Chapter 9 Lila #2
“I can ask my cousin to keep an eye on them for me,” I reply, running a hand through my hair.
Truth be told, I don’t want to feel like I owe him anything.
After what happened the last time we were alone together, I can’t help but wonder just where my self-control will go being out with him on something that could, at a glance, pass for a date.
“Sure,” he replies, and he taps the paper again. “I’ve left my number. You need anything, you just call me, alright?”
“Alright,” I reply, and I feel a little fizz at the base of my spine as I slip the card into my pocket. I could try and tell myself that it’s nothing more than relief that he seems to be open to helping with the twins all of a sudden, but I know deep down that it’s something more than that.
“Text me what day works best for you,” he offers. “I’ll get the table booked.”
“Sounds great.”
I’m doing my level best to keep my voice neutral, but I feel like he must be able to see right through me. There’s something about being around him that makes me feel…exposed.
It’s not an entirely unwelcome feeling, but I know, if we’re going to keep this relationship above board, it’s going to have to become one.
I grab the stroller and make for the door.
He pushes it open for me, and I have no choice but to brush right past him as I go out.
I catch the scent of him once more, the same as it was on the night we met, the woodsmoke and amber wrapped around a core of something dark and masculine.
I swallow hard, doing my best to put it out of my mind.
“Thanks for your help,” I chirp over my shoulder, sounding ridiculous even to my own ears as I attempt to put on a show for anyone who happens to overhear us.
I can’t help but smirk a little as I head for the door, feeling like I’m getting away with something. Nobody here knows the truth of what happened between us, or the fact that he’s actually the father of the children in this stroller I’m pushing.
I nod to the receptionist, who smiles back at me without a care in the world, and hurry to the door before I can let myself get too cocky and give away something I’m not meant to.
Outside, I head for the bus, the slow rock back and forth soothing the twins to sleep in their stroller as I stare out the window.
It was raining earlier, but the sun has peeked out from behind the clouds, casting shimmering light across the rain-slicked sidewalks, little rainbows bursting in the corners of my vision.
For the first time since I saw him again, I feel like things might actually be coming together. So much of these last few months, this last year, really, has felt like I’m just fighting to keep my head above water.
After everything that happened with Thom, my mind was wrecked, and even getting to sleep at night was more of a problem than it should have been.
And then the pregnancy, the morning sickness, the aches and pains, the preparing for the twins’ arrival—all of that on top of the stress and fear that Thom might find me again, might pick up where he had left off.
Not to mention the usual stresses of work, money, trying to keep my bills paid…
But now a sense of calm settles over me, a relief that I didn’t know I needed. I’m not foolish enough to think that Martin is going to make everything right, but at least he’s willing to speak to me. More than that—he went out of his way to set up this date, so we could figure things out.
Not that I’m thinking of it as a date. No, that would be crazy, given that he’s practically twice my age…
But he isn’t married. Divorced, that’s what he said. And the thought of him being single draws a smile to my face, even though I know it shouldn’t. I don’t expect anything from him, but at least I know that I didn’t wreck a relationship with everything that has happened between us.
A kind stranger helps me off the bus with the stroller, and I head to my apartment to find that the elevator has been fixed. I was prepared to hump the twins and the stroller up the stairs again, but it looks like today is my lucky day. In more ways than one.
I hum to myself as we head upward, leaning down to check on Matty and Ross.
I’ll need to call Sofia, tell her that I require her services to cover for me while I’m heading out for dinner.
No doubt she’s going to interrogate me a million times over about who exactly I’m going out with, but hey, if things are taking a turn for the better between Martin and me, maybe I should just go ahead and—
As I round the corner to my apartment, something stops me in my tracks. It takes me a second to realize what it is that’s thrown me off, but I can tell something is wrong.
My instincts are always pulled tight, after what happened with Thom—living with him, I had to be aware of everything I could do that would piss him off, just to avoid another blowup, and the tension in the air speaks to something like that.
And then my gaze is drawn to a small rectangle of paper sticking out from beneath the apartment door.
My heart clenches in my chest. It could just be one of the neighbors, putting in a note about a neighborhood party or something, but as I stoop down to pull it out, I realize that my hands are shaking.
I don’t believe it could be something that simple.
I don’t know if I deserve that kind of peace…
I unfold it slowly, and I recognize the lettering on the inside at once; it’s the same kind I used to come home from college to find scattered around the apartment I shared with Thom, back when he would lay out a million chores for me to do as soon as I came home.
He would tell me it was just so I could feel like I was pulling my weight, given that he paid for everything, but I can see now that he was just trying to do his level best to make it impossible to keep up with my studies and live with him at the same time.
Thinking of you. T.
That’s all it says. I flip the note over a few times in my hand, like more words might manifest right there in front of my eyes, but they don’t.
It’s from him. It has to be.
I look around the cramped corridor, wondering if he’s still here. The hairs on the back of my neck rise, like he could be watching me right where I stand, a sickness twisting in my gut.
And the twins—God, does he know about the twins? Is that what this is about? Is he trying to intimidate me like he did before, scare me into getting back with him at the risk of putting my babies in the firing line?
My hands still shaking, I push the key into the lock and push the stroller inside, crumpling the note in my hand.
This isn’t going to scare me. I’m not going to let it.
I got away from him once, and if he thinks for a fucking second that I’m going to let him frighten me, he has another thing coming.
He’s the pathetic one, not being able to move on after all this time, the asshole who can’t accept that it’s over and that I don’t want a thing to do with him again…
But before I know it, my legs are crumpling out from underneath me, and I sink to the floor, tears streaming down my cheeks.
Just like that, I’ve been thrown back into the midst of everything he did to me, the terror he inflicted on me. And now he knows where I live. He wants to make that very, very clear. And if he was jealous enough that I was so much as keeping friends…
I can’t imagine how he’s going to react when he discovers that I have babies by a whole other man.