15. Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Fifteen
Hayden
The next day, Caroline had a request ready when Hayden came through the door with two bags of groceries.
“Could you make me an omelet?” she asked from the couch. “With cheddar, but not too much. And I want toast, if Hank hasn’t sold the new secondhand toaster yet.”
Hayden stopped at the kitchen counter. The request was small. So small that she looked almost cautious after making it, as if she might still take it back.
He’d spent most of their marriage telling her she could have anything. A car could be waiting in minutes, a room could be filled with clothes by the end of the day, and someone could bring food on covered plates without either of them leaving their chairs.
None of that had ever made him feel as useful as knowing how much cheddar she wanted in an omelet.
“Hank hasn’t sold it yet,” he said. “I checked.”
“Good. We’re all very proud of his restraint.”
Hayden started unloading the bags. He’d bought the softer bread Caroline liked, the tomato soup she’d asked for the day before, apples, eggs, and the crackers that didn’t make her thirsty.
She’d once thanked him for a diamond bracelet with less surprise than she’d shown when he’d remembered the right soup.
He put the milk on the middle shelf of the fridge because that was where Jemma kept it. The mugs went in the cabinet above the sink. The frying pan was kept under the oven, though Hayden still hit his head on the cabinet door whenever he reached for it.
“I heard that,” Caroline called.
“There was nothing to hear,” he protested.
“Did you hit the cabinet again?”
“No.”
“Are you too tall, or is it too low?”
He rubbed the back of his head and took out the eggs. “You wanted lunch, didn’t you?”
He heard her laugh as he worked. The laugh didn’t mean she’d forgiven him. Hayden knew that. She still wore no rings, and she still went quiet if a conversation came too close to New York or their marriage.
More days passed like that, and his visits no longer began with her asking when he planned to leave. He came with groceries, put his jacket over the same chair, and checked what she needed before looking at his phone or touching a dish.
Soon, he learned to ask the question in a way she could answer. “Do you want my arm?” worked better than telling her she shouldn’t stand alone. “Would you like me to wait here or in the other room?” worked better than following her until she felt watched.
The first time she needed help getting to the bathroom, her face went red before she even asked. Hayden supported her as far as the door, then started to wait in the hall.
“Not there,” she said.
He looked at her.
“I can see your shoes under the door. It feels like you’re guarding me,” she explained.
“I am guarding you.”
“From what?”
“Bad decisions involving one good ankle.”
Her mouth twitched, but she pointed toward the living room. “Wait where I can’t see your shoes. I’ll call when I need you.”
He did. When she called, he came back without asking whether she’d managed every part alone. He offered his arm, waited for her to settle her weight against him, and moved at her pace.
After that, the awkwardness eased. She’d tell him when she needed help and tell him when she didn’t. Hayden made himself listen to both answers.
When Caroline asked him to come to a prenatal appointment, he went.
The doctor said her placenta was low and they would keep watching it, since it might move as the pregnancy continued.
If Caroline started bleeding, she needed to seek help at once.
Hayden asked whether that meant any bleeding.
When the doctor said yes, he repeated the instruction aloud, making sure he understood.
The household began to make sense to him.
Caroline’s mother left first on early diner shifts and set out water before she went.
Jemma checked the crib each evening even though its frame hadn’t moved.
She brought the mattress in from her car, and the women spent several minutes pressing it into place and testing the fitted sheet.
Hayden stayed out of their way until Caroline asked him to move the crib two inches closer to the wall. He moved it two inches.
Jemma came home tired and usually tried to take over whatever he was cooking. Caroline’s mother did the same. Both of them had spent years walking into rooms and looking for work that needed doing. Hayden learned to hand one of them a glass of water before she could reach for a dish towel.
“Sit down,” he told Caroline’s mother one evening.
She gave him a doubtful look. “You’ve got a full-time job, don’t you?”
“So do you.”
“Mine doesn’t involve running a company.”
“Mine doesn’t involve carrying six plates at once while three people ask for more coffee.”
She sat, though she watched him stir the sauce as if she expected disaster.
Hank had also started appearing before the food went cold.
He drank less when Hayden was there and stayed at the table instead of vanishing for most of the evening.
Hayden didn’t mistake that for a lasting change.
A man could behave for a few meals and still return to every old habit.
But Jemma’s shoulders weren’t as tight when Hank came in steady enough to talk, and Caroline’s mother no longer kept glancing toward the door.
For now, that mattered.
“Needs salt,” Hank said one evening after taking a large bite of roast chicken.
Jemma stared at him. “You ate half the piece before you decided that.”
“Had to investigate properly.”
Hayden slid the salt toward him. “I respect a thorough review.”
Hank nodded as if they were two serious men conducting business. Across the table, Caroline caught Hayden’s eye and smiled.
Each evening became harder to leave.
Sometimes Caroline fell asleep on the couch while the television played. Sometimes she stayed awake and argued with him about the people on the reality show. Once she told him a woman couldn’t possibly have forgotten kissing someone else’s husband because the cameras were pointed straight at her.
“People forget remarkable things when they’re embarrassed,” Hayden said.
Caroline looked at him then. The easy moment thinned.
He didn’t reach for an explanation or an apology she’d already heard. He picked up her empty glass and asked:
“More water?”
“Please,” she said.
That counted too.
Near the end of one visit, she said, “If you’re coming tomorrow, could you remember to bring my sketchbook from the bedroom after you help me settle on the couch? I keep forgetting to ask Mom before she leaves.”
If you’re coming tomorrow.
Hayden kept his face calm. “Of course.”
He carried those four words back to the hotel with him.
At the hotel, two dozen new messages filled his inbox.
At first, Hayden had believed a few shifted meetings and calls with senior staff would cover his absence. He answered urgent emails before going to the apartment and joined calls when Caroline rested. At the hotel, he worked late with his laptop open on the desk and his phone beside it.
But delay could turn less urgent work into something important. Decisions needed his approval, meetings needed more than his face on a screen for ten distracted minutes, and people in New York kept solving what they could, then adding the rest to a growing list.
Hayden read every update and answered the questions that couldn’t wait.
Then morning came, and Caroline needed groceries or help getting across the apartment, and he told himself he’d deal with his father the next evening.
His intended day or two of silence when he blocked his number had stretched across most of the week.
Paulie called while Hayden sat at the hotel desk, halfway through an email about a decision that should’ve been made in person.
“You’ve got to come back,” Paulie said without greeting him.
Hayden leaned away from the screen. His brother’s voice held none of its usual lazy amusement.
“What’s happened?”
“What’s happened? You blocked our parents and poor Dasha, that’s what happened.”
“Poor Dasha?”
“She’s suffering terribly. Nobody has listened to her complain for nearly six days except me.”
“Then block her.”
“That doesn’t solve Dad.” Paulie sounded close to shouting. “He’s got me sitting in meetings, Hayden. Meetings. People ask me questions and then wait as if I might know the answers.”
Despite himself, Hayden smiled. “You could prepare.”
“Don’t be cruel.”
“What does he have you doing?”
“Your job. Badly. He hands me papers covered in numbers, clients keep asking when you’re coming back, and everyone appears upset when I suggest we order lunch and think about it later.”
The smile left Hayden’s face. “Senior staff have my number. I’ve spoken to them.”
“Yes, and then you go back to California while the rest of us remain in the building with Dad. He wants somebody with the right last name in every room. Apparently, I’m that somebody now.”
Hayden looked at the email on his screen. Three people had already added comments under a question that still needed his decision.
“I’ll speak to him.”
“No. You’ll come back.”
“Paulie…”
“I don’t want your pressure, your schedule, or Dad standing behind me asking when I plan to become useful. I’ve spent years making sure nobody expects this from me. You don’t get to ruin that because your marriage is a disaster.”
Hayden’s jaw tightened. “Careful.”
“Caroline needs you. Fine. I understand that. I like her more than I like you. But you’re still the CEO, and Dad has decided I’m your replacement until you remember it. I refuse. Come home.”
Hayden tried to tell him what could be handled by whom. Paulie cut across every answer. He didn’t want another list or a promise that Hayden would call someone. For once, the panic beneath his complaints was real.
“Fine, fine,” Hayden said eventually, and ended the call.