Trusting You

by Ketley Allison

  I pause with my hands on the stroller’s handles. “We’re having a fight?”

  “I…are we?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I’ve never fought with a guy before. My parents, sure. Brother, definitely. But to fight with a guy would mean having some kind of relationship with one, and for the most part, Paige and I kept to ourselves in college.

  Well. Present company excluded, of course.

  “Look, my sister wants to take you out,” Locke says.

  “Huh?”

  Lily’s making impatient sounds, so I start pushing the stroller in a rocking motion.

  “Tomorrow night. So you can’t leave.”

  I’m pretty sure Astor hates me. “I don’t know if that’s…”

  “Enough to keep you here? Believe me, I know. Astor’s a lot. But deep down, she’s soft and squishy and won’t bite. I promise.”

  I lift my chin. “I wouldn’t say she’s—wait. You’re trying to distract me.”

  He grins, and even when laced with a grimace, it’s disarming. “Is it working?”

  No, but you are.

  My shoulders relax. “I don’t want to be a burden.”

  “Do I look like a guy who’d lie down for a chick?” Locke asks with emphasis.

  “Uh…”

  Locke gives me a flat stare. “Not that kind of lie down. Look, I’m no doormat. If I didn’t want you here, I’d tell you. I’m moody, though. Can’t help you there.”

  Lily’s frantically turning herself into a human pretzel to escape her harness.

  “I’d better go,” I say.

  “Yeah.” Locke waves us off. “Go. But make sure to come back, okay?”

  I offer him a small, deflated smile as I push the stroller through the doorway. “I’m not going to abscond with your baby.”

  “I don’t just mean the baby.”

  The door’s almost shut, but I catch a glimpse of his face as he says it, and in those brief seconds, I detect nothing but irritation.

  It makes no sense, his words coupled with his expression, but I’m coming to understand that about Locke. The conflict and layers and constant upkeep it takes for him to keep pretending everything in his life is okay.

  I lift the stroller the way I saw Locke do it—surprised by the lightness—and descend the staircase sideways. Lily smacks at my face and tries to palm my nose. I blow a raspberry at her, but I’m thinking about the man I left behind, and how I’m coming to learn that sometimes, it’s not kindness I crave.

  Seeing Locke angry is upsetting. But understanding its impact unearths a sexual lust coiled beneath my bones.

  I’m used to emotional charge. Usually in the roller coaster form of grief, thinking everything will be all right, like when the treatment’s working and Paige has more energy, before the crash of devastation when told there’s nothing more that can be done.

  But this ride with Locke…the leap from anger to happiness to sweetness, then back to anger, in such a short amount of time, has me wanting to lift my dress and deal with the overdrive in an entirely different way. I want to straddle him, to massage and kiss and tame him.

  I shudder as I drop Lily’s wheels to the ground.

  Maybe…

  I can keep looking forward to dinner.

  Lily and I spend some time at the nearby park, and I’m pushing her on the swings while she ogles the bigger kids making expert use of the playground.

  “One day, honey,” I say.

  She gurgles, then puts her fist in her mouth as I push her.

  “Before you know it, you’ll be big and strong and walking more than you’re falling, and—” The realization is like a throat punch. And I won’t be here to see it.

  “Ah!”

  Lily’s hands splay out as she cries, her bunny dropping to the soft tarmac at our feet.

  “I got it, honey,” I say, picking it up. “Now he’s got park dirt on him instead of just the sidewalks and subways of NYC.”

  She rips it from my hands and shoves a fluffy ear into her mouth, staring at me with beguile. I can’t help but stroke a chubby cheek as she chomps.

  Wallowing over my absence from Lily’s daily life does Locke a disservice. He more than tolerates me, maybe even likes me. There’s nothing to indicate he’ll keep Lily from me after…whatever this is…is finished and I go back to Florida.

  And this is exactly what I’m resolving on the way back to Locke’s place.

  There has to be stated terms, lines drawn. We can’t keep living in this fantasy where he’s the dad, and I’m the pretend mom and Lily is happy with us both by her side.

  For my sake, there has to be a finite end to this masquerade.

  “You’ll always be my heart,” I say to the top of Lily’s head as we stop at the door.

  I buzz up to the apartment, and instead of hearing the answering zzzzzz to tell me the door’s open, there’s silence.

  Could Locke have fallen asleep? I try again.

  The door bursts open when I lift my finger to attempt a third time.

  “Locke!” I say once a face appears.

  His cheeks are red from exertion—or, more likely, contained pain—and he gestures for me to get out of the way so he can handle the stroller.

  “You can’t keep doing this,” I say to him.

  “I’m just fine.”

  “I’m no doctor, but all you’re doing is ruining whatever work was done to repair your leg in the first place.”

  “Goddamn, you people,” he grunts as he lifts. “Let me be the judge of it for once.”

  “Don’t lump me in with your friends, whom I don’t even know,” I say as I follow him inside. Before he can yell at me, I’m lifting some weight off him, and we’re climbing the stairs together. “Though they’re right.”

  He doesn’t respond and is probably ignoring me, the way I’ve noticed he deals with most issues he doesn’t like, and when we make it inside his apartment, I’m instantly sidelined by the smell.

  “You cooked?” I ask.

  “Yes, I cook,” he says. He’s already unstrapped Lily and is carrying her to the kitchen. While limping.

  I walk up to him and lift Lily out of his arms. He’s annoyed but allows me to do it.

  Keeping Lily safely away from any escaping steam, I lift the lid of the pot on the stove with my free hand.

  “Pasta with red sauce,” Locke says, and I realize he’s peering over my shoulder, so close I can almost smell him over the scent of garlic and onion. “Also known as the only thing I can cook successfully.”

  “It smells delicious.” I step away, but not because the food isn’t enticing. Because he is. “But I would’ve been happy to whip up something. You didn’t have to go to the trouble.”

  “I’m aware. You like to pay your way. But I wanted to do something to make up for my attitude earlier.”

  I incline my head. “Is this apologetic pasta?”

  Locke’s lips do a down curve.

  I can’t help but breathe out a small laugh. “I guess it is.”

  “Yes,” he says. Begrudgingly. “Sometimes, I let other people’s opinions get to me too much.”

  Lily wriggles out of my hold. When she goes to open one of the bottom cabinets, I move to stop her, but notice Locke has already baby-proofed them. When I glance at him, he’s back to his arrogant smirk.

  “Didn’t trust me to hide the knives, huh?”

  Whatever vulnerability he was about to allow to escape has long vanished. I straighten. “One can never be too careful.”

  Locke busies himself pulling plates out of the top cabinets. “So, you’ll go?”

  “Go where? Back to Florida?”

  “No, out with my sister. She’s assaulting me via text. I have to give her an answer.”

  “Uh, sure. I guess.”

  “So that means you’re staying.” Locke smirks again, but there’s more behind it this time. It’s not just for show.

  “With no uncertain terms,” I state firmly.

&nb
sp; He cocks a brow, that one-sided move that few know how to do with such carefree arrogance. “Go ahead. Make them certain.”

  “We can’t keep going on like this. We both know that.” I follow him to the table, hooking under Lily’s arms on the way and settling her into the high chair. “This evening proves that.”

  “True.”

  “So, we need a timeline.”

  Locke places his palms on the wooden table, leaning closer to me on the other side. He ponders for a moment, his forehead going smooth and his stare drifting over my shoulder. He’s so close I can trace his cheekbones, maybe press a thumb to his lower lip, bigger than his upper, tantalizing enough to bite.

  “Lily’s first birthday is coming up, right?”

  His question has me drifting up to his stare, now hooded, his eye color darkened by his lashes, but no less compelling.

  “Yes,” I manage to say.

  “You should be there for that.” His voice has gone soft, husky, and I’m back to staring at those lips.

  Unconsciously, I lick my own. I hear a low growl in response.

  I’m damp in unspeakable places. I want to cross my legs, to brush up against pleasure, but I’m standing. The last thing I want to be is upright. Under him, on top of him, those are positions I’d prefer…

  I want to scrape my teeth against his jaw.

  “BAH!”

  We both startle apart, Lily appearing in the middle of us, smacking her palms on her plastic table.

  The very reason I’m forbidden to have this fantasy stares back at me. Paige’s daughter. Locke’s child.

  Because they slept together. Locke and Paige came together in the most intimate way. He hugged her curves, she caressed his body. They were naked, heard each other’s sighs, together.

  I’m lucky Lily is here policing the situation.

  Phantom cold water splashes against my cheeks and I stumble farther away. “Lily’s birthday. That’s in a little under three weeks. I can do that.”

  As much as instinct screams at me to leave now, to back away from Locke, I can’t leave Lily so soon. Locke’s right, I’d love to be here for such a milestone.

  “That’s settled then.” Locke’s scratching at his chin as if he’s also coming to terms with what we almost did.

  “Yep. Settled. I’ll get the pasta.”

  I scurry away, conscious of Locke’s stare on my back and look for a hot plate to set down the pot. Finding none, I bring the pasta and a hand towel to put under the still-steaming pan. Locke watches me do all this with careful consideration.

  “Huh,” he says with a shoulder jerk like I’ve just come up with the solution for gravity.

  “You need a potholder,” I snap, then plop down on the chair and start serving Lily.

  I avoid his stare throughout dinner, and he doesn’t attempt small talk, other than trying to learn Lily’s language. Outside city noises are the soundscape to our dinner, but I prefer it that way. In fact, I prefer the solid, tangible, cold wooden table coming between us. And Lily herself, sharing Paige and Locke’s DNA, because of sex. Paige and Locke had sex.

  So many glaring reasons during this very dinner to stay far away from whatever inkling is stirring in my soul, enticing and seductive as it uncoils.

  Three more weeks will not give me enough time to fall in love with Lachlan Hayes.

  I’ll make sure of it.

  16

  Locke

  Three more weeks won’t give me enough time to sleep with Carter Jameson.

  I’ll make sure of it.

  It’s four in the morning, and I’m lying awake in bed, too aware of Carter in the next room. As far as I know, Lily sleeps through the night. If the baby stirs at all and Carter comforts her, I don’t know, because I’ve never had to get up and check.

  That will all change when Carter leaves. She’ll have to tell me what Lily’s habits are at night.

  Because Carter is leaving. It’s official now.

  I should be glad. Instead, I roll over and spear my shoulder into the mattress, punching at my pillow that’s gone too flat. Then my knee starts up, pissed I’ve moved it again.

  I think about the pills I’ve hidden away in an empty bottle of antifreeze underneath the sink, way in the back, behind the plumbing.

  Ben, Asher, Easton think I’m clean, and I am. To a point. Six months ago, I couldn’t see straight, happy to be buzzed within a cocoon spun from Oxy threads. No future, no decisions, only the simple act of popping pills and drifting away. And that felt pretty fucking good.

  It took a long time, I know—I think I know—for the guys to get me out of that hole.

  Depression is no joke, especially coupled with the discovery that pills can make tough days foggier, forgettable.

  Right now, this now, everything is too clear. My actions too culpable. I shouldn’t have gone after Carter today and been such an ass, but that didn’t stop the need-monster inside from doing it anyway. The need to make people around me feel as shitty as I do. The craving to bring them down to my level so I can maintain a miserable existence.

  I hid it well this past week, when Carter moved in when Lily became my new reality. But as real-life resettles its broken, rotting crow’s wings around me, I’m reminded that nothing stays perfect.

  Not people, not actions, not dreams.

  Do I have the strength to carry on like this for my daughter? Sure I do. I can maintain a level head. But when night comes, when those black feathers begin to fall, it’s tempting to remember who I really am. Who I’ve become.

  Carter has the annoying habit of making me want to explain myself. Like at dinner tonight, when she was sulking at the table, I wanted to lower my head and explain that my dissing her paintings had nothing to do with her talent. It had to do with her future, and it was simple: she had one. A passion she pursues, a dream alive and rampant in her head.

  I don’t know what that’s like anymore.

  Every time I open my laptop, I blindly scroll through the classifieds in a futile attempt to figure out what my next steps should be, now that there’s a child relying on my life skills. Lily. I can’t live off my rookie contract forever, no matter how frugal I’ve become. The two-bedroom apartment I leased in TriBeCa, new construction, luxury building? Gone. The BMW 550? Gone. Spending two-a-days on the field, fire licking at my calves as I flew—not ran—by the yard? Bye-bye.

  Pride?

  Still motherfucking there.

  I glance at the wall separating me from Carter again. She can never know how far I’ve fallen from grace. Why she can’t, I’m still figuring that out. I remember her from UF, how she, among many other faceless, nameless girls, scoped me out. She caught my attention because of her innocent seduction, and I knew if I took her then, I’d break her. Carter walked in during that party, she landed on me, and her eyes went wow. There he is. The football king, the perfect guy.

  These past few days, I’ve seen that wow go to irritated, annoyed, sometimes bemused. And today, I saw it go to pity.

  Fuck, I wish I smoked. I’d light up right now, staring at that wall through vaporous clouds and would probably look a helluva lot sexier than the one almost huddled in an agonized fetal position as my leg throbs.

  That college man is long gone, and Carter knows it. I think I hate that realization the most.

  To consider Lily might one day look at me like that….no. Fuck, no.

  The pills are singing a siren song.

  I turned my face into the pillow, alternately punching and roaring into it.

  Two things could get rid of this tightness in my chest, the crushing angst. The Oxy I’ve hidden or having Carter’s naked body underneath me, mine to control, to stroke into ecstasy. I’d lose focus on anything else. Watch her eyes go half-lidded, see those crimson lips—were they still innocent?—parting, for my tongue, for my cock, then lowering, driving into her, clenching my hands on those milky soft thighs….

  “God. Damn it!” I roar into the pillow.

  I didn’t gro
w into adulthood as a screwup. But it seems I’m settling into it just fine.

  My head pounds, and I’m not hungover.

  Don’t think so, anyway, except my mouth feels like dry cake batter and my bones creak like someone tipped me upside down to drink out of a keg last night.

  But nope, it’s just me, excruciatingly sober, sitting up in bed, scratching my morning beard, hiking my boxers down to disguise a morning stiffy, and padding out of my bedroom and into the bathroom to—

  Oh, hey.

  “Locke!” Carter screeches before slamming the door in my face.

  I blink. Rub at my eyes. Remember who’s living with me and that I’m sore because of lifting and carrying my daughter everywhere yesterday.

  Still a mind-fuck.

  I turn to the kitchen instead and come across Lily, munching on a more expensive veggie version of Cheerios on the floor.

  “Speak of the devil,” I say and lift her up, kiss her baby-soft hair, and focus entirely on forgetting what just greeted me in the bathroom two seconds ago.

  A naked Carter.

  Well, not entirely naked, I muse as I accept some puffed cereal being mashed into my mouth by Lily’s eager hand. Carter was in the midst of folding a towel around that very fine, very toned body of hers, flashing me enough that my morning half-chub turned into a full boner upon my eyes meeting her breasts.

  They’d still been wet from the shower, offering a liquid shine, practically a beacon drawing my mouth forward. They were big enough to palm and squeeze—

  “Bahbah!” Lily screeches into my ear.

  Literally. In my ear.

  I mouth CHRIST as exaggeratedly as I can, since I definitely can’t shout it, and find an empty, clean bottle of Lily’s. She decides to help by grabbing for anything I lift up with my free hand.

  “You’re only adding time between you and this bottle in your mouth,” I say to no avail.

  “Abah.”

  “No. Not yours,” I respond and start mixing formula. “Yet, anyway.”

  “Sorry I screamed.”

  “Oh, it’s okay, I only need one eardrum to function, anyway,” I say to Lily.