I swung the bag full of the groceries I’d picked up by my side as I strolled down the street, and I wondered what we were going to get up to that night with the apartment all to ourselves. That last time, when Erin had been at her after-school club, I had taken firm advantage of the space and the time, and Nina had given as good as she had taken it. My kinky side had been on lockdown since Erin came along, but now that it was out to play once more, I had to admit that I missed having it around. I looked forward to finding out just how far I could take her, just how far she was going to let me go over the course of this evening.
It was strange to think that the last person I dated had been Samantha. I mean, if you could even really call what the two of us did dating; it was more a controlled explosion, the both of us flipping our lives upside down to try and get things to work when we knew, in our hearts, that they were never fucking going to. Samantha wasn’t the worst person in the world, but sometimes she came pretty damn close to it, and I just couldn’t handle the thought of raising a child with her. Hell, even being alone in a room with her for more than five minutes at a time. I was glad she was off traveling the world, doing what-the-fuck-ever with her life, because it meant she kept herself away from Erin and me. What would she do if she found out about Nina? The thought hadn’t crossed my mind until then, but I winced at the very imagining of it. That wouldn’t be good. That wouldn’t be good at all. I would just have to make sure that I kept our relationship on lockdown long enough that Nina was firmly integrated into our lives before Samantha came rolling back in to wave her arms around and make noise about being Erin’s mother again, as though that meant a damn thing after the way she had treated her daughter.
But maybe it would be different with Nina. In fact, I knew for sure that it was going to be different with her because I was so far removed from the person I had been when things had kicked off between Samantha and me. I had Erin to think of first, and she was always the one at the front of my mind; I would never let anything get in the way of that, and I had been her father for long enough to know I could trust my instincts on this. Nina was good for Erin, had been from the moment she’d stepped up to take care of her that evening, and even if Erin had little clue as to what was actually going on between us, I knew that she would be delighted when we decided it was time to tell her. This was a new start for all of us, for Erin and for me, and maybe even for Nina as well. I would have to get the full story of that asshole of an ex out of her one day—
Just as I approached the steps to our apartment building, I stopped dead in my tracks. I blinked a couple of times as though the image in front of me was so clearly and utterly wrong that it would reveal itself to be a mirage. But she was still there when I opened my eyes.
Samantha. I must have manifested her with the power of thought alone.
I strode up to her quickly, and she got to her feet as soon as she saw me approaching. She was drumming those long-ass nails on the metal railing of the steps, staring at me expectantly, as though she had an appointment.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing here?” I demanded, and Samantha rolled her eyes at me in that infuriating way she had, as though I was the biggest idiot in the world for not instantly catching on.
“I’m here to see my daughter,” she replied simply, as though the answer should have been obvious. I widened my eyes at her. Sure, I had expected some bullshit, but this was something else entirely.
“You can’t seriously think that I’m just going to turn around and let you see Erin because you rolled up at her doorstep demanding to spend time with her?” I stared at her, shaking my head. “Come on, Samantha, even you’re not that stupid.”
“Don’t,” she lifted one pointed nail and held it an inch from my face, “call me stupid.”
The perfume that she’d always worn was nearly choking me, and I wanted to step away from her, to catch my breath and get my head together, but I knew I had to deal with this now before things got any more out of control.
“Samantha,” I fought the urge to shake her to get some actual sense into her. “You heard what I said on the phone last week, didn’t you? If you want to arrange an actual schedule with Erin, we can do that, but I’m trying to make sure that life is as settled and as easy for her as possible—”
“And you don’t want me to be a part of it.” She shook her head. “How easy do you think that is? For a young girl, growing up without a mother? You can’t tell me she doesn’t feel as though she’s missing out.”
I dumped my bags and ran my hands through my hair. I would have taken her up to the apartment just to get her off the street, but I didn’t want her to get in there in case she just refused to leave. This wasn’t how I wanted to explain the ex-situation to Nina, that was for sure.
“I think she does just fine without you,” I replied firmly. I was starting to lose my cool. How could she always do this to me? I could be the calmest, coolest, most zen I had ever been, and she could still needle me in such a way that made me feel like I was going to start yelling at her any second.
“Then let me see her,” Samantha implored me.
Anyone else might have taken the passion in her voice for sincerity, for an actual, genuine urge to see her daughter, but I knew what it was: an attempt to manipulate me, to get me to give her anything and everything she wanted. She knew how to get me angry, and she knew how to make it look like I was the one who was being unreasonable.
“Samantha, I’m not going to have this conversation with you for a minute longer,” I told her firmly. “I don’t care how certain you are that you deserve to see her, you don’t, and if you really want to prove that you can make this work, you can call me up, and we can figure out a time that actually works for both of us. Alright?”
“That’s not what I’m here for!” she exploded, suddenly losing her cool; she would be stamping her foot and demanding her way before I knew it.
“Then go,” I snapped back at her. “I don’t want you here. Erin isn’t even here tonight, she’s staying with someone else.”
I nearly dropped Ant’s name, but I thought better of it at the last moment—the last thing I needed was her figuring out where my sister lived and storming all the way over there to try and make her point to Ant in person. I was pretty sure Ant would take the opportunity to gleefully call the cops on her, and frankly, I wouldn’t blame her.
“You’re keeping my daughter from me,” she gasped, as though she could hardly believe that this was happening. “You realize that? You’re keeping a family apart, Logan. This is your doing.”
“I know it is,” I replied, clenching my fists at my sides, trying to keep my shit together so I didn’t just go off on her. “But that’s the best thing for this family, keeping us apart. You made that decision when you abandoned the two of us, remember?”
“That was so long ago.” She waved her hand. “You really expect me to stand by every single thing that I did nearly a decade ago?”
“When it comes to you leaving your daughter behind, I fucking do,” I shot back, loud enough that someone walking down the street past us glanced at me and cocked an eyebrow. I looked back at him, daring him to say something, and he lowered his gaze and carried on.
“I’m not asking for a lot from you,” I continued, and I realized my voice was getting louder and didn’t give a crap. “I’m just asking that you stick to the agreement we made, the one that you wanted. You fucking remember now?”
“I was young!” she shot back at me, clearly as tired of this back-and-forth as I was. “I didn’t know what I was giving up! Are you seriously telling me that if someone had come to you and made the same offer way back in the day you wouldn’t have taken them up on it?”
I fell silent for a long moment, and she seemed to think it was because I was considering her comment. But I wasn’t. I was just so angry that I couldn’t speak, couldn’t even think. The implication she was making, that I would have abandoned my daughter if I was given the chance, that I would hav
e just left her the same way Samantha—it was so cruel it actually made my head hurt. I shook my head.
“I would never have done that,” I replied fiercely, and I knew it was the truth. And now that she had pushed that button, there was no way in hell I was going to be able to treat her with any degree of kindness any longer.
“You need to get out, now,” I told her, pointing down the street.
“And where do you expect me to go?” she demanded. She always had an answer for everything, was always prepared for a way to make me look like an asshole for kicking her out as though she didn’t bring this on herself, time and time again; as though all of this couldn’t have been fixed if she had just listened to me for a change.
“I don’t fucking care, Samantha!” I exploded. “I just need you to get away from my apartment, away from my daughter, out of my life!”
As I raised my voice and started yelling at her was precisely the moment that I saw Nina standing behind her.
Nina was staring at the two of us like she had seen a pair of ghosts, and it felt as though my heart stopped dead in my chest when I laid eyes on her. It must have been written all over my face because Samantha smiled triumphantly, clearly believing that she had managed to break me down and convince me to let her come in.
“See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” she planted her hands on her hips and cooed condescendingly, and I brushed straight past her, no longer interested in playing a second of her stupid game anymore.
“Nina,” I took her hand and she let me, letting it lay there like a dead fish. “I’m so sorry you had to see this.”
“Who the fuck is that?” Samantha spun around on her heel, narrowing her eyes at the woman next to me as though she sensed competition. “What’s she doing here?”
“I live here,” Nina told her calmly, and she let go of my hand and pushed by the two of us, so she could get into her apartment. Her face was clear, and her eyes were fixed forward, as though she was working hard to pretend that there was nothing going on in her head at all. Samantha glanced at me, eyebrows raised, and I shook my head at her.
“Get out of here,” I told her, and I guessed the anger in my voice was so obvious that even she couldn’t deny it any longer. She raised her eyebrows and held her hands up and backed off down the street, and I grabbed the bags where I’d dumped them earlier and hurried to catch up with Nina. My heart was pounding in my chest. How much had she seen? How much did she hate me right now as a result of it? I had never really spoken to her about Samantha before, never really bothered, but now she turned up on my doorstep, and Nina had seen the side of me that I had done my best to keep from her all this time: the side with the temper, the side that lashed out and fired back and got mad.
I caught up with her just as she reached her door, and she was fumbling with the key in the lock as I started to talk.
“Nina, I’m so sorry you had to walk in on that,” I told her, the words pouring out of me. “I didn’t expect her to be here. She just turned up, and I was trying to get rid of her. I’m so sorry—”
“No, don’t be,” she replied, and she still had that curious calmness to her voice, the same kind she’d had before, as though none of this had really sunk in yet. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
I paused. I wanted to grab her hand and lead her up to the apartment where we could laugh about how ridiculous Samantha was acting and drink a little wine and thank God that Erin had been staying with Ant that evening. But Nina seemed reluctant to so much as look me in the eye, and I couldn’t say I blamed her. I hated getting out of control the way I had done down there; there was a reason I had fought so hard to get a handle on my temper, but Samantha always seemed to know the precise buttons to press to get me to act out like a fucking teenager.
“Nina?” I spoke her name one more time, not sure what I was hoping to achieve.
She turned and looked at me, eyes blank. “Yes?”
“Are you still coming up for dinner today?” I tried desperately.
She sighed heavily, and then shook her head, looking down at the floor in front of us. “I think it’s for the best if we leave that for now,” she admitted. “I need … I need a little time to think.”
“Really, you don’t have to worry about her,” I tried to promise her. “She’s nothing to me. She’s not even part of my life anymore.”
“That’s not true,” she pointed out calmly. “She was right there. She’s a part of your life whether you like it or not, Logan.”
And with that, she closed the door in my face, and I stood there staring at the pale wood and wondering what the hell just happened. Half an hour before, I had been walking home excited to cook dinner for the woman I was dating, and then the last woman I’d dated rolled in to come fuck everything up, apparently just to make a point about the fact she still had control over my life. I had no idea what to do now to make it better, so I turned up to my apartment, dumped the bags on the floor inside, and cracked open the bottle of wine I had been hoping to save for the two of us. I had a lot of thinking to do, same as Nina, and I had a feeling it was going to be a lot easier with half a bottle of red inside me to take the edge off.
But after a glass or two, I heard a knock on the door and felt a zing of excitement—it was Nina, and the two of us could work it out. She had been a little shaken, who wouldn’t be, but now she was here and willing to give it a try and—
I opened the door and found myself face-to-face with Samantha.
Chapter 15
Nina
I heard her running up the stairs, and I knew precisely where she was headed. I could have stuck my head out and stopped her, told her that she was crazy if she thought that Logan was actually going to have a conversation with her about this after the shit she had pulled on him. But it wasn’t my place to get involved with any of this. Instead, I went to my door and listened to what happened next.
She banged on the door like she was trying to take it off its hinges, and when he eventually answered, I could practically feel his irritation dripping down from where I was hiding out.
“Samantha?” he demanded, sounding tired like he wanted nothing more than to shove her back down the stairs and out of the apartment once and for all.
“You can’t just walk away from me like that!” she exclaimed.
She had the most grating voice, like someone dragging acrylic nails over a blackboard. I had only caught a glimpse of her, but she was a little terrifying, perfectly made-up and constructed like she had built herself out of solid steel and was about as likely to back down.
“If you don’t get out of here in the next five minutes, Samantha, I’m going to call the police,” Logan told her firmly. I thanked God once more that at least Erin wasn’t around; the thought of her having to face this after everything else she had been through made my heart ache. Small blessings.
“Then call the police on me,” she snapped back at him. “I mean, you’re the one keeping my daughter from me. You really think they’re going to believe that she doesn’t want her mother in her life?”
“All it takes is five minutes of research for them to find out that you’ve been out of her life her entire fucking life,” he fired back. “Get out of here, Samantha, you don’t have a leg to stand on.”
“You can’t stand to be around me, can you?” she snarled, and there was a sudden edge to her voice, as though she had finally figured out which buttons she could press to get a rise out of Logan. I wanted to run up there, drag her away, tell him that she was nothing but a short fuse waiting to blow up the rest of his life. But I knew that I couldn’t stick my oar in. I would only make things worse. I had seen the way she looked at me, as though she wanted to claw me. I didn’t want to deal with it.
“No, I really fucking can’t.” Logan sighed deeply, as though it should have been obvious.
“It’s because you still have feelings for me,” she told him, gleefully. “That’s why you can’t bear to be around me. Because you’re still in love with
me.”
My heart dropped. I knew it wasn’t true. I knew that he couldn’t have faked the way he was with me, couldn’t have made it up on the spot. And yet, hearing those words come out of her mouth, I believed her. Just for a moment, I supposed that she knew better than me. She had known him longer—she had shared something that ran deeper.
“That’s not true—”
“And that’s why you’re keeping Erin from me,” she told him, finishing up with a flourish. The whole building must have been able to hear the end of this argument. It had certainly provided some late-afternoon drama for me. I had been so looking forward to tonight, to spending a date night with Logan and actually letting ourselves indulge in some romance. But now I wanted to distance myself as far from Samantha and Logan and all of it, for a long while.
“That’s not fucking true, and you need to leave,” he told her. He was speaking so quietly that I was having a hard time making out what he was saying, but the hardness of his voice was enough.
“Prove it,” she replied.
His voice dimmed for a moment as he ducked back into the apartment. “I’m calling the cops,” he told her, and I heard the distant beep of the buttons on his phone. “And if you’re not out of here in the next ten seconds, I’m going to get them here and tell them that you’re harassing me. Alright?”
“You’re such a bastard,” she shot back, landing in one more blow before she left, but with that, she scuttled down the stairs and past my door and out of the building. Thank God.
I heard Logan let out a long sigh above me, and his door clicked shut. I wanted to go up and comfort him, tell him that he was in the right and that it was all going to be okay, but I felt as though my feet were rooted to the ground. My mind, on the other hand, was whirring so fast that I could hardly keep up with it.
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