by Tara Brown
I scrolled up, looking at the text I had apparently sent from Belgium. It didn't feel like something I would have sent, but the wording was perfect, exactly, for what I had been thinking all along.
Servario, I am done with this. I am done with us. You are the wrong choice, the selfish one. I want to be with you, but as a mother I have to pick my kids. I am so sorry but from this moment on, we will be work only.
Every single word stung as a small whimper slipped from my lips. I deleted the conversation, frightened the two messages would be seen by Coop. Something had happened in Dubai or Belgium. Something that had made me make the decision I was already planning on making but feared I wouldn't. From the moment I took the STI test, I knew I couldn't keep being Evie the hooker. I had to be Evie the agent who kicked ass and didn't need to be sexy to win over the confidence of marks or targets.
My insides were on fire, my heart was broken, and everything felt cold. I slipped from the room, wishing I hadn’t deleted the conversation. I didn't know the random number he had sent me the message from. I couldn't text him and take it back. I was sealed in the choice I had made before he had drugged me.
That seemed weird.
He had to have seen me to drug me.
Unless of course he had slipped the drugs to me in a beverage that I didn’t drink until after I had sent the text.
I realized it didn't matter as I was on the stairs and Jules came bounding up them at me. She was the reason for the message. I was a mom not a porn star. I needed to act like one.
“Mom, can I get a horse?”
“What?” I gasped.
“Uncle Fitz says all little girls need a horse. He says it’s part of growing up.”
“I never had a horse.” I folded my arms.
“Right, Evie.” Coop walked to the bottom of the stairs and nodded. “That's not a great example of why not to get her a horse.”
My jaw dropped. He didn't say it like it was funny. There was no spark in his steely blue eyes. He had insulted me because he was pissed at me. “If Uncle Fitz wants to get a horse he can take care of it with you.”
Jules jumped up and down clapping and I realized the horse was already here. The asking was an informality. She jumped and kissed my cheek before sprinting back down the stairs shouting, “Yay! We can keep it!” She ran off leaving Coop at the bottom of the stairs and me close to the top. He looked hurt; there wasn't any other way to see it.
I had hurt him.
Apologies and other words I knew I shouldn't speak aloud sat on the tip of my tongue, threatening to slip out and make all this more uncomfortable.
He furrowed his brow, obviously lost in thought and hating me. It took seconds of him maybe filtering or just fighting the urge, before he spoke, “You want to give me a few minutes in the bedroom so I can move my stuff to the basement?”
I swallowed hard and nodded. Had I texted him with a high school breakup as well?
“You don't want to talk?” I asked softy, hoping my kids weren’t nearby. They didn't sound nearby.
“No, Evie. I think this last week has pretty much summed it up for me. I think I see where your heart is.”
I opened my mouth to protest but it just sat open, catching flies and all.
“See, you don't even have an excuse, do you?”
“I don't have an offense either though. I don't remember anything.” I treaded lightly, but I wasn’t going to play the bad guy if I had done nothing.
“You don't recall leaving me on the beach with a dozen teenagers and running back for Servario?”
I shook my head.
“You don't recall not returning any of my texts?”
Having already shook my head I decided on remaining still. I didn't want to get dizzy from constantly denying whatever charges were being laid at my feet.
“You don't recall the fight we had before we even left when I told you that I thought you were too in love with him and not in love with me?”
That I remembered. I bit my lip on the side and sighed. “I remember.”
“You had no real defense. You love him.”
“I love him. I love him in a way that's older than this year. It’s a way I can’t explain and from a time I don't remember being the girl in. But he is still an arms dealer and a drug dealer and a human trafficker. He might have other things going on, but those things won’t ever go away for him. They are who he is. No one can love someone like that.”
He winced. “I don't want to share your heart with anyone.”
“You won’t.” Tears started building in my throat as my words lowered in case little ears were creeping about. “I can’t do this anymore. I have to be a mom and stop worrying about me. I’ve been selfish.” I tried to copy the sad goodbye I had given Servario, but the words felt different saying them than they did reading them.
His eyes widened and the hurt in them was more obvious than the pain in my heart. I felt sick, seeing him look so devastated. He didn't back off or take the words the way Servario did. He hurried up the stairs, grabbing my hand viciously and dragging me to the bedroom. He shoved me in and closed the door, leaning against it. It felt like he had forced me there but didn't know what to do with me, now that I was with him in the room.
He licked his lips, clearly contemplating his next move. I walked to him, lifting my hands to his cheeks. The warmth of him made sparks against my fingertips. I didn't pull him down to me. I just held him and tried not to get lost in his steely blue eyes. “Coop, do you want to have kids one day?”
He furrowed his brow, fighting his answer. “Yeah.” He was curt.
“I can’t have kids. I can’t have any more of them. Don't you want to meet someone who’s your age or closer to it and have children and get married and celebrate that life?”
He pulled his face from my hands, sliding along the wall to get away from me and the questions I was proving the point of the ridiculousness of us with.
“I want you, Evie. I love your kids. They’re wonderful. I want to be with you.”
“And never marry and never have a child of your own?”
He winced, maybe wanting to lie to us both but he didn't. He nodded. “I want that too. With you.”
“I will never marry again. Never. I don't buy the bullshit of it anymore—”
“But that’s just bitterness talking.” He cut me off.
My eyes widened. “Do you blame me? A man pretended to love me and pretended to have a family with me to join the ranks of a government agency. My whole life is a fraud and my kids’ births were based on those lies. I murdered their father. I could never marry someone again. I could never let their life and their wishes be bigger than mine. I don't want to have this reckless abandon again. I don't need to sew oats. I did it when I was young. I feel good about my life as a mom. I don't want to be this woman that wonders why it isn’t my time to have fun and why I have to take care of my kids—alone.” The last part hurt. I loved my kids. I loved them more than anything. I hated myself for believing even for a second that I deserved Servario and the dirty things he did to me. Or that I deserved my time.
“I wouldn't ever do any of that to you. I don't want to suffer for what James did.”
“I know.” I grimaced. “It isn’t fair at all, and yet here we are. I won’t ever marry again, I can tell you that. I daydream about it, but then the whole reality of this fucked up life comes seeping back in. And I know I can’t have kids. Is this the fate you are signing on for? Because if it’s not, tell me now. My kids are falling in love with you, just the same as I am. And they can’t get caught up in the recklessness I have had going on. They don’t deserve to have their hearts broken and it’s my fault for dragging them into this.”
His jaw trembled, not like he might cry but like he might scream at me. It took him a moment to gain control of the hostile look in his eyes. And in that moment I watched it turn from hostility to defeat. He slumped. “We could get a surrogate.”
“Never.” I laughed; I didn't mean
to but the idea of baby diapers and all-night feedings and crying on both our parts was about as appealing as marrying James again.
He clenched his fists and then relaxed his hands, stretching his long fingers out. “So that's it then?”
“Yes.” My battered and broken heart didn't have much emotion left for the moment we were having. It was used up. A year of hell had taken so much of the empathy, sympathy, and compassion I once had.
He shook his head, obviously lost in the answer I had given. “Fine.” The anger and the rage swam below the surface. It was hard not to hate myself but my brain told me this was the right course. My heart couldn't be trusted. My brain knew that. It told me that there was no way I would ever be allowed to make choices like this one again. It wasn't just my heart involved in the pain and consequences.
“If you want to live somewhere else, I get it.”
He lifted his gaze. “You can give up on me, Evie. That doesn't mean I have given up on you.” He turned and left the room, pausing in the hallway before he closed the door silently.
I dropped to my knees and heaved breaths.
Nothing felt right anymore. Nothing but the fact that the love triangle of doom was finally over.
Chapter Nine
Two months of celibacy is actually nine months in cat spinster years
Sighing under the showerhead, I wiped my face and shut the water off. I climbed out and noted the muscles in my arms. I hadn’t seen them in a decade, but there they were, like they had never left. The pull-ups and push-ups and constant bush runs were working. Coop made me run every day, following his beautiful ass through the woods. It had been misery at first, but I had gotten used to running and daydreaming about him pinning me against a tree, ravishing me.
Eight weeks of running and waiting for Servario to contact us with something of a plan had been harder without the constant sex with my young delicious partner.
Many times I had nearly mentioned I was into bootie calls from the basement, but pride had prevented the words from leaving my lips.
The only good day I’d had in eight weeks happened when the health nurse called me to tell me I was fine and the tests had all come back negative. I had cried a little that day.
But the focus on the kids and the damned new horse had been consuming.
I dried off and contemplated what I was going to do. The Burrow hadn’t come up with any new threats, but the list of enemies was growing. We had come up with a way to use CI to monitor the list by convincing the commander the people on it were our best suspects for either being the Master Key or seeking the Burrow. Two names hadn’t been added to the list we had created at headquarters. Gustavo Servario, and of course, Fitz.
Being the only one in contact with headquarters, it was Jack’s job to create the list and add the recs for surveillance and financial monitoring.
He hadn’t come up with anything though. The surveillance had been rich people doing boring rich people things. Watching it, I had nearly choked when I saw Servario at a party with a young blonde on his arm. She was beautiful and maybe twenty-five. She looked like she had come from money. She was everything I was not.
“Mommy, can we swing?” Jules shouted from my bedroom. It actually meant could I push her on the swing across the road at the park.
“Yeah, just give me a second.”
“Mkay.”
It still made me smile when she said it.
I dragged on clothes and hurried downstairs to grab a coffee. I needed a second one if I was going to push her in the cool spring air. The warmth was coming, but it wasn't there yet. Soon. Locals had been telling us tales of opening their pools in the next couple of weeks. It felt like madness but nothing about the Canadian winter had been what I expected. It wasn't arctic or so cold you thought you might die. It was mild and sort of pleasant. Boston had suffered a record snowfall that winter and I felt okay with where I lived.
I stepped out into the hall, freezing when I realized I was chest to chest with Coop. His hand was up like he might have been about to knock. “Hi,” I blurted.
“Hi.” He was always calm around me. Too calm.
“What’s up?” I lifted my gaze and hated the fact that he could still drag me into his stare.
“Your mom wanted to tell you she is going to grab some groceries. She will be back in about an hour.”
“Oh.” I tried to be nonchalant. “Okay. Thanks.”
He grinned like he knew something I didn't and turned, walking away casually.
Leaning back on the closed bedroom door, I sighed and tried not to notice the scent of him in the air. It was wind and sweat and deodorant, and all of it was my favorite smell.
Hurrying to the park with Jules, I played a game of tag with her on the slide and then pushed her on the swing. I couldn't help but smile at her squeals of delight, but my eyes never stopped scanning the area. The gun in the back of my jacket was illegal there. Canadians were not fans of weapons the way us Americans were. I didn't care though. I carried it in case. I couldn't risk the kids, regardless of the fact that I knew we were safe.
“Look, Mom. It’s Coop!” She giggled and pointed. My heart fluttered, like it always did when I watched him walk. Today’s winning outfit was tight Wranglers and a charcoal-gray sweater with a white polo underneath, collar out of course. His arms and chest made me clench my thighs, but the crabby look on his face was what got me the most. I hated seeing him grumpy. I wanted to fix it.
In the two months since we had agreed he should move on, he hadn’t brought up getting back together once. He had apparently given up on me, contrary to what he had said.
His steely blue eyes trapped me in a stare as he marched over, brooding about something until his gaze landed on my daughter. Immediately the hatred melted and was replaced by the brightest smile he had in stock. She kicked her legs and giggled, knowing the under-duck push was coming. He ran over to her, sort of crouched and in play mode. She squealed and I backed away, watching him torment her and then push her high enough to make my already fluttering heart beat faster.
She bounced and kicked, getting even more air. He ran around, pushing her back with so much force I thought—feared—she might actually go over the top of the swing set. He glanced back at me, in quite the offside manner and grunted, “You don't have to stay. I can push and bring her home.” He nodded. “Luce is here too.”
“I can stay.” I bit my lip, barely fighting off the aphrodisiac of a sexy young man pushing my child on the swings in a way her asshole father never really did.
“What do you think, Jules? Should Mommy go home and get on the treadmill so her butt doesn't end up looking forty?”
“Yeah.” Jules giggled and nodded. “Mommy, you don't want saggy butt.”
He laughed and pushed, not bothering to give me another glimpse of his smirk.
“Fine. I’ll go home and start baking those brownies Grandma loves.”
Coop turned sharply. “NO!” Not those brownies.”
His face made me laugh harder. Brownies weren’t my weakness but they were his. I folded my arms and sauntered back to the house.
When I got into the kitchen I pulled out the secret recipe Mom always used that no one knew about. The brownies were actually chickpea and coconut sugar. It gave me great pleasure to secretly know that the ingredients were completely healthy and the taste was sinful, making Coop self-conscious about how many he would eat. Little did he know, each one was packed with protein and fiber.
“What are you doing?” Mom asked as she walked in with her groceries and turned on the kettle to make tea.
“Making brownies.”
She rolled her eyes. “Still torturing Coop?”
“Yup.”
“I see.” She leaned on the counter. “Have you ever considered that maybe you love him enough?”
“No.” I shook my head. “I know I do. I don't need to consider it. What I need to consider is that I just got out of a long-ass relationship with a douche nozzle who screwed m
e over and made me a fool. I need time to process that, not time to sleep with every agent I work with.”
“Trust me, darling, you don't fall far from the tree in that respect.” A wicked grin crossed her lips.
“Gross.” I grimaced. “Mom!”
“What?” She was suddenly innocent. “A lady never tells, but I will say this—you don't need to process anything, Evie. Your heart was never in that marriage and you Americans and all this ‘time to process’ nonsense is a little intense for everyone else to bear.”
“You’re just as American as I am.”
“Hardly.” She snorted and filled the teapot with steaming hot water to warm it. “Just love someone and worry about the mechanics of it later.” A smile crept across her lips, making me wonder if she was remembering something. “Don't waste your heart. You won’t ever get this time back. Stop thinking and just feel.”
“He’s young, Mom. He wants kids.”
“You have kids.” She shrugged.
“He will want his own one day. And he will want to get married.”
Looking annoyed with me, she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Let me guess, you will never marry again because one bad man made you feel like an idiot?”
“I don't ever want to marry again.”
“Liar.” She popped open her eyes, suddenly wild with passion. “Make no mistake, child. For the right man a girl is obliged to do anything. If he is willing to walk through fire for you, should you not do the same for him?” She wrinkled her nose. “And that joke of a marriage you had was nothing, ever. That boy out there is ten times the man James thought he was. He is the person you should have married, and choosing to close that option off because of James lets that asshole win. Why let him ruin something amazing? That makes no sense to me.” She turned and made her tea.
I stood, confused and frozen and filled with regret. As per the usual, she was right. Letting James live for one more moment in my head was a waste of energy and a waste of a perfect life that might be lived if not for him.
Slowly, I placed the bowl on the counter and walked back through the door I had just come in. I didn't even know if I had closed it. My eyes were focused hard on the man pushing my child and making her giggle at the park across the road.