure if Hunter listens close enough he could hear it, too. I miss Mom terribly. I’ve thought about her every minute of every day over these last few months. Almost every day since Brooklyn was born I’ve told her a story about her grandmother. Eventually, I’ll run out of things to tell her but now that we have her diaries I’ll have a few more things to tell her to keep her memory alive.

  My eyes slide over to my brother whose legs are bouncing up and down. He’s probably feeling the same way as me in this moment. “Hunter,” I say his name to get his attention. I wait until he’s looking me in the eyes. “Maybe, if you want, we can read the first entry.”

  Hunter clasps his hands out in front of him, leaning on his knees and nods. “Okay, as long as you want to.”

  I take a deep breath and reach for the worn black diary. I set it in my lap with shaking hands. “I’m scared,” I whisper. I don’t want to be sad any more than I am already but I miss her and I think by reading this… it might help dull the sadness or… it could hurt more than it already does.

  Hunter places one of his big hands over mine. “We don’t have to do this right now. These books are not going anywhere.”

  My eyes tear up but I swallow the emotions down. “I know, just a little, okay? We can stop if it hurts either of us.”

  Hunter moves his hand and settles back against the couch with his long arm resting against the back. I lean back, too, wanting, needing his protection just a little bit even if he doesn’t know that he’s offering it to me. I flip the diary open to the second page but not before running my fingers over her name once more. A folded note card is tucked inside. I flip it open…

  July 2, 2015

  When you find this I’ll be up in heaven with your grandparents looking down on you both, Hunter and Jaylinn. Helping and guiding you both along the way. Know that there isn’t going to be a day that passes that I’m not there with you guys in some way. You were my heart and soul, my reason for breathing, my reason for living the life I lived. With you both having children of your own you’ll understand the love a parent has for their children. It’s difficult to put into words but I know you’ll both understand. You are my children, after all.

  I love you my sweet, handsome, baby boy.

  I love you my gorgeous, strong, baby girl.

  This may be hard to read for the both of you but I think in some way it may help you understand things that happened along the way. If you can’t read it now, it’s okay, perfectly okay. You’ll read it when you’re ready. I made this one diary for you both over the last few years. You’ll find the more detailed diaries among the other books from the house but this one is for you both. I felt like I needed to explain things to you that I never got a chance to, which I never wanted to taint you both with until you were old enough to understand but then time got away from the three of us. This was difficult to relive but I hope now you’ll have a better understanding of why I did the things I did during my life. I hope by reading this it fills in some of the pieces that you may have questions about. I don’t regret a single decision in my entire life, please remember that. This isn’t meant to hurt either of you. It’s to help you heal, to allow you to understand. I did what I had to do as a mother.

  Always Love You,

  Mom

  The tears fall freely down my face, I don’t even bother to wipe them away. There is no use because they are just going to keep coming. She’s right, as always, this is going to be hard but in the end I think it’ll be worth it.

  Hunter sighs loudly, shaking his head. He stares in the opposite direction of the diary sitting in my lap so I can’t see his face. There aren’t many people in this world who can bring my brother to his knees but our mom was definitely one of them. “You read the first entry.” His voice comes out a little rough and scratchy.

  Taking a deep breath I flip to the next page.

  ***

  The day it all started.

  The car that my dad bought me for an early senior gift didn’t stop when I pushed down on the brakes as I was coming out of the driveway that first morning I drove it to school. I damn near hit someone who was driving down the street just as I was pulling out of the driveway. Someone up above must have been looking out for me because I thought for sure we were going to crash. All I remember was squeezing my eyes shut and bracing for impact but it never happened. When I peeked one eye open I was looking at the dirt embankment across from our house. After taking a few deep breaths I ran back into the house and told your grandpa what happened.
He wasn’t happy by any means that the car he just bought me had the brakes fail but he tossed me the keys to his truck and told me he’d have the car taken care of.

  Later that afternoon when I got home from school my mom was waiting for me in her car in the driveway. She explained that grandpa had my car towed to the garage down the road to have my brakes fixed and we had to go pick it up but we needed to go right now because she had to get back to work. Grandma explained on the way to the garage that the bill had been taken care of already and all that I needed to do was sign some of the paperwork.

  When I walked into the shop there was a girl I recognized from school sitting behind a desk with mountains of paperwork everywhere. I couldn’t remember her name at first but she seemed to recognize me since she called me by my name. Thankfully I didn’t have to worry about her name too long since she introduced herself as Rebecca. She explained that Jason, the tech, was going to take me to my car after I signed some papers for her.

  I hadn’t noticed anyone else in the room until she tossed my car keys behind me. I turned and my eyes locked with the brightest set of blue eyes that I had ever seen. I remember my heartrate picking up and it suddenly became extremely hot in that tiny little office. The corner of Jason’s lip lifted with a little dimple on his right cheek that peeked through as he nodded his head for me to follow him.

  ***

  My eyes shift toward Hunter to gauge his reaction. His face is screwed up in a disgusted look that probably matches my own. The both of us have Jason’s eye color while Mom has blue, too; although hers were a much darker blue.

  Hunter clears his throat after he notices I’ve stopped reading. “Let’s skip ahead.”

  Chuckling lightly at his reaction to our mom explaining when she first laid eyes on Jason I do as he asks and skim a few pages coming to stop on the next entry.

  ***

  Jason was absolutely the best boyfriend ever.

  Every day that first week he picked me up after dinner and took me out. We went to the lake, had gone fishing, laid under the stars talking for hours, and on Friday night he took me out to eat and even bought me and my mom flowers. He was making a lasting impression for sure. I had hoped things would have kept going that well for us because I needed someone to take me to my senior prom.

  ***

  Prom night!!!

  After I had asked Jason a few times he agreed to go to prom with me. He didn’t think it was appropriate for someone four years older than me to attend but he did it to make me happy. He always said as long as it made me smile he’d do anything for me. He was quite the charmer but he wasn’t charming my parents too much these days. They thought he was too old for me but they allowed our relationship as long as my grades in school didn’t start to slip and my curfew was met.

  I told my parents a little white lie for what Jason and I had planned after prom. They thought we were going down to the shore with a bunch of friends and would return home the next day. While we did go to the shore it was only the two of us. We got a hotel room that Jason had booked for us that overlooked the ocean. The view was beautiful but the night… was a little awkward.

  ***

  “Nope,” Hunter runs his hands down his jean clad legs. “If she’s about to tell us they had sex, skip it. I don’t want to hear it.”

  I glance down at the next few lines and I read them silently to myself until things started getting a little uncomfortable even for me. I’m sure Mom wouldn’t have gone into details but it was a little bit more than I’d like to know. I skip a few pages ahead until stopping on another entry.

  ***

  My parents and I headed out to our cabin in the Tennessee mountains for our yearly two-week vacation during the Fourth of July, just like we had been doing for years. The drive was long because we had to keep pulling over because I was throwing up. My parents thought I was trying to get out of going on vacation because Jason wasn’t able to get off of work for two weeks to come along with us. Truth be told I honestly wasn’t. I felt like someone had poisoned me or something since I couldn’t keep anything down—not the crackers Mom bought me at the first rest stop we stopped at and not even the water that Dad had in the cooler in the back. I took a nap as soon as we got to the cabin and finally started to feel a little better but when I woke up the next morning it was back. That continued for the whole two weeks, just not as bad as the drive to the cabin.

  ***

  I glance over to Hunter, who is shaking his head. “What’s the matter?”

  He lets out a deep breath, “Nothing. Keep going.”

  ***

  When we got back home the first thing Mom did was make me an appointment with the doctor to see what was going on because I was still not feeling well. I had a revolting feeling that I knew already but I was too scared to say anything to anyone. Jason was worried sick but I told him I would be fine and it was just a lingering bug.

  ***

  That lingering bug was going to be lingering for the next nine months.

  I was pregnant.

  ***

  I would have rather been anywhere but at my parents’ house when they found out. Things were pretty intense right after that. My parents pretty much stopped talking to me at that point. Jason had been missing in action for the first few days. He said he needed time to think. I remember barely leaving my room since the doctor’s office confirmed my pregnancy. This was not how I pictured my life. Eighteen and pregnant with no job or college education, a car that was barely running half the time, a boyfriend I was afraid was about to bolt, and I was going to be stuck living under my parents roof with a newborn.

  I had been crying myself to sleep every night. My mom would come in a few times to just lie with me and tell me things would work out and that we’d figure it out as time went on. This was the only time that she felt like my mom in those lonely days. When the dawn of light hit she’d be back to ignoring me, like my father. He was the one who I felt like I let down the most. It wasn’t like I planned that but it happened nonetheless. He wouldn’t look me in the eyes anymore. I missed that spark he used to hold only for me. In that moment I just felt all alone.

  Jason… I had no idea what was going on in his head. I thought he would have been a little more comforting but he all but shut me out. He left me with so many unanswered questions. Did he want this baby? Did he not want anything to do with it at all? I was so confused but one thing I was not confused about… was keeping the baby. It wasn’t planned but that wasn’t the baby’s fault and one way or another I’d figure it all out.

  I guess time would tell what happened…

  ***

  Hunter takes a deep breath. “I think we should stop for today.”

  I take the note that Mom left us and place it between the pages to hold our place. After closing the diary I place it on the coffee table then set back again. “That was…” I trail off not knowing the right word to use.

  “Yeah.”

  A cry starts from the monitor that is sitting on the mantel of the fireplace. “Damn it.” I mumble under my breath.

  “It’s alright. I’ll stay with Brooklyn while you take your shower.” Hunter digs into his pocket. “Just going to text CC and let her know what’s going on.”

  My daughter’s cry gets a little louder but I don’t get up just yet. “Are you okay?”

  Hunter’s fingers are flying across his phone. “What?”

  I place my hand over the screen so he stops and looks at me. “Are you okay?”

  He sighs and leans his head back against the couch. “Yeah, I guess.”

  I pause a few seconds waiting for him to continue because I know my brother. He’s just how not sure how to put into words what he’s thinking.

  “I hate that he stopped talking to her and made her guess how he was feeling. It shouldn’t have been like that. No real man would ever have the mother of his child second guessing a situation like that.”

  I nod. “I agree but at least Mom never once questioned her decisi
on about keeping you.” He should never have any doubts on Mom’s decision.

  Hunter nods in agreement just as Brooklyn starts wailing louder.

  “I’m going to run up there, change her and then I’ll bring her down. You sure you don’t mind staying for just a few minutes?”

  Hunter smiles “She’s my niece, of course I don’t mind staying.”

  “Okay, be right back.”

  Hunter

  After sending a quick text to CC that I’m staying at Jaylinn’s for a little while longer, she messages back that she would bring the kids and lunch over. My wife’s been a huge help since the loss of Mom. I’m not sure I’d be handling things as well as I have if it weren’t for her and the kids. Life is cruel with illnesses like cancer but having the support system I have makes things a little easier to cope with. I couldn’t imagine not having them when things started going downhill.

  I wander into the kitchen for something to drink when Jaylinn comes in holding Brooklyn in her arms. Her little eyes are red from crying but she seems content now in my sister’s arms. Jaylinn holds her out for me to take. I place her up against my chest and rest her head on my shoulder then pat her back softly offering her comfort.

  Jaylinn goes in the fridge and pours me a glass of iced tea that I didn’t get a chance to pour myself. “I’ll be quick in the shower.”

  “No rush. CC’s going to bring the kids and lunch over for us.”

  Jaylinn places the glass on the counter and cocks her hip up against the counter. “She doesn’t need to do that.”

  Jaylinn has this really annoying habit about her, always has. She’s too damn independent. She refuses to ask for help, she thinks she’s inconveniencing everyone. We’ve had a few minor fights about things like this in the past but she’ll never change. I try to just accept it for what it is these days, although it’s not easy.