27. Cooper #2
“You really want to go straight into this?” Meghan chuckles while shaking her head. Her face grows serious as she turns to me, leaning over to rest one hand on Lizzie in her crib, as if she might be taken away if she isn’t somehow connected.
“I didn’t think you would want to know… it was never a pa rt of what we had. We never talked about it. I didn’t know if you even wanted to have children. We were just supposed to be fun.”
I might not have seen her for seven months, but I know her well enough to know when she’s lying to me. It’s the way she’s looking somewhere over my left shoulder, as she robotically states her rehearsed lines that gives her away.
Resting my elbows on the arms of the chair, I rest my chin on my right hand as I stare at her. “Want to tell me the truth now?” I ask. When she drops her gaze, I continue, “Look me in the eye and tell me those lies again, Meghan,” I demand with a growl.
Her eyes dart to my own and her shoulders deflate for a brief moment before she straightens her spine.
“Fine,” she huffs, folding her arms across her chest. “I contemplated not telling you at all because I had no interest in being a toy for you to pick up and play with whenever your latest conquest bores you. I wasn’t going to put my child in a position to witness you dipping in and out of our lives.
All of that being said, I decided last month that it wasn’t my decision, and I was going to come to you after she was born, so you could at least be involved in her life.
If that was what you even wanted.” She draws in a deep breath as if the next words out of her mouth are the ones that pain her the most. “Not that it matters now, but I heard you in your office with your ex… sorry, your girlfriend , the day I resigned. Does she know you’re here, by the way?
” she asks, tilting her head to the side, as if daring me to lie to her .
A smirk spreads across my face as I lean back in my chair and I barely resist the urge to laugh at the fact that she almost didn’t tell me about my child because she thought I was cheating on her—it’s almost comical.
“I don’t find this even remotely funny, Cooper,” she practically hisses as she glares at me before darting her eyes to Lizzie.
The smirk that was forming falls from my face before I reply. “Neither do I. You have to believe me when I say what you heard… it wasn’t what you think.”
I remember the day, but for an almost entirely different reason.
Hayley had brought me lunch from my favorite Italian place.
We talked about my new woman, she gave me some sound advice, and then the conversation moved on to her new woman .
Meghan throws a pillow at me, but I dodge out of the way before it can make contact, chuckling at her misunderstanding.
“I heard her fucking moan, Cooper,” she whisper-yells, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, releasing it, before she looks at me.
“Look, it doesn’t matter,” she says before I can explain.
“We’re done, I’m over it. Yes, we have a daughter, but you’ll go back to New York and visit when you can, I’m sure.
No doubt getting on with your life.” She averts her gaze away from my own, as if it hurts to think of me leaving her.
“I’m not going anywhere without my daughter,” I snarl, my nostrils flaring.
She looks at me with fear written across her face and I almost immediately realize my mistake.
Fuck.
I didn’t mean it to sound like that—I’m not going anywhere without both of them.
“You can’t take her away from me. She needs me… I need her,” Meghan cries out, tears well in her eyes and she turns away from me but not before I see the first one fall.
I drop my gaze from hers, shaking my head at my poor communication as I try to sort through my thoughts.
“That’s not what I meant—I didn’t mean it like that.
” I pause, trying to get my words out right.
“Come back to New York with me?” I plead, my eyes lifting to look into hers, hoping and praying she can see all that I'm not saying.
“I can’t… I don’t have a job and I can’t afford to rent a place in New York by myself, not with a newborn baby and no job.” Sadness is reflected in her tone as she drops her head, causing her hair to fall in front of her face.
Standing from my chair I sit on the edge of her bed. The movement causes her to tense ever so slightly, but I don’t let that stop me. Instead, I tuck her hair behind her ear and cup her cheek as I lift her face to me.
“Move in with me? You and Lizzie,” I murmur. “I want my baby close to me.”
Both of them.
She closes her eyes at my declaration, pressing her cheek further into my palm before moving away from me. “I can’t be with you, Cooper… not like how we were. I was kidding my self before with all the rules. I’m not going to be the other woman.”
I don’t know what she means about the other woman or kidding herself before. I don’t want her with the rules we had agreed to all those months ago either, but now isn’t the time to delve back into what we had.
Now isn’t the time to try and figure all of this out, she’s just given birth to our daughter and if I’m exhausted, I can’t imagine how tired she must be. I need to focus on getting her and our daughter to come home with me—where they belong.
Everything else can be figured out later.
“I’ll take care of you both,” I blurt out and as she looks up at me, a protest on the tip of her tongue. “Until you get a job. You can stay in one of the spare rooms.” For now. “I don’t want to miss a thing with Lizzie,” I plead, hoping to God that she doesn’t deny me this.
She considers it for what feels like a century and I can see her warring with the idea of living apart from me and us having a custody agreement, splitting Lizzie between us equally, before she replies.
“Okay… I don’t want to keep you from your daughter.
” Her tongue darts out to sweep across her lips, bringing my attention to the fullness of her mouth.
“But I meant what I said about us not resuming what we had before I left. We’ll be co-parents, nothing more and nothing less.
” Her voice is husky, as if I’m not the only one affected by our close proximity .
She holds out her hand for me to shake. I’m grateful she’s agreed to come back to Manhattan with me but I’m not shaking her hand as if this is some business deal.
Ignoring her still outstretched hand, I bring my hands to her cheeks, tilting her head up before bringing my lips down to graze across her own.
Pulling away, I stare down into her slightly dazed gaze as her lips part and I barely resist the urge to kiss her again.
In that moment, it felt like the most natural thing to do.
My eyes focus on hers and I try to get a read on whatever it is she’s thinking. Her eyes darken and I’m about to act on the feeling she’s stirring within me, but hurt flickers across her face and she turns away, causing my hands to drop from her face.
“That can’t happen again. Co-parents, Cooper,” she asserts breathlessly.
The only thing I can do is nod in agreement, afraid that if I argue the point now, she’ll change her mind about coming home with me.