“You’re so good with him. Sometimes I still feel like he’s a stranger. The other night he cuddled up to me while I was reading him a story, and it took me a minute to fully understand that this was my life. But that maternal connection people talk about? It’s real.” She glanced at the fort and heard him laugh. “I didn’t recognize him, but my heart knew exactly who he was.”

“What about Jax?”

Gretchen smiled in spite of her sadness. “My heart knows her, too. Without a doubt.”

“Do you love her?”

“With everything I am.”

“Do you think you ever stopped?”

Gretchen struggled to imagine a life where she’d stop loving Jax. She just couldn’t. “No. As sure as I was that Caleb was my son, I am sure I never stopped loving her.”

“Maybe this can be your second chance. She may not have forgotten the past four years, but maybe she has forgotten all the good that came before. You can remind her.”

As wonderful and hopeful as that sounded, she couldn’t believe in such a beautiful possibility. “Have you seen the way she acts when we’re in the same room? She hates me. I left her to feel like she was raising our son alone. I was not a good person, and I can’t really blame her for wanting a divorce.”

Amanda hummed. “I think if you both had a conversation, maybe there would be a chance. Tell her how you feel and let her talk.”

“We could, but I don’t know if she’d be up for it.”

“That last part is the most important. Did you hear it? You have to let Jax talk. Hear her out.”

“Was I really the monster she said I was?”

Amanda was quiet for several minutes. The television sounded loud. “You worked a lot. I knew you two fought a lot, almost every time I came over, which honestly wasn’t often. Jax didn’t invite me, and you were—”

“Busy with work. I love my job, I do, but I just can’t understand loving it more than my family. They’re my whole world.”

“You need to make sure Jax knows that.”

“I don’t think I’d be able to handle it if she said no to us trying again. You can’t force yourself to fall back in love with someone.”

“You can’t,” Amanda said, shocking Gretchen with the easy agreement. “But I don’t think she ever stopped loving you.”

“You don’t see the way she looks at me.”

“And you don’t see the way she looks at you. I was there, Gretchen—I watched her sit at your bedside every day. I saw the haunted look in her eyes when we thought we were going to lose you. Splitting up hurt her, but this nearly destroyed her.”