Chapter 12
twelve
CAL
“She spent over six thousand dollars at some stupid kids’ store and now she’s not answering her fucking phone!”
Mav laughs from his spot in the passenger seat of my car.
“This isn’t funny!”
“I disagree. You’ve been ignoring her for weeks and being a miserable bastard because of it. She should’ve spent more.” He keeps laughing.
“I’m glad my life is so amusing to you,” I grumble as I white knuckle steering wheel.
“Me too.”
I roll my tinted window down enough for the guard at the gate to see my face as we approach.
“Hey Cal. Harlow just flew through here. She looked really shaken up,” the guard, Dean, says once he sees me. He’s already opened the gate.
“Thanks, Dean!” I yell, already pulling through and speeding towards my house.
Harlow’s car comes into view, parked sideways in the driveway like she flew in at an angle and ran out. I throw my car in park in the middle of my lawn and jump out, running towards my front door. I don’t even bother turning the car off.
“Harlow!” I call the moment I cross the threshold. “Cora!”
“Here! We’re here!” Harlow’s voice is strained as she comes rushing into the living room. She has Cora clutched to her chest. I run to them, anxiously checking them over, trying to figure out that terrified look in her eyes.
“What’s going on? What happened? Why wouldn’t you answer me?” I ask more harshly than I meant to, but she’s freaking me out.
“I-I-I’m sorry about the money,” she stutters out around the fat tears falling down her beautiful face.
“I don’t give a fuck about the money, Harlow. Why are you so scared?” I ask, more gently. I want to take Cora from her, just to assure myself she’s ok. But Harlow seems to need her more than I do right now, and Cora is asleep against her chest.
“Someone knows,” she cries. Then proceeds to tell me about some man that cornered her in a parking lot.
All I see is red. Rage that someone would do that to her and rage that Cora was even there at all.
“You threw a hissy fit and put my daughter in danger! What the fuck were you thinking? What is wrong with you?” I scream at her. I can’t contain it.
Harlow flinches back like I hit her, and Cora wakes up with a loud cry.
“I understand you’re upset, Callahan, but if you ever speak to my daughter like that again, it will be the last thing you do.”
I turn to see a furious Harrison Ray standing behind me with a disappointed Maverick.
“She put my daughter in danger!” I argue.
“My daughter was in danger! My daughter! She took your daughter to a store to get clothes. A very public store. Do not take this out on her!” The anger in his voice has me wanting to cower. Physically, I stand my ground, but mentally, I’m already trying to figure out how to apologize to Harlow.
“It was my fault, Dad,” Harlow says meekly, and that tone alone is what breaks me. Harlow is anything but meek. I put that sound there, and I hate myself for it.
“I have the security footage. Everyone sit down so we can watch it and you,” he says, looking directly at me, “you can find a way to beg for Harlow’s forgiveness.”
We all sit dutifully on the couch, Harlow choosing to sit on the opposite side of me, Cora still cuddled against her. Mav sits beside me, shaking his head.
Harrison pairs his phone to the TV and plays the footage. I watch as this man scares Harlow. I can see, even in the grainy picture, how scared she is. I watch as she puts herself between him and the door Cora is directly behind.
Harlow put herself directly between danger and Cora. I cover my mouth, but I can’t help the sob that escapes.
“Firecracker,” I say, looking over the woman I so poorly judged just minutes ago. She keeps her focus on the screen, and I can see the determination there.
Mav goes rigid next to me, causing my attention to swing back to the screen.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“You know who that is?” Harlow asks.
“It’s my fucking dad,” Maverick answers, standing abruptly and pacing the room.
“Why would your dad be in the parking lot of a mall? In Massachusetts? He’s a Maine Senator.” Harlow asks.
“He keeps sending me emails asking if I’m done with my ‘little rebellion’ as he puts it,” Mav answers, running his hands through his hair. “He keeps saying I need to join the family business. He wants me in law school and in some political position. I’m an embarrassment to him as I am now.”
“You’re leaving out the part where he wants to arrange your marriage to one of his political allies’ daughters,” I add.
Mav snorts. “Yeah. There’s that too.”
“So you’re not falling in line, so he went after me?” Harlow asks, trying to put together the pieces of a puzzle that I’m pretty sure aren’t even from the same puzzle. “Wait,” she says suddenly. “He said something about how even a small scandal ends careers. He’s going to use Cora to try to bring negative attention to the band.”
“Seems likely,” Harrison says.
“What if he has something to do with Ezra and he’s going to use Cora as a threat?” I ask, panicking and mentally making plans to move to another country and change our names. I will not let my daughter get caught up in this.
“I don’t think that would make sense for him. He was threatening me out in the open, seemingly uncaring if anyone caught him,” Harlow says, and Harrison nods. “If it was connected to Ezra, and we could connect the dots to him, that would end his career that he seems to love so much.”
“I don’t think this is related to Ezra, even if he is involved there. He wants me back in his orbit. And if it means protecting Cora, I’ll go,” Mav says, and I see the determination on his face. He’ll give up everything and go back to the toxic family.
“No, Mav. We’ll figure something out,” I tell him immediately.
“I have an idea, but you might not like it,” Harlow says, looking at me, and I see the spark back in her eyes.
“Lay it on me, Firecracker.”
“You get out in front of it. Put out a press release telling the world about Cora.”
I feel my body tense, but she puts her hand up before I say anything.
“I know it’s not what you want. But plenty of celebrities have announced their surprise children and the news dies down within weeks. I can’t even tell you what famous people have kids and which ones don’t.”
“I don’t want Cora to have to deal with a public life,” I tell her, even though she knows that.
“She won’t. You don’t need to release any pictures or even her name. Just tell the world you have a child, probably have your PR team put a better statement together than I could, and let it fizzle out. It takes away Wolfe’s one piece of leverage.”
“No. I won’t let you do that,” Mav says, making his way to the door, like he’s planning on leaving for his parent’s house right this minute. Knowing him, he probably is.
“I’m doing it, Mav. It makes sense. He won’t stop at using her to get you back. He hates all of us. If he even smells you thinking about leaving him again, he’ll threaten her. Harlow is right, Mav. We need to get ahead of this.”
Mav nods, realizing I’m right, that Harlow is right. He makes his way over to her and puts his arms out for Cora. Harlow smiles sadly and hands her over. Cora immediately snuggles into him and continues to sleep. “I’m so sorry,” he whispers into her hair.
“Don’t blame yourself for the evil of another, Maverick. You didn’t do this, and nothing is going to happen to Cora. If anything, she’s just going to have to go to an expensive school with other rich kids to have the added security. Which Cal was probably going to send her to anyway,” Harlow says.
I laugh, and that seems to ease some of the tension in Mav’s shoulders.
“What the fuck is going on? Why is everyone parked like a bunch of drunks?” Willa yells, coming in to join the party with Kai, Belle, and Jo right behind her.
“We need you to get a press release together,” I tell Jo.
Harlow fills them in, with Harrison adding how quickly she called him to get the footage, making sure whoever threatened my daughter wouldn’t get away.
I look at the woman who willingly put her body between my daughter and a threat and wonder how the fuck I can make it up to her.
“Can we talk?” I ask Harlow. Everyone went home hours ago, and she’s sitting alone on the couch watching an old 90s movie I’ve seen Belle and my cousin Millie watch. Her legs are curled underneath her, and she’s snuggled into a knit blanket that’s up to her chin.
She pats the seat next to her, not taking her eyes off the screen.
“I’m so fucking sorry for the way I reacted today, Harlow. I should never have jumped to conclusions. Not about you. I know you would never put Cora in harm’s way.”
“Are you sure that you know that? You seemed pretty sure that I would.” The hurt in her voice is so obvious that it breaks my heart.
“The thought of something happening to Cora has been my biggest fear since she was born. It felt like my fear came to life, and I handled it with anger. I know I was wrong.”
She just nods, still refusing to look at me.
“Look at me, Firecracker. Please.”
She turns her head, and her broken eyes meet mine. “I’m sorry I spent so much money.”
“I really don’t care about that,” I tell her. “But why did you?”
“I just wanted you to talk to me,” she admits. “I figured if I made you mad, even if you were only speaking to me because I pissed you off, at least you were speaking to me.”
If I wasn’t sitting already, I would have collapsed to the floor.
“What? I thought that’s what you wanted?” I know I’ve been more distant than I needed to be, but I didn’t think I could stay away from her if I wasn’t.
“I wanted to keep things professional, not turn into your enemy.”
“You’re not my enemy, Firecracker. You’re the woman who was about to throw down your life for my daughter.”
“That’s a bit dramatic,” she scoffs.
“If that man raised a gun and told you he would shoot you in the head if you didn’t move, would you have moved?” I ask her my worst fear. The one that’s been running through my head all day. I don’t know when, but somehow the thought of losing Harlow has been added right next to losing Cora on the running list of nightmares I seem to be keeping.
“No,” she says without an ounce of hesitation.
“Exactly.”
“So, where does this leave us? Because I don’t think I can take you avoiding me anymore,” she says, looking down at her hands like she can escape the vulnerability she just showed.
“I’m sorry I made you feel that way. I never meant to hurt you. Can we go back to being friends?” I ask, hoping I can manage to give her that much. It’s the least she deserves, even if it crushes me.
Her bright smile tosses aside every worry I have. Even if I have to want her in silence, I will, just to see her smile at me like that.
“We’re really behind on Senseless Love,” she says, grabbing the remote and changing it over.
“You didn’t watch it without me?” I ask, surprised.
“It kind of felt like our thing, and I didn’t want to watch it alone anymore.”
“Are you making popcorn?” I ask her with a grin. She rolls her eyes and stands from the couch.
“Fine, but I’m making you your own bowl, and you’re not allowed to eat out of mine when you inhale it like a vacuum cleaner.”
“We’ll see,” I say, smiling as I follow her into the kitchen.
Yeah, protecting my heart from her is going to be super easy.
Fuck.