I nodded. “I do. A part of me wants to try but I’m scared. I’m cautious. It doesn’t help that Brad is being such a…” Brad what? Brad actually wasn’t doing anything wrong per se, he was just not being supportive.
“Laila, in regard to Cole, you can’t allow yourself to not try for the sake of fear. I will keep saying that. What I will say too is that now we know what actually happened in the past, we know that he’s never really given you a reason to question how he felt about you.”
She made a fair point I’d never really considered. It was a point I thought I needed to heed.
“I think I’m gonna take the chance. I want to.”
She smiled at that. “Well that’s good. I’m glad to hear it. Now about Brad, sweetie, you’re gonna hate me for saying this because to you the sun used to shine from his ass, but I have news for you. It doesn’t. Neither does it rotate around him. We have this saying in my family. To see me and live with me are two different things. It’s a tad different for you because he’s your brother and you lived with him most of your life. Working with him, however, is gonna be miles different. Brad is a control freak and I personally wouldn’t work with someone like that.”
I frowned. “It’s Remington’s though.”
“Yeah, and that Nick guy shot down your idea.”
“What are you saying? I really want this job.”
“Happiness, that’s what I’m saying. Think about that part. Nothing more. Remember, you’re at work around seventy percent of the day. That’s a really long time. You should be happy. Start there. I know it’s Remington’s and they’re hot shit in the science world so if that is where you want to be, then fight. Do what you need to. It just sounds to me like doing that might not be what you want. At the same time, it might give you more opportunity. It may be a stepping stone.”
I was listening and taking in everything she said.
I would fight because Remington’s was like being at the top and anything else would be like, well, anything else. It wouldn’t be the same.
I nodded and smiled. Remington’s was also the place where Cole worked so that made it a win-win in my book.
I couldn’t wait to see him in a little while.
I didn’t know what I was going to say but I thought I’d start with going to his office.
I’d take it from there and see what happened next.
Deep breath…
Inhale and exhale…
I still didn’t know what I was going to say but on account of the fact that I kissed Cole when I last saw him, I was pretty certain he’d know what I’d want to see him about.
I stood outside his door, knocked, and waited. After a minute I opened it to find he wasn’t in.
Damn.
Maybe he was somewhere else in the building. It was difficult to pin him down sometimes because he was all over the place.
I closed the door and sighed.
“Can I help you with something?” came Brad’s voice from behind me.
Startled, I whirled around to face him. Seeing he still sported that look of disappointment from yesterday placed me on edge.
“Hi, morning. I just needed to speak to Cole quick,” I explained.
He glanced at the door and then back to me. “He’s in Archives. Actually, I wanted a word with you so this is good.”
Here we go. “Okay, what’s going on?”
“I’m just going to be real with you and tell you what I think. You pissed me off yesterday and made me look bad in front of my boss, a man who has the power to help me get up the ladder of success. I work damn hard here and I took pity on you and gave you a chance to skip having to look for work. Now I’m starting to regret it.”
Holy hell. Piper’s words couldn’t have come back to my mind any quicker than they did just now.
She was so right and because I did think the sun shined from his ass, I couldn’t help but be shocked and hurt by his attack.
“That’s unfair. I didn’t do anything wrong. What did I do?”
“Laila, your theories…that’s the sort of crap you talk about over coffee. It’s stuff you say in passing. You don’t talk like that when you don’t have grounds. I’m not saying the idea wouldn’t be great but you know as well as I do that in this world you only make proposals like the one you did when there are reasonable grounds for it. That was why Kirk did so much better than you.”
“What do you want me to do?” I asked weakly. My skin was so hot it started to burn and tingle. The question of what to do was the only thing that came to my mind because I still couldn’t see where I went wrong. I couldn’t even meet him halfway and accept that I’d erred in some way. Because I hadn’t. Not at all.
“I don’t know what you’re doing with Cole, but whatever it is isn’t going to help you land this position. How I would have loved the reverse to happen yesterday. Nick proud of your ideas instead of Kirk’s. You didn’t even run it past me first to see what I thought. You are on a trial, but I won’t hesitate to fire your ass if you piss me off again. I mean it.”
Before I could answer, he walked away. Stormed away was more like it, leaving me staring open-mouthed.
Feeling my cheeks burning, I went to my office. I couldn’t see Cole today, or anybody. I just went in and sat down, feeling the weight of everything on my shoulders and not wanting to talk.
Where did I go wrong?
Dr. Gregory loved the direction my ideas were going. He was an expert in the field so if my ideas were so stupid why didn’t he say that? Cole was an expert too.
I ran through everything in my mind and felt, for the first time, the anxiety of last year coming back to haunt me.
Last year was so awful. Then when I started getting better and feeling more like myself, I worried I wouldn’t be able to keep it up. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to maintain the progress I’d made and that the memory of Porter and what he did would wear me down all over again.
I never wanted to feel like that again.
Today was the closest day that I’d found myself feeling that angst.
Sitting in your office pretty much all day was never a good sign. I’d only left to get a sandwich and check in with the team very briefly. That was it. The supervisor thought I was in here doing filing.
I was glad when the time came to go home.
The sight of a black Ferrari parked on my driveway should have been a clue that the day was about to get worse. But since I didn’t know who the car belonged to, I ventured inside the house right into the unexpected.
And the unwanted.
Inside the living room was Delia and Peter. Siting on the chair across from them was Porter.
My wonderful ex-husband.
Laila
Telling him to get out was the first thing that sprung to my mind.
I had to tamp down my rage firstly because of Peter. He’d never seen me angry. Next because of Delia. She had a worried look on her face and it turned to panic when she saw me.
She stood up and made her way over.
“I’m sorry Laila, I wouldn’t normally but—” she started to explain but I interrupted.
“It’s okay. I’ll see you in the morning,” I answered.
She nodded and Peter ran to me, circling his arms around my waist. He didn’t say anything. It was so unlike him to be so quiet. Not even to say hello to me.
Does he even remember who Porter is?
Porter stood up and smiled with a smug expression. The gray hair that lined the sides of his hair glistened against the ceiling light and his ice blue eyes appeared colder. Arctic.
It had been only two years since I last saw him but to me he looked older, and not in a good way. Not in the way that would lure most women who liked older men. Maybe it was because I could see the evil in him now. Maybe that was why I no longer found him attractive.
“He’s gotten so big,” Porter commented.
“What are you doing here?”
“I needed to see you. Needed to talk about certain th
ings. But really, what a question to ask. Can’t a father come by and see his son?” He gave me the same winning smile that charmed me out of my dignity back in the day.
Now I wondered what the hell I ever saw in him.
That smile I once found charming was just creepy, holding a warning to stay away.
“Don’t…two years and you suddenly remember you have a son?” I raised my brows.
“Really Laila? In front of the boy?” The smug look on his face only got more vibrant, as if he had some info he was holding over me.
I bent down to kiss Peter on his forehead. “Go upstairs sweetie, I’ll be up soon. Okay?”
“Okay Mom.” Peter glanced back to Porter and made his way upstairs. I waited until I heard him get up to the last step before I intensified my glare.
“What the hell do you want? What the hell are you doing in my house?” I practically growled.
“I’ll cut to the chase. I know I haven’t been around, but I want to be. I want to see my son. I want to set up visitation rights.”
My heart squeezed and I was pretty certain I was red with rage.
“How dare you? You just leave us for two years and suddenly walk back in with this bullshit? Like I said before, did you just suddenly remember you had a son?”
“You made it very difficult for me after the divorce. You didn’t want to be around me. I was giving you space to do what you needed.”
Laughter fell from my lips and it made me wonder if I had gone crazy. “You expect me to believe that? Really Porter? That’s not the truth. You left. You were off screwing your students. Remember? That was how I found you. I walked in and saw you. And it wasn’t just her. You were always cheating on me, cheating on our family. Don’t make this out to be my fault.”
I sounded like I was still in pain from it. I wasn’t.
The truth was, I’d hated that I allowed myself to be with a man like him.
“You can’t keep me from seeing my son. I’m his father. You can’t tell me I can’t see him.”
That might be right but it didn’t mean he deserved to see my boy. “What the hell is this?”
“I want to see my son and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it if I walk in here and see him whenever I want.”
“What the hell?”
He shook his head. “This…it’s the easy way. It’s me asking to set something up, something you can’t screw with.”
“So wait, you want to take him traveling with you? Where do you even live?” It wasn’t Pittsburgh.
He stepped closer. “Laila you were always a quick one.”
“Why? Something must have made you come here. You didn’t care before.”
“That is none of your concern.”
“Of course it is! We’re talking about my son,” I shouted. This was so crazy. Crazy and unreal. “You can’t come to my home and make these demands.”
“Yes…I think you’ll find I can. I don’t need to remind you that I’m a very powerful man. I can make certain things happen, certain people do things I want, certain people who are official agree to whatever I want. I could take him from you if I wanted to. This just felt more humane, for you. But cross me and, well…it depends on how much you love the boy. I will take him away from you if I’m pushed.”
Numbness filled me, coursed through me and worked its way inside my soul.
I didn’t need to be reminded of how powerful he was. I knew. That would be the only way we could get a divorce where I ended up with nothing. Not a damn thing. To this day I didn’t know how the shit worked the way it did.
It was only our house in LA we lived in that I kept. But that was because of Peter. I didn’t get anything else. He’d done something with all his assets and everything was shifted to make it look like he wasn’t earning enough for me to take half his belongings. And since I was earning well above what the judge supposedly deemed as average, I wasn’t seen as being in need.
The look on his hard face was enough to show me how serious he was.
He could do it too.
He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a card.
“My number is on there, call me. I want an answer in the next twenty-four hours. If I don’t get one, or the one I get is not to my liking, you’ll hear from my lawyers.”
Swallowing hard, I took the business card and he walked out. The echo of his footsteps against the hardwood floor brought back memories of the last time I saw him.
Leaving.
I waited until the door clicked shut before I broke down. Tears rolled down my cheeks and my legs gave from beneath me. I crumbled to the floor.
Visitation rights. God…
I got it. He was entitled to see his son, but him not being in Pittsburgh or anywhere nearby meant anything. What if it meant me seeing my baby for a few months out of the year while Porter had him the rest of the time?
The flutter of little hands on my back made me lift my head.
Peter stood before me looking so sad.
“Mom, why are you crying?” he asked.
“I’m so sorry baby. I’m just sad.”
“Because of that man? I don’t know if I like him. He wasn’t like Cole.”
Cole…
I cried harder and my heart actually hurt.
But my heart knew what would help me. Who would help me.
I stood, grabbed Peter’s jacket from the coatrack, and put it on him.
“We’re gonna take a little trip,” I told him.
Instantly his face brightened. “Is it an adventure?”
“Yeah, I think it will be.”
I was sure going to Cole’s place would be exactly that for him.
For me it would be more.
I’d become the girl again who used to run to him.
Run to him for strength.
I tried to keep the tears away while I drove. I tried very hard but they just kept streaming down my cheeks.
What an absolute jerk Porter was.
I was so mad I could breathe fire.
We got to Cole’s house, which looked exactly the same as it did when last I saw it.
I prayed he was home and it was okay to go to him.
I picked Peter out of the car and carried him up the steps, then rang the doorbell and waited. Like I waited this morning at his office door.
He answered seconds later.
His hair looked damp and he had a towel draped over his shoulders. He looked like he was either in the shower or had just worked out.
“Laila, Peter.” He beamed and Peter practically jumped out of my arms into his.
“Cole!” Peter squealed.
Cole laughed. “I missed you too buddy,” he told Peter and held him close. Seeing I wasn’t okay, he returned his focus to me and I broke down all over again.
“Baby, come here.” He slipped his arm around me and held me too.
I held on to his shirt to keep myself from falling. Falling into despair.
He ushered me inside and Peter stroked my hair.
“Peter, run upstairs to the first room. You’ll find all my superhero figurines in there and a whole bunch of motorcycle stuff.”
Peter gasped. “Oh my gosh. Yippee!” He jumped out of Cole’s arms and raced up the stairs.
Cole then took me into the living room and set me down on the long leather sofa.
The place still looked the same. Masculine just like him, with that less is more look. Seeing him in front of me made me question why I had someone like him and never thought to even choose to be with a man who cared about me.
“Laila, tell me what happened.” He crouched down before me and took my hands.
“Porter. He was at my house when I got home,” I blurted out, on another wave of tears.
“What?”
I nodded. “He was there.”
I told him what happened.
“He could do it Cole. He’s right. He’s a very powerful man. He could take Peter away from me.”
Cole shook his head an
d the wild look that flashed in his eyes showed how worked up he was.
“No baby…you let me deal with this.”
“Cole, what are you going to do?”
“Don’t worry. Just don’t. Hey, I get two for one tonight. My girl and my kid.”
Hearing that, I just melted and threw my arms around him.
My girl and my kid
For the first time in a long time I felt like I actually had hope.
Like I belonged to someone.
Someone who wouldn’t break me.
Since it was Wednesday we both missed out on the hospital visit. Cole contacted Porter, actually called him and arranged to meet at midday back at my house. We drove Peter to daycare first then got back to my place just before twelve.
We must have had five minutes to the hour before the doorbell rang and in came Porter.
His face when he saw Cole was classic.
Porter was just over ten years older than Cole but not out of shape in the least. But Cole looked like an avenging angel dressed in his black button-down shirt and black slacks. His jet black hair was striking against it, his face stern.
“Well, looks like you came with a friend, Laila,” Porter stated, looking Cole up and down.
Cole smiled. “Her oldest, so I don’t take it lightly that you threatened her.”
I made my way over to Cole to stand next to him. “Threatened was only the result if it came to it. This…” Porter lifted his hands and glowered at me. “Is this your answer? You get this punk to try and frighten me?”
I didn’t answer him. I didn’t have anything to say that I hadn’t already said. All I felt for him now was pure disgust.
Cole managed to get a private investigator who did a little digging around and got the answer to why Porter was back in my life. It turned out he’d had gotten remarried and discovered he couldn’t have any more kids. That was what was happening so he thought he’d come to collect on the one he had. My child.
“Punk? I haven’t been called that in a while.” Cole laughed. “I should introduce myself properly. Dr. Cole Dawson, at your service. Dawson, as in Robert Dawson. President of the board of trustees at the American Medical Association. Robert Dawson is my father and the head of many things to do with the medical world and the teaching world. Given what happened at your last job, I’m sure you’ll want to protect the one you have.”
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