Chapter 6
HARLOW
“Imissed you so much!” I drop to my knees and grab my daughter’s face between my hands, placing a kiss on each and every freckle on her nose and cheeks.
“Ew, Mom, get off of me. I was only gone like two days.”
Two days and it felt like forever. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the chance to decompress when she’s gone, and spend adult time with Jameson, but Monroe is always on my mind.
I worry when she’s not with me. I know it’s dumb, she’s safe with Spencer and he takes as good of care of her as I do, but she’s my baby.
“I.” Kiss. “Just.” Kiss. “Missed.” Kiss. “You.”
“You’re drenching me with your saliva. It’s gross.” Monroe wipes at her face and with a laugh, I finally let her inside, standing up to meet Spencer’s amused gaze.
“Was your weekend too quiet?”
My cheeks heat as memories of Jameson’s hands on my body and my cries of pleasure fill my mind. “No, but it’s strange when she’s gone. Did you guys have a good weekend?”
“Daddy took me to the pier. I got cotton candy, and he won me a stuffed animal, it’s in my bag, and then we rode the Ferris Wheel and I put my hands up like this!” Roe puts her bag down and throws her hands up in the air to demonstrate.
Spencer and I exchange amused glances at the fact that she answered for him.
“I hope your dad didn’t get you too hopped up on sugar all weekend.”
He mock gasps, placing a tanned hand against his chest. “I would never.”
“Yeah, Daddy would never,” Monroe echoes, spinning in a circle.
“How come you’re always Daddy and I rarely get called Mommy anymore?”
He shrugs, stuffing his hands in his designer jeans. They fit his frame so perfectly I can’t help but wonder if they’ve been tailored specifically for him. “No idea. I must be special.”
He flashes a grin, his dimples winking at me. Those dimples always used to make me weak in the knees. Forget used to, they still do. I’m certain dimples have that effect on all women.
“You can come in,” I tell him, feeling bad that he’s still standing in the doorway.
He shakes his head. “Can’t. I have to meet Lydia.”
It takes everything I have not to roll my eyes.
Lydia St. Clair.
Big boobs.
Big lips.
Big teeth.
And hair so red that it’s as far from natural as you can get, but everything about her is already fake so why not her hair too?
Lydia has been Spencer’s PR person for around five years now, and I’ve hated her for all that time.
When we were together, I used to think I was insecure and jealous.
As a new young mom, I didn’t take well to her fawning over my boyfriend and dragging her claw like nails all over him.
But even after we broke up the feeling never went away.
Spencer can’t see it, but that woman is vile.
Clearing my throat, all I say is, “Hope that goes well for you.”
His amused chuckle fills the air. “You still hate her, don’t you?”
I pinch my lips. “Why would I hate her? I have no reason to hate her.” I tilt my chin up.
Spencer’s amusement doesn’t wane. “Whatever you say. Roe, I have to go,” he calls out, and our daughter comes bounding over to him a second later.
She crashes into his legs, hugging him tight. “Don’t go, Daddy. Can’t you stay? Maybe we could have dinner just the three of us.”
Hurt flits across his face and I look away pretending I didn’t see it.
“Not today, Princess. I have a lunch meeting so I can’t stay.”
She blinks her big round blue eyes up at him. “Can’t you cancel?”
I hear Spencer’s heart break. Kids have the tendency to do that to you with only a few simple words. “No, I’m sorry, sweetie. It’s important. But maybe if Mommy is okay with it, I can pick you up and take you to school in the morning?”
Roe turns those dangerous blue orbs on me that manage to get her everything she wants. “Oh, please, Mom, can Daddy take me tomorrow?”
“Of course.”
“Yay!” She jumps up and down, gives a twirl, and hugs him again before she’s gone in a flash.
Spencer takes a step back, tilting his head down slightly so his copper-colored hair falls over his eyes.
“We’ll see you in the morning.” I grab the door to close it.
“Wait,” he whispers so softly I’m not sure he actually wanted me to hear.
“Yeah?” I hesitate, my eyes narrowed.
He clears his throat, his shoulders rising closer to his ears like he’s nervous or something. Twisting his lips back and forth, he meets my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
I blink back at him, my bitchy side wanting to snap, “For what?” But I know what he’s sorry for, so I don’t say that. “Don’t be. Everything happens for a reason, right?” I force a smile, closing the door.
He utters my name, but the click of the door shutting is my way of saying I don’t want to talk anymore.
It’s Roe’s bedtime and I move the mountains of pillows on her bed onto the floor, then turn her covers back.
Like the hurricane she is, she tears into the room in her pale blue Princess Elsa pajamas and jumps on the bed with her ‘snuggy’, a stuffed sloth she affectionately refers to as Mr. Kitty.
When she was a toddler, she could not be told otherwise that Mr. Kitty was a sloth, not a cat, and at this point the name has stuck.
I pull the covers over her and point to the pink bookshelf in the corner. “Which book do you want tonight?”
She smiles, wiggling around to get comfy. “The otter one.”
I shouldn’t be surprised at this point. It’s her favorite and she requests it a few times a week. I pluck it off from the top shelf in its prized spot and carry it over, climbing into bed beside her.
It’s just the two of us tonight. Jameson has an early morning meeting in L.A. and even though mileage wise it’s not far, time wise it’s a world away. Only in L.A. can you spend over an hour in traffic and still get nowhere.
Monroe scoots her body as close to mine as possible, resting her head on my shoulder. The scent of her strawberry banana shampoo fills my nostrils from her still damp hair.
I close my eyes, soaking in the feeling of her small body against mine. She’s growing up way too fast. I might not have been ready to become a mom at seventeen, but it happened, and I wouldn’t change a thing. Monroe is my entire world.
“I missed you, Mom,” she says suddenly, taking me by surprise.
I tip my head down. “You did?”
“Of course,” she scoffs in dramatic fashion. “I always miss you when I’m with Daddy, just like I miss Daddy when I’m with you.”
My heart fractures at her words.
Monroe doesn’t remember a time when her dad and I were together, and I hate that for her. I wish she had some kind of good memories of the three of us as a family.
She looks up at me with her ocean eyes. “Why don’t you and Daddy love each other anymore? Other parents love each other, but not you guys.”
Fuck, my daughter has taken a battering ram to my heart and smashed it to smithereens.
How do you explain to a six-year-old why your relationship with their father didn’t work out?
“Your dad and I still love each other,” I assure her, setting the book aside so I can wrap my arms around her small body. “How could I not love him? He gave me you.” I tickle her and she giggles. “But it’s a different kind of love.”
She rubs her pink lips together, the gears turning in her curious brain. “Different how? Like Jacob who has two daddies?”
A soft laugh bubbles out of my throat as I stroke my finger through her hair. “No, baby, a bit different than that.”
“Tell me.”
I inhale a deep, steadying breath, trying to think of the best way to explain this to my young child.
“There are all kinds of love in the world, Roe. There’s the love you feel for your family.
Another kind of love for friends. Then there’s the kind of love you feel for one person and one person only, but sometimes timing, circumstances, just …
life … can turn that love into a bad thing.
Sometimes you love someone so much, but you have to let them go anyway.
” Tears prick my eyes. Even though it’s been years, I’ll never forget the pain of our breakup.
Breaking Spencer’s heart was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
But I had to protect myself and our daughter.
“Did you let Daddy go?”
I bite my lip hard to hold back a sob. “I did.”
“So, you love Jae the way you used to love Daddy?”
“Um, yes and no. Love is different with every single person, but yes, I love Jameson in a romantic way, the way I used to love Daddy.”
She presses further. “You and Daddy are just friends now?”
I close my eyes, thinking back to my last moment of weakness two years ago, only a few months before I met Jameson, where Spencer and I fell into bed together again.
It only happened a handful of times before I put a stop to it.
My heart couldn’t take it. The heart is a resilient organ, but it’s not impenetrable.
“Yeah, baby.” I snuggle her closer. “We’re just friends now.”
I kiss the top of her head, take a cleansing breath, and start to read her book aloud.