Problematic Love (Rogue Series Book 8)

by Lara Ward Cosio

  “Just warning him I’m a bad influence.” I look away from her and finish my whiskey. I don’t want to talk with her about Amelia. I know she’d be on the side of “just give her what she wants, and you’ll find it will all be okay.”

  “We don’t believe that, do we, Hale?” she asks softly.

  I watch her as she looks down at her baby, her face so full of love that it’s painful. This is just another reason why I don’t want to be a parent. Yes, being around Sophie and her kids sporadically is a pleasure, but it also brings up too much hurt. It’s too much of a contrast to my own childhood, which was nothing but utter deprivation and coldness. I don’t want to relive any of that. For fuck’s sake, it’s why I willingly became an addict, so I could push away all those feelings.

  “It was so sweet to watch Shay propose, wasn’t it?”

  I’m pulled from my maudlin thoughts. But gratefully so. We’d all watched from the back of the church while Shay surprised Jessica with a ring.

  “Yeah, it was grand,” I agree. “Not sure when they’ll have the chance to actually get married, though, what with the tour about to start.”

  “I think there’s a break about three-quarters through that Shay lobbied for. That will be a good time.”

  “Oh. Yeah, sure.” I take a deep breath. “Seems my kid brother has everything sorted. Good for him.”

  “What about you? How are you doing?”

  She’s looking at me with tenderness. I know she’s not the type to overstep, but I’m still not interested in sharing my fucked-up thoughts with her.

  “Me? I’m fantastic. Look at my life.” I spread my arms wide. “And it’s only going to get better with this tour. I’m really looking forward to it.”

  She examines me for a moment and I can tell she wants to say more. But something tells her not to. Maybe it’s the I don’t give a fuck attitude in my eyes. Or maybe she just knows she’s not going to win any arguments with me, not when she’s now recognized how buzzed I am.

  “We’d better get to sleep. The kids will be up early for Christmas,” she finally says. “You’ll get up with us, won’t you? Daisy will want your help opening presents.”

  I watch as she gently pulls a sleeping Hale from her breast and covers up in one smooth motion. I’d gotten a flash of her rigid nipple. It was darker than I expected, making me wonder if that was to do with nursing or if they were always like that. Not that it matters. She’s still dangerously beautiful. My earlier thoughts on the purity of her nursing have been displaced by desire and I’m tempted to smack myself on the side of my head to rid it.

  Instead, I stand. “Yeah, of course. Shall we?” I gesture to the patio door and then trail after her.

  Lying on my bed, I try to decide if I have the energy to masturbate to that fleeting peek at Sophie’s tits.

  I decide it’s probably not something I should indulge. What would I be if I did? Just another one of the guys in this group of ours who can’t control himself where she’s concerned? No, that’s not where I want to be. She’s fantastic, but I have no interest in giving into that. My dear Ms. Patterson would probably diagnose the attraction for her as some sort of transference or maternal longing or some other psycho-babble. In truth, I’m just drunk.

  Turning over, I grab my mobile and pull up Amelia’s last text to me. She’d wished me safe travels. I hadn’t replied. Didn’t even tell her that we’d landed safely. It was a dick move. I figure I owe her something. The best I can come up with is telling her exactly how I feel at this moment.

  I miss you.

  To my surprise, I see the indication that she’s replying come up within seconds.

  Happy Christmas, Daniel.

  I wish you were here.

  There’s no hint that she’s replying. I watch the screen for what seems like an hour. Finally, she’s typing, and I wait for her message.

  How is it there?

  It took her that long to ask such a banal question? I’m guessing she had more she wanted to say but couldn’t bring herself to do it.

  It’s lovely. Warm and beautiful. Much like you are. Makes me miss you all the more.

  I give myself a pat on the back for that one. Such flowery things don’t usually flow out of me like that.

  You said you’d give me time.

  Well, that isn’t the fucking answer I wanted. I want her to tell me she misses me, too. Even better, if we could turn this into a video chat so I can see her face. Maybe even see more of her. Now is as good of a time as any to get skilled at phone sex. We’ll need it for when I’m on tour. I think of the last sex we had, of how daring she’d been, of how close she was to letting me do whatever I wanted. Other than my “give me your knickers” stunt in that pub in San Francisco, I’d been purposely conservative with her in bed. She’d surprised me with the way she responded to something a bit more. I rub my hardening cock over my jeans.

  Moira is pregnant.

  And there goes the erection. She’s developed a new skill of killing my desire at the worst time. Still, I know what the right response is, so I give it to her.

  Congratulations to her and Nolan. I’m sure Max will be a great big brother.

  After a moment of inaction, I add, Shay asked Jessica to marry him. It was after Christmas services in church this evening. Had a choir at the ready to make a big show of it.

  That’s amazing. Send them my congratulations?

  I will.

  And then it seems we’ve both run out of things to say. There’s no indication she’s typing, and I don’t start either. In the end, I force a closing message.

  Hope you and your family have a good Christmas and New Year’s. Okay to call when I get back?

  She starts her reply right away.

  Yes.

  It’s not much, but I’ll take it.

  39

  Dublin

  * * *

  Danny Boy

  * * *

  It’s the first thing I do when we get back to Dublin two days after the New Year. I call Amelia and hold my breath.

  But she doesn’t answer.

  I leave a brief message and decide to take a hot shower. I need to rinse off the travel, but I also want the alone time. Shay and Jessica are here, too. They’ll both be here until the tour starts in a fortnight. Then Jessica will go back to San Francisco.

  By the time I’m showered and dressed, I have a return message from Amelia telling me she’s happy to hear from me and can we meet for coffee. It sounds rather friendly when all I want is to have her in a much more intimate way, but beggars can’t be choosers. I text her, suggesting Coffeeangel on Trinity Street in an hour’s time and she agrees.

  I find Shay sitting at his drum kit in the Man Cave. He’s getting ready to practice, setting up his in-ear monitors through which he’ll be hearing the setlist the band has agreed upon for rehearsals. They plan to get together for the next ten days to play together live, but my brother has always put in extra effort like this.

  “I’ll be heading out soon,” I tell him.

  He nods and keeps up his preparation. It’s very like him not to make any inquiries. And, of course, it compels me to keep talking.

  “Going to meet Amelia for coffee.”

  This only gets me a cursory glance.

  “I think I’ll leave Roscoe here with you guys. He’s still recovering from his jet lag, you know?”

  “Got it, Danny Boy. Got it.”

  He starts tapping on the cymbals, getting a feel for his touch.

  “So, when I come back, I’ll either be with her again or she’ll have cut me loose.”

  I get another nod from him, but it’s in time with the thumps of the bass drum and I’m not sure if he’s even heard me. I’m not sure what I’d want him to say if he did. This is all just me trying to expel my nervous energy. The certainty I’d had that we were over after telling her I don’t want children hasn’t gone away. I just don’t want to hear it.

  Shay is engrossed in his drums now and I start to turn aw
ay.

  “If you want her, fight for her,” he says to my back.

  Turning to him again, I admit, “It’s sort of complicated.”

  He stops his tinkering and meets my eyes. “It always is. And it’s always worth it.”

  I know he’s talking about romantic love. He and Jessica had their rough patches and have come through them. But I also sense he’s talking about our brotherhood. That he thinks I’m worth all the trouble I’ve given him is an enormous relief. It makes me realize that no matter what happens with Amelia, I’ll still have him. And Jess. And soon, their child. I’ll be a part of a real family, at least tangentially. And that’s a hell of a thing. More, in fact, than I ever could have hoped for.

  Amelia is inside, chatting with the girl behind the counter when I arrive. We give each other an awkward hug, order our coffees plus a raspberry tart for her and take it all to the small back room. We have the space to ourselves and perch on stools at a round table barely large enough to hold our drinks.

  “You look well,” she tells me with a smile that lights up her whole face.

  “You look beautiful,” I tell her in return.

  But she doesn’t take the compliment, instead asking me, “How did everything go with the trip?”

  Though I’m disappointed, I accept that we have to keep playing this game of catch-up. “It was brilliant. Sophie was our mother hen, guiding us to all the sights in the city, making sure we had amazing meals, and just generally taking care of us all. And the show itself was amazing. I actually didn’t work the lights for this one. With it being such a last-minute commitment, they had to use a lot of locals. So, I got to watch it in a sea of happy, drunk Brazilians. We had the best time.”

  “That sounds great.”

  “Oh, don’t let me forget,” I say, “I have a gift for Max in the car. It’s a Brazil vs. Ireland Subbuteo game.”

  “That’s so sweet. He’ll love it, I’m sure.”

  “And? How did you enjoy your holidays?”

  “They were fine. Quiet,” she says. “Without you.”

  I smile at her adding that. It gives me hope that she might not be done with me after all.

  “My dear Amelia,” I purr, “are you saying you missed me?”

  She bites the corner of her lip. “Of course, I did.”

  I lean across the table, grinning at her. “Because you love me, yeah?”

  There’s a sparkle in her eye now, a challenge. “What’s love got to do with it?”

  “Everything, Tina Turner.”

  She laughs. “You’re problematic.”

  “I make things interesting,” I counter.

  “You do everything to excess.”

  “Including you, when you’ll let me in your knickers.”

  “You have no sense of what’s proper.”

  “Thank fucking Christ for that.”

  She holds back a laugh. “You’ve turned my world upside down.”

  “It’s a better view of things that way.”

  “You’re about to leave for months on end.”

  “Come with me.”

  That stops our back and forth. I hadn’t even considered this idea until now. But it feels perfect.

  “Let’s do it, baby,” I tell her. “Come on tour. We’ll travel the fucking world together. How can you say no to that?”

  I can see her considering it, see in her face that the idea is tempting. But then she turns serious. “You don’t want children. I do.”

  And here we are again. I lean back and nearly fall off my stool.

  We sit in silence for the longest time. She sips her coffee and nibbles on her pastry while the frustration builds up inside of me.

  Finally, I blurt out, “How can you not understand that I’m not fit to be a parent? You, who knows me so fucking well. You, who knows everything I went through as a kid. You have to know that even if I did want to put myself through being a father, I’d fuck it all up. There’s no way that I won’t.”

  “Daniel—”

  “I already walked out on one kid. I chose heroin over my own fucking brother. I walked out on him when he needed me. You think I wouldn’t do that to my own kid?”

  “Listen, you’re jumping to the worst-case scenario—”

  “Because that’s what it always comes down to with me. I am the worst-case scenario.”

  “No, you’re not. You have so much more value than you’ll let yourself believe. You’ve come so far from where you used to be. Don’t you see?”

  “What I see is that where I used to be is where I can be just like that.” I snap my fingers. “And it’s to your fucking detriment not to understand that. You’re giving me way too much credit. You always have. You hear me?”

  “You’re falling back on creating your own reality.”

  “You don’t—”

  “I do understand. I do. I know you.”

  I laugh and look away from her. “I’m beginning to think you don’t, Ms. Patterson.”

  “I know you, Danny Boy.”

  She’s said it to make me look back at her and it works.

  “I know Danny Boy. I know Daniel. I know you. You’re this crazy mix of the old you and the new you. You’re reckless and insecure and self-destructive at the same time that you’re responsible and confident and caring. But mostly, you’re still confused about how to reconcile everything that you are. You’ll never be one way or the other. You won’t ever really shed your ‘Danny Boy’ persona. But it has faded. And you won’t be this respectable ‘Daniel’ character, either. But the good things have been ingrained in you. Because it was always there. You’ve always been a good person. Even when you did bad things.”

  That last bit inexplicably brings tears to my eyes. And to make matters worse, she repeats it.

  “Take that in. Because it’s a truth you need to really understand. No matter what you’ve done, you are a good person.”

  Clearing my throat, I blink back the stupid fucking emotion in my eyes and look away from her again. This feels like one of our therapy moments where she went beyond the normal confines of her position, all because she desperately wanted me to understand something about myself. Back then, it worked—both because I trusted her implicitly and because I wanted to get to a better place. With her help, I did.

  So why am I so fucking eager to remind us both that all that is only temporary? That this good behavior is just me living on borrowed time? I suppose her answer would be that I’m giving myself an excuse ahead of time in case I do slip. It’s my way of announcing that nobody can really blame me that I went back to my old ways. After all, I warned them all, didn’t I? Almost makes it easier to give up on myself.

  But it doesn’t have to be like that. That’s what she’s telling me.

  And I love her all the more for it.

  The only problem is that doesn’t clear our impasse.

  “I appreciate all this. I really do,” I say quietly. “It’s stuff I’ll be thinking about.”

  “I’m happy to hear it.”

  Turning my eyes back to her, I offer her a weak smile. “But none of that changes my mind about kids, I’m afraid.”

  She nods. “I know.”

  I’ve got that sinking feeling again, the one that settles into the pit of my stomach like lead and tells me I’ve lost her.

  If I’m such a good person, then I need to let her go. I need to send her on her way with my support.

  “I want you to have what you need, Amelia. And I know you’ll be a wonderful mother,” I tell her.

  “In due time.”

  My eyebrows come together in confusion over that.

  “When you were away, I realized that while I do want children, I don’t have to put so much pressure on the whole thing. The idea that my time is running out because I’m thirty-three, just isn’t fair. I have so much I need to do before I have a family. That includes starting my new job—”

  “New job?”

  “I’m starting as a school psychologist in a few wee
ks.”

  “Wow. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you. I realized I still have something to offer in counseling people. I also love children. And one of my good friends recommended me when a position opened up, so I’m going to take it. It should be the right kind of challenge to focus my skills.”

  “Sounds perfect, actually.” I smile, genuinely happy for the peace she seems to have found.

  “I was thinking it would be a good idea to give myself this year to settle into this new journey. I’ll do my best with this job and then I’ll sort of reassess where I am by the end of the year.”

  “Sounds very rational. Very like you, my dear Amelia.”

  “Well, except for this part,” she says with a laugh.

  I laugh with her, though I’m not sure why.

  “I’m not ready to give you up, love,” she says. “I want to be with you in these last few weeks before you go off on tour.”

  “You do?” My incredulous smile is so big I can feel it at my ears.

  “I do.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then . . . I don’t know for sure. Maybe I could visit you wherever you are in the world during school breaks?”

  “That would be amazing. I’d love nothing more. Well, I mean, I’d love for you to come with me, but I see why you can’t.”

  “We’ll just enjoy what we can with each other for the time being, right?”

  I open my mouth to speak but stop once I realize she’s putting a time limit on our relationship. If I can’t give her a child, then the best I can get is the next year of her life—fragmented though it may be by my time away. Then we’ll go our separate ways. She’ll find some reliable, boring man to settle down with. She’ll have children. Just not with me.

  “Are you okay with that, Daniel?”

  No.

  No, I’m not okay with knowing our relationship is doomed. That we’ll never be anything more than a fleeting connection. That she’s just biding her time until she can find someone else to satisfy what she truly needs to be happy. I’m not okay with knowing I won’t be the one to give her what she needs.