Chapter 23
Miranda agreed to let Garrett keep Owen overnight on Saturday because she wanted a full morning to prepare for Nolan’s board presentation.
She told herself the decision was practical, but when Garrett arrived at Claire’s carrying the diaper bag and a second tote packed with bottles, sleepers, the fox, and Owen’s white-noise machine, practicality did not make handing over the baby easier.
Garrett seemed to understand that without making her comfort him through it. He took Owen only after Miranda loosened the carrier straps, listened while she explained the evening feeding, and did not interrupt to prove he already knew.
“I’ll send one message after he goes down and one in the morning,” he said. “If he gets distressed, I’ll call before either of us is too tired to make a sensible decision.”
Miranda looked into the open tote. The bottles were labeled, the formula portions measured, and two clean pacifiers sat inside a small plastic case she had never seen before.
“You bought a pacifier case.”
“I found one under the couch covered in lint last week.” Garrett adjusted Owen against his chest and added, “I decided that was not a system.”
Claire, standing behind Miranda with her arms folded, made a small sound that might have been approval. Garrett did not look toward her for credit.
He left at three, and Miranda spent the first hour walking through Claire’s house as though she had misplaced something important. She opened her laptop, reviewed two slides, then checked her phone despite knowing Garrett had promised not to send an update until bedtime.
Claire watched her from the kitchen. “You gave him the baby for one night, not custody of the Mona Lisa.”
“I know.”
“You are still allowed to miss him.”
“I know that too.”
Miranda worked until six. When Garrett’s message arrived shortly after seven, it contained one photograph of Owen asleep against his shoulder and a simple report.
He fought the bottle, accepted it after I changed the nipple, and fell asleep during the second walk upstairs. No fever. I’ll call if anything changes.
Miranda enlarged the picture despite herself. Garrett’s face was only partly visible, tired and unshaven, his chin resting against Owen’s hair.
She slept badly anyway.
At two in the morning, her phone rang.
Garrett did not begin with an apology. “He has been crying for twenty minutes. Clean diaper, no fever, no tight clothing, and his stomach is soft. He took two ounces and refused the rest.”
Miranda sat up, already reaching for the lamp. “Take him into our bedroom.”
There was a pause on the line. “All right.”
“The chair by the window. Put the fox against your chest and bounce your knee instead of standing.”
She heard Garrett moving through the house, Owen crying sharply in the background. The sound tightened every muscle in Miranda’s body, but she stayed on the phone while Garrett followed her instructions.
Within minutes, the cries weakened into broken complaints.
“He’s calming down,” Garrett whispered.
“Wait before you offer the bottle again.”
“I will.”
Miranda remained on the line until Owen drank another three ounces and fell asleep. Garrett did not fill the silence with gratitude or tell her how hard the night had been for him.
Before they ended the call, he said, “I understand why you told me to call before I became stubborn.”
Miranda closed her eyes. “Goodnight, Garrett.”
“Goodnight.”
When he brought Owen back Sunday morning, he looked exhausted enough that Claire’s expression softened before she could stop it. Garrett carried the baby inside, handed Miranda a folded page showing feeds and sleep, then placed the bags by the door.
“He woke twice,” he said. “The second time went better.”
Miranda took Owen and pressed her face into his hair. He smelled like home, formula, and Garrett’s soap.
“Thank you for calling instead of trying to prove something.”
Garrett looked at her. “I have spent enough time proving the wrong things.”
He left without asking to stay.
Three evenings later, Garrett arrived for his scheduled time with Owen wearing a dark coat and carrying nothing except the diaper bag.
He played with the baby on Claire’s living-room floor for more than an hour, fed him, changed him, and settled him into the portable crib without asking Miranda to supervise.
When he came downstairs, Claire collected her laptop and announced that she needed to buy coffee before the store closed. Miranda knew the excuse was transparent, but Garrett had not arranged it. The surprise on his face when Claire left made that clear.
He stood beside the sofa with both hands in his coat pockets. “Can we talk?”
Miranda closed the client document on her laptop. “About Owen?”
“No.”
The directness tightened something in her stomach.
Garrett sat in the chair across from her. He did not take out tickets, a hotel confirmation, or any object designed to make refusal more difficult.
“I want to take you to Paris,” he said.
Miranda stared at him.
The sentence was astonishing and so disproportionate to the room that it seemed to remain suspended between them. Garrett did not rush to fill the silence.
“For what?” she asked.
“To try to win you back.”
The answer came without apology for wanting it.
Miranda leaned against the sofa. “You think a weekend in Paris fixes this.”
“No.” Garrett’s voice remained steady. “I think treating the trip like a cure would prove I still do not understand what I did.”
“Then why Paris?”
“Because I saw something beautiful and extravagant and thought of Willa before I thought of you.” His mouth tightened around the admission, but he did not look away.
“Then I told you the thought meant nothing because admitting what it meant would have required me to see how completely I had stopped choosing you.”
The old hurt moved through Miranda with enough precision that she could have placed a hand over it.
Garrett continued. “I want to take you somewhere beautiful and spend the entire time choosing you deliberately. Not choosing what I think you should want, not choosing what makes me look generous, and not arranging a grand surprise that leaves you responsible for the baby, the schedule, and every practical detail.”
“You have not arranged anything.”
“No.”
The answer surprised her.
“I researched the train times, the hotel, and the YSL flagship,” he said. “I have not booked any of it because asking Claire about childcare before asking you would turn her into my accomplice and make the gesture something happening around you.”
Miranda held his gaze.
“If you say yes,” he continued, “we choose the dates together. Then I arrange childcare directly with Claire after you approve it. I pack Owen’s things, confirm bottles and sleeping arrangements, book refundable tickets, and handle every reservation. You do not have to manage the gesture for me.”
“And if I say no?”
“I keep trying to win you back in ways you might actually want.”
There was no sulk beneath the answer and no plea for credit because he had considered the possibility.
Miranda looked toward the portable crib. The monitor rested on the table beside them, its green light steady.
“What happens at YSL?” she asked.
“You choose whatever you want, including nothing if that’s the case.”
“I already bought what I wanted.”
“I know.”
“Then why take me there?”
Garrett leaned forward, forearms against his knees. “Because the basket was never really about the products. It was about the fact that desire had stopped belonging to you in my mind.”
Miranda went still.
“You were the person who needed practical things,” he continued. “Diapers. Groceries. Sleep. Time to shower. Willa was the person I associated with beauty, indulgence, and being seen as a woman. That did not happen because motherhood changed you. It happened because I stopped looking.”
His voice roughened, but he kept speaking.
“I want to stand beside you in that store and ask what you like now. Not what you used to wear before Owen, not what seems useful, and not what I can afford to present as proof that I am sorry. I want to see you choose something because you want it and not make the wanting answer to me.”
The explanation reached beneath the basket to the part Miranda had struggled to name even to herself.
“You cannot buy back the woman I was before this,” she said.
“I do not want her back.”
Miranda’s eyes narrowed.
Garrett’s face changed immediately, but he did not retreat from the words. “I mean I do not want the version of you who made everything easy for me because she believed love required it.”
The room seemed smaller around them.
“I want the woman who left,” he said. “The woman who stopped accepting my version of events because mine was more convenient. The woman building work that belongs to her and deciding whether I deserve any place beside it.”
Miranda looked down at her hands.
Garrett did not reach for them.
“I want my wife back,” he continued. “I want our home, Owen down the hall, and you beside me. I am not going to pretend I only want to become worthy in some abstract way because saying that sounds respectful.”
The need in his voice was unmistakable. It did not make her responsible for soothing it, but it refused to hide.
“I want you,” he said. “I am going to court you. I am going to ask you to dinner, plan the childcare after you agree, remember the dates, make the reservations, and accept no without punishing you for it. I am going to show you that wanting you is not the same as wanting the work you did for me.”
Miranda’s eyes burned.
“You should have wanted me like this before.”
Garrett’s face folded for one brief second. “I should have. I was lazy with the wanting because I thought having you meant I could stop earning you.”
The sentence landed harder than the polished parts of the speech.
He sat back and allowed the silence to remain. He had asked, and now the answer belonged entirely to her.
“How long?” Miranda asked.
“One night if that is all you can stand.” A faint, painful smile touched his mouth. “Two if you decide you want more time after we are there.”
“Separate beds.”
“A suite with a sofa bed.”
“You checked.”
“I researched. I did not book.”
Miranda studied him. “And Claire?”
“I ask her after you say yes. I explain everything, arrange the schedule, and accept whatever conditions she sets.”
“You know she will set many.”
“I deserve most of them.”
Despite herself, Miranda smiled.
Garrett saw it and did not seize upon it as evidence that the marriage was saved.
“What if Owen needs us?” she asked, her voice low, the words catching on the dry air between them.
“We come home immediately.” Garrett’s hands rested on his knees, palms up and open, as if waiting to receive whatever came next.
“And what if I spend the whole trip angry?”
He did not flinch. “I spend the whole trip with you angry.”
The answer was simple enough to be true. Miranda looked toward the monitor again, its small green light pulsing softly in the dim room. On the screen, Owen shifted in the crib, one small hand curling into a fist before relaxing back into sleep.
“I will go,” she said.
Garrett closed his eyes. Only for a moment—a brief, private surrender. When he opened them, relief moved through his face without becoming triumph, softening the lines around his mouth but leaving his gaze sober.
“Thank you.”
“This is not forgiveness.” Her tone was flat, factual.
“I know.”
“It is not reconciliation.”
“I know that too.”
She watched his throat work as he swallowed. “You are carrying all the bags.”
“Yes.” The word was quiet, solid, but he smiled slightly. He did not look away from her.
Miranda’s smile returned before she could stop it. This time, Garrett smiled wider, but the expression held more grief than celebration.
As she rose, he stood with her but did not move closer.
“I am going to win you back,” he said.
Miranda looked at him across the quiet room.
There was no arrogance in the promise. Only determination stripped of the assumption that love made the outcome his.
“You can try,” she said.