Chapter 5 #2
“I wasn’t so sure. And moving across the country to have a child?” She shook her head. “Overwhelming. More upheaval than morning sickness.”
“What about after she was born?”
“We’d lost touch at that point.” She’d stopped all contact with him somewhere in her second trimester. “I didn’t want to be the reason you left the job you’d been so excited about.”
“The other side of the country isn’t that far. Not like I’d moved to Australia or something.”
“No. You’re right.” And yet here he was. “I knew the variables here. I understood the system and how to create what we needed.”
He grunted and she looked away. Her gaze drifted to the oak tree nearby, dripping with Spanish moss. Countless times she’d sat out here reading or playing or having a picnic with Cora, wondering what Cooper might be doing.
“Be honest,” she began, ignoring the tumult in her gut. “If I had told you, how would it have played out?”
“Are you kidding? I would have come back,” he replied. “Been with you here. Delayed for a semester. Walked away if they didn’t agree. I would have given you any and every support.”
“And that’s exactly why I couldn’t say a word!” Scarlett’s voice cracked. “You were thirty-three, Cooper. You finally had the tenure-track position you’d been chasing. You deserved to live your dream.” She caught herself, managing to hold still instead of scoot closer to him.
“We can theorize all we want, but I was twenty-two, a student with no money and a positive pregnancy test. If I’d told you, you would have stayed out of obligation and resented me for it.
Or you would’ve convinced me to follow you and I would’ve floundered to find support I could trust and resented you.
At some point you would’ve looked at me as the monkey wrench that obliterated your career. ”
“Never,” he denied. “We could’ve had everything.”
She let him have his fantasy. They would never know for sure. She’d had years to accept the consequences of her choices. Years to wallow in the what-ifs of going through it alone on bad days and regret that she couldn’t share the joys with her daughter’s father.
“You made a choice for me—that wasn’t your right,” he said, his tone grim.
“I chose to keep our daughter. I chose an independent study and finished my degree online while she was napping. I built a life for us where she is safe and loved and doesn’t have a father only out of guilt.”
“Guilt?” Cooper scowled. “I loved you. I wanted a life with you. Your choices stole six years of her life from me.”
“I know,” she whispered, her anger suddenly deserting her, leaving only exhaustion. “I know it’s unfair. But she is my entire world, Cooper. And I won’t let you just waltz in here and disrupt it because you’re having some sort of mid-life vacation crisis.”
He scooped a hand through his hair. “I deserve to know my own child. Has she ever asked about me?”
“Of course. She’s a bright and curious child. Yours in so many ways,” Scarlett added. And she’d only ever said good things about Cooper, without sharing his name.
“I suppose you’ve told her I died or something.”
She laughed. “No. I’ve told her she has a father who loves her, but he works far away and we can’t be together.”
Cooper snorted. “You expect that to hold up?”
“Not forever. But it’s one piece of the truth she can understand right now.”
“This isn’t a mid-life crisis. Memories of you brought me back. I wanted to be in a place where I felt happy.” The admission surprised her. “This isn’t a vacation, it’s more of a reset,” he continued. “The college closed.”
She recognized that look in his eyes. He’d come up with an idea and he wouldn’t be dissuaded. Solution mode. The anger might’ve faded, but not the intensity.
“I want to know my daughter, Scarlett.” His determination was clear. “I’m not going anywhere,” the level tone sent a chill down her spine. “I have all the time we need to catch up and set things right.”
For him maybe. Introducing him to Cora’s life couldn’t end well for her. “I see.”
“You will.”
Goose bumps raced across her skin. She was sure he didn’t mean to make that sound like a threat. But it did. He was a threat to everything: her heart, her future, and their daughter’s world.
He embodied the change she knew was inevitable. Her darkest secret was out, the vault was open, and her quiet, guarded life was over.
“Tomorrow’s Saturday,” he said.
“And?”
“Do you have plans?”
“No.” She wanted to kick the honesty right out of herself. His grin only intensified the urge. “Why?”
“Because I’m coming over to help with a few things around here.”
“What things?”
He studied the house behind her. “Whatever you need.” His brow flexed. “Do you have basic tools?”
“Of course.” What did he take her for, some helpless damsel? “We’re not telling her tomorrow.”
“Agreed. Tomorrow I’ll still be your friend she met at the bakery.”
He had handled that well. “Fine.”
“I’ll bring coffee and breakfast and lend a hand.”
Before she could sputter any kind of reply to that, the man was striding away and she was currently too emotionally exhausted to give chase.