Chapter Six - Rachel
CHAPTER SIX
Rachel
Two hours of hot chocolate, cartoons, and a bath pass before I finally got Lyla to calm down enough to put her to sleep. I had to stay with her for half an hour until she fell asleep before I could leave the room without sparking another panic attack.
All I want to do is curl up in my bed and let sleep take over, but I have a feeling Ryder didn’t quietly retreat to the pool house for the night.
My suspicion is confirmed when I reach the bottom of the staircase and find Ryder standing beside the table, arms folded over his chest with an oh yeah, we’re doing this, look on his face.
I sigh and go straight to the kitchen for a glass of wine. “Ryder, I’m exhausted. Can we do this tomorrow?”
“How many times has that happened?”
I’m tempted to brush him off and head to my room, but I know that’ll only make things worse. It’s best to get this over with as soon as possible.
“A few.”
“What’s a few?”
I shake my head. “Maybe four or five times. Never that bad, though. Usually, it only takes a few minutes to calm her down. I think she was extra sensitive after the appointment.”
“Right. The appointment that you hid from me.”
My legs ache, but as much as I’d like to take my glass of wine to the couch, I can’t. Ryder is fixed in a combative stance that I can’t help but match.
“I’m not hiding anything. I just don’t make a habit of telling you every time she sees a doctor.
If you want me to change that, I’ll be happy to.
” I set the glass down and count on my fingers.
“She sees the dentist in two weeks, she’s due for a check-up at her pediatrician’s office in three months, and—”
“That’s not what I mean, and you know it,” he bites out. “You knew I was coming into town. You could’ve told me you were going to see Dr. Danver, but you deliberately kept it a secret.”
“What do you expect? I’m doing things the same way I always have.”
“Things aren’t the same as they’ve always been,” he snaps. “And putting me in the pool house isn’t going to change that fact.”
I’d known he wasn’t going to like the sleeping arrangements, but it’s the way things need to be.
Was it cowardly to have Meredith deliver the news instead of doing it myself?
Probably. But I couldn’t risk falling prey to his smooth-talking as he convinces me that he should stay in the house.
I’m smart enough to know that I probably would’ve given in.
“Things are better this way.”
“Please,” he says, dramatically sweeping his arm as if to give me center stage. “Enlighten me on how me sleeping in the backyard is better for anyone.”
I don’t know if it’s his snide tone or my own exhaustion, but the voice in the back of my head—the one that usually pleads with me to remain calm—goes silent.
“Because the last thing Lyla needs is to get used to you being around,” I snap.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“It means that staying with us for your weekend visits is one thing, but moving in is another. It’s not fair for her to get attached to you living with us at a time when she’s so emotionally vulnerable.
Do you have any idea what that could do to her when you leave?
So yes, I have you living in the pool house, which is far nicer than what I wanted to do, which was make you get your own place.
The only reason I didn’t is that it would only make things worse for her to go between houses when she desperately needs stability.
You can get your feelings hurt all you want, but I’m going to do what’s best for my daughter. ”
Ryder’s eyes narrow to thin slits, and he takes a slow, daunting step toward me. There are dark clouds swirling in that ominous gaze, but I lift my chin, refusing to cower. He may intimidate the masses, but not me.
“Our daughter,” he whispers, and the edge in his tone is sharp enough to cut diamonds.
I don’t realize that I’ve taken a step back for every one of his forward until my back hits the granite counter.
So much for standing my ground.
One second, I’m watching the storm that spirals around him like an omen of death, and the next, I’m in the center of it.
Dark eyes pin me with unmovable force, daring me to push back when his chest presses firmly to mine.
It’s like being held down by a boulder, but his muscles are the only part of him that is even remotely rock-like.
Gone is the Ryder I compared to a marble statue because, right now, everything about him is so… alive.
His brow doesn’t set but furrows as he locks and unlocks his jaw with seemingly methodical movements—like he’s trying to calm himself down, but it isn’t working. Big, warm hands that I know all too well brace themselves on either side of me on the counter.
“Lyla is our daughter, not just yours,” he bites out in the alluring yet venomous tone that Moreno puts to good—or bad, depending on your moral code—use. “You don’t get to conveniently forget that fact.”
“Fine. Our daughter needs support right now, which means”—I shove his chest as hard as I can, and he concedes a step back—”we need ground rules.”
“Ground rules,” he repeats slowly, near mocking.
“Yes. Things aren’t the same as they were the last time we lived together.”
“And what exactly do you think ground rules will accomplish?”
“Keeping Lyla our sole priority. Neither of us needs to be distracted from that.”
He thinks about that for a moment, and since no snarky comment comes, I go on.
“First, you don’t get to order me around. This isn’t one of Moreno’s bases. It’s my home, and I will continue living my life the same way I did before.”
“Again, things aren’t the same as they were before. You can’t ignore the fact that I’m here.”
I resist the urge to tell him that I absolutely can ignore him and, in fact, plan on doing just that to survive however long this season of living together lasts.
“I’m not ignoring you, but I’m not flipping the world upside-down for you either.”
His eyes narrow in a look I can’t decipher. Whether it’s frustration, calculation, or some form of intimidation, I don’t know, but I am not a fan.
“Do I make you nervous?” he finally asks, voice dropping several notes and hitting the place inside me that quiets the white noise in my head.
The answer to his question is a resounding and embarrassing yes, but, of course, I can’t say that, so I take a long sip of my wine before setting it on the counter with a firm clink.
“I’m not nervous, Ryder. I’m just telling you how things are going to be.”
“You just defined my being a part of your life as flipping the world upside-down. Seems like the kind of thing that would make a person nervous.”
I take a deep breath and remind myself that twisting words is half of his job. “That’s how I described what it would be like if I did let you boss me around, which is exactly what I was saying I will not be doing. So, again, no. I am not nervous.”
He looks like he wants to engage in verbal sparring some more, and since I suspect I won’t be able to keep up, I go on before he can try anything.
“Next, you’ll keep anything and everything work-related out of the house and as far from Lyla as physically possible. She doesn’t need anything reminding her about that day.”
He doesn’t protest, and I’m glad we seem to agree on this, at the very least.
“And?” he prompts when I don’t immediately continue.
I eye the space between us warily, then steel my nerves.
“No touching.”
“No touching,” he repeats slowly, tone void of any emotion that could indicate how he feels about the prospect.
I nod, hoping I come off as nonchalant as he does.
Slowly, in the same taunting manner that Ryder seems to do everything, one side of his lip quirks upward. “You don’t have to worry about me touching you.”
Ryder takes a measured step toward me, not quite as close as he’d been trapping me against the counter, but close.
It’s far more tantalizing than if he were to press himself against me.
At least then, I’d have no choice but to face, breathe, and feel him.
With this sliver of space between us, I’m forced to maintain the minimal distance that taunts me to come closer.
And Ryder knows it.
“Because when I do, it’ll be because you asked for it, Rebel.”
That nickname. That damn nickname.
He hasn’t called me that in years, but I still have the same heart-melting, spine-shuddering, palm-sweating reaction I had the first time he said it to me.
Because, deep down, I know the only person who has ever made me feel the least bit rebellious is the man in front of me.
And that ended in a disaster that I barely recovered from.
“Well, it’s a good thing we don’t have to worry about that then,” I say in a brisk voice that I’m proud doesn’t reflect any of my conflicting emotions.
I step past Ryder, careful not to make any contact as I move toward my bedroom, clearly indicating my desire to end this conversation.
“Plenty of people co-parent,” I say. “I’m sure we can, too.”
“And that’s what we are? Co-parents?”
“It’s all we can be, Ryder.”
“There was a time when we were friends,” he reminds me and moves toward the back door.
“That didn’t work out either.”
He huffs a laugh, and his small smile hints that he’s remembering just how friendly we’d been. “Co-parents.”
“Co-parents,” I confirm as he reaches the door.
“Guess we’ll see how this one ends,” is all I hear him mutter before the back door closes behind him and the lock clicks into place.
That sound opens the floodgates, and the anxiety that I’ve been barely keeping at bay over the last two weeks has me wringing my hands and popping my knuckles. I clutch the chunky, half-smooth, half-studded heart-shaped charm on my necklace as if it’s a lifeline.
I take one step toward my bedroom before changing my mind, going back into the kitchen to refill my wine glass, then ascending the stairs.
I reach Lyla’s room and peek my head in to see my sleeping daughter curled up next to her pink stuffed tiger with a matching pink bonnet over her hair.
I close the door as softly as I can manage so I don’t wake her, then go to the room across the hall.
The office.
The door shuts behind me, and I lock it for my own peace of mind before sitting in the rolling chair, ready to dive into the only vice that’s really been able to ease my anxiety since we got home from Los Angeles.
Then I send up a prayer that Ryder never finds out because if he does, he might actually kill me.