Cooper

by Lagomarsino, Giulia

  I sighed and pushed away from her, making sure to keep her covered as I pulled my own jeans back up. She was looking perfectly disheveled and ready to be fucked, but it would have to wait just a little longer. After she was presentable, I shoved past Tony, who was standing guard in the entrance. Apparently, I hadn’t pulled her as deep into the house of mirrors as I thought.

  “Nice,” Tony whispered as I walked out of the house. “Way to scare the fuck out of all the little kids.”

  “Fuck off,” I grumbled, shoving my shoulder into him as I passed.

  “I thought we were meeting up,” Delaney said.

  “We went on the ferris wheel,” Becky said with a smirk. “It was…interesting.”

  “Ooh, what happened? Should I take Tony up there?”

  “Only if you want a kid in your lap,” I grumbled.

  Tony barked out a laugh, pressing his hands to his eyes as he bent over. “God, foiled twice in one night. Man, you have the worst luck.”

  “No shit. You couldn’t just stand guard while I- ow!”

  Becky fucking pinched me and narrowed her eyes at me. “Behave.”

  “Or what?” I challenged.

  “Or I won’t do the dunk tank.” She sauntered off with Delaney while Tacoman and I stared after them.

  “A chilly night and a light colored t-shirt?” Tacos grinned. “That sounds like my kind of party.”

  “Just keep your eyes on Delaney and off my woman’s tits.”

  We caught up with them at the dunk tank, but Becky spun around slightly panicked and tried pulling me away.

  “You know, I think we should just go home.”

  “Why?” I asked, trying to move past her. “You promised me the dunk tank, and I’m going to be the one to dunk you.”

  “I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Why?” I asked, finally shoving past her just as I saw a girl already sitting in the tank. I only caught a glimpse of the blonde-haired girl before a ball hit the target and she was dunked under water. The girl popped up out of the water, her tits bouncing in the air. I laughed because she wasn’t wearing a bra and it was quite chilly for that. Her nipples protruded through the thin fabric and I was imagining the same happening with Becky. The woman in the tank laughed and then she turned and faced me. Only it was a face I knew all too well.

  “Ahh!” I screamed, covering my eyes with my hands as my daughter’s eyes locked with mine. I spun around and ran right into a vendor, knocking over the whole fucking stand and sending all the food sprawling. Becky was grasping at my arm, trying to pull me up and Tacocheese was laughing his ass off at me.

  “What the fuck?” I shouted, not caring that there were little kids around.

  “Dad!”

  I spun around and caught another glimpse of her way too naked body and freaked the fuck out. I tore off my shirt and yanked it down over her head. “Tony,” I barked, shoving Kayla to him. “Take her home.”

  But then Tony grinned and I thought better of it. I yanked her out of his arms and shoved her to Becky and Delaney, chills running down my spine as I had flashbacks of her popping out of the tank. “Just take her home and lock her in her room.”

  “Daddy-”

  I chuckled humorlessly and scowled at her. “Don’t fucking call me ‘Daddy’ after what I just saw. What the hell were you thinking? And where the fuck is your bra? There are little kids here!”

  “It was for work! I didn’t know I was going to have to do that!”

  “So, you regularly walk around without a bra?”

  She didn’t answer, and I didn’t really want to know. I spun around and scrubbed at my eyes, hoping that image wouldn’t be burned into my eyes for the rest of my life.

  Tony clapped me on the back. “I think you need a drink.”

  “No shit.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Becky

  “Oh my God!” Delaney laughed as we got into her car. “That was priceless.”

  “Delaney,” I chastised, turning around to look at Kayla. “Kayla, what were you thinking?”

  Her eyes went wide as she stared at me with incredulity. “I didn’t do that on purpose! I was supposed to be working at the ice cream shop, but they needed people to work the fair. I didn’t have a choice!”

  “You told your dad that you would be at work. Then you showed up at the fair. You know that he’s not going to see this your way. You should have called him.”

  “I was going to as soon as I got to the fair, but then I got shoved at the tank and the next thing I know, Dad’s there and he’s freaking out!”

  I couldn’t see how Coop would see this any way other than her lying about where she would be.

  “Kayla, that’s not going to be a good enough answer, especially after seeing you with no bra on. What the hell was that about?”

  “The wire broke through the fabric and it was poking me. I took it off at work because the apron covered me. I didn’t even think about it again until I was getting into the tank. By then, there was nothing I could do.”

  I sighed and sank back in my seat, wondering how the hell I was going to get her out of this one. She had the worst luck known to man and Coop was a live wire, just waiting to be set off. And tonight definitely set him off. Kayla was going to end up in a nunnery if we didn’t play this right.

  We pulled into Reed Security and I immediately took her to the panic room, looking for anyone that might be able to help us strategize. Luckily, I ran into Raegan and her mom in the kitchen.

  “Susan! Raegan! I need your help. Coop is gonna kill Kayla if we don’t figure out something before he gets back here.”

  “What happened?” Raegan asked, eyes wide as she plowed through a whole package of Oreo cookies. I looked at her funny and she shrugged. “I’m pregnant.”

  “Oh my gosh!” I yelped, jumping up and down as I ran to hug her. “That’s fantastic news!”

  “Yeah, that is great, but we have major problems headed this way. I’m guessing we have twenty minutes,” Delaney reminded me. “Congrats, by the way.”

  Raegan nodded and I shook my head, reminding myself that pregnancy was not life-threatening, but Coop was if he came back here and we didn’t have a damn good explanation.

  “Okay, long story short, Kayla had to go work the dunk tank at the spring carnival and wasn’t wearing a bra. Coop happened to see her right as she got dunked, and all the stuff that no father wants to see when she came up.”

  Raegan grimaced and Susan just stared at me wide-eyed.

  “That sucks,” Raegan finally said. “Yeah, I’m not seeing how you walk your way out of that one.”

  “Seriously? You lived dangerously for years and you can’t come up with one good thing to help us out?”

  “Hey, I’ve left my wily ways behind. I’m a good girl now.”

  Susan snorted beside her and pulled Kayla over to a chair. “Now, let the professionals handle this. You’re trying to think of how Kayla can get out of this, but you need to think as the woman. And the woman controls the man. You just can’t let him think that he’s being controlled. Trust me, ladies. I’ve been doing this for years.”

  Twenty minutes later, as expected, Coop came storming into the panic room with Tony in tow. “Where the hell is she?”

  I stood immediately and stepped in front of Kayla. “Don’t worry, Coop. I’ve already called the store and told them Kayla no longer works for them.”

  “You bet your ass she doesn’t,” he snapped.

  “I know. And to think that they threatened her job if she didn’t go do this stupid dunk tank thing. And she even told them she needed to call you first, but that stupid manager just didn’t listen.”

  “He didn’t?”

  “And worse, she told him that she was having issues with her…” I cleared my throat and jerked my head toward Kayla, who was hiding her head like she was ashamed, “her wardrobe, but they didn’t care. They said it would sell more tickets. She was absolutely mortified!”
<
br />   “She was?” Coop said, completely stupified.

  “In fact, I would say the next time that Kayla wants a job, you need to do better research into who her employers are going to be. Seriously, I’m not sure how you allowed her to go out and get a job, but you didn’t check every employee out first. That’s just not like you, Coop.”

  His brows furrowed and he glanced over my shoulder at Kayla, a hint of worry on his face. “I guess you’re right. Well, maybe it’s best she doesn’t have a job anymore.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” I interjected. “Think of the great lesson she’s learned tonight. I think an extra self-defense course should be given before she finds another job, but this would be a good teaching moment for her, don’t you think?”

  He nodded slightly. “Sure. Maybe you’re right.”

  “Of course I’m right. In fact, I think you should go talk with her instructors now and make sure that she’s all set up starting tomorrow.”

  “Yeah, that’s…a good idea.”

  He took a step back and tilted his head as he looked at Raegan, Susan, Kayla, Delaney, and I staring at him expectantly. He cleared his throat and then turned on his heel, leaving us alone with only Tony Tacos.

  “Slick,” he grinned. “Very slick.”

  “No, well played,” I clarified. I knew he wouldn’t give us up. Every once in a while, a man knew that he just had to let the chips fall where they may. He left us with a smirk, and we all finally breathed a sigh of relief.

  “I can’t believe you did that,” Kayla huffed. “Now he’s going to be even more protective of me.”

  “Kayla,” Susan smiled in a motherly way and squeezed her tight for a moment. “You may have lost the battle, but you won the war.”

  ✯✯✯✯✯

  I stayed behind that night, even though I should have just gone home. If I stuck around too long, Coop would know that I was up to something and it would make things worse for Kayla. But I wanted to stay in his bed and wake up with him in the morning, so I stupidly stayed behind. When he walked into his bedroom that night, I knew by the look on his face that the jig was up.

  “So, it occurred to me after I went and planned out a new training schedule that Kayla didn’t actually explain what happened today.”

  I fidgeted with the comforter and did my best not to look at him. “She didn’t? Well, she explained it all to me.”

  “Right. Well, it just made me so angry that her boss would treat her that way, so I called the store and had a little talk with them about how they treat their employees.”

  My eyes flew to his and he smirked. “You-you…” I stuttered, not sure how to respond to that. For some reason, when I went over this in my head, I never thought he would actually contact them. “You contacted the owner. What did he say?”

  “Well, after I threatened to cut off his balls, I told him that I would destroy his business and take down his whole family, including his pretty wife that’s five months pregnant.”

  “You didn’t!”

  “I did. And then I called the police chief and told him that the guy was a pedophile.”

  I slapped my hand against my forehead and cringed. “No, please tell me you didn’t really do that.”

  “I did. Do you really think I’m the type of man to walk away and let someone treat my daughter like that?”

  “Shit. Coop, it was all a lie. I made it up because you weren’t going to listen to Kayla.”

  “What?” His face turned slightly angry, but I didn’t have time for that. I had to figure out where to go from here.

  “I’m sorry, but all that shit that happened tonight wasn’t Kayla’s fault. It was purely coincidental. You were gonna lock her in her room for the rest of her life!”

  “So, the guy isn’t a pedophile?”

  “No!”

  “Shit. I had him dragged off to jail. I may have even paid someone to teach him a lesson.”

  I groaned and hid my head in the blankets. I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t thought of how Coop would fly off the handle over this. I was such an idiot.

  My head snapped up when I heard him chuckle with a shit-eating grin on his face. My mouth dropped open when I realized that I had been played. I picked up the pillow and threw it at him.

  “You played me!”

  “You played me first.”

  “So, you didn’t do all that stuff? You didn’t call the manager or the police?”

  “No. I got down to the training center and realized that you were doing what you had to so that Kayla didn’t get in trouble.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, not sure that he could have thought that rationally under those conditions.

  “Who really figured it out?”

  “What are you talking about?” he asked, pulling his shirt over his head. Who was hiding from whom now?

  “I’m talking about the fact that you were angry and determined. You weren’t thinking clearly. So, who was it that clued you in?”

  He yanked down the zipper on his pants, shoving them down his legs. He quirked an eyebrow at me when he did the same with his underwear and his cock started to harden under my stare. He was trying to distract me with sex, but it wouldn’t work. I wouldn’t give in until I knew the truth.

  “Tell me.”

  He crawled onto the bed and over my body, pressing me down into the mattress. His lips brushed my neck and then started sucking hard.

  “Who…was it?” I asked, trying to hold my concentration.

  His hands moved down my waste and slipped inside my pants. I tried to wiggle free, but once his hands started working, I just couldn’t think clearly anymore. What the hell did I care anyway? I won in the end and that was all that mattered. I threw my leg around his waist and rolled over him, straddling his hips. I had my man and was about to have major orgasms. What more could a girl ask for?

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Coop

  I pulled up to Becky’s house with a surprise coffee for her. She loved that specialty coffee shit, but rarely got it for herself. After last night, she overslept and had to run out the door to get home and get ready for work. I knew she would be hustling to get ready and she wouldn’t have time to stop for the good stuff. So, I went out and got it for her. I laughed at the way I was acting, tripping over myself to please my woman. I was just like every other schmuck at work, and I didn’t even care.

  I slowed as I pulled onto her street and saw all the people standing out in their yards. They were staring all around, but I wasn’t sure at what until I saw black objects on the ground. I pulled into Becky’s drive and parked, getting out to see what all the fuss was about. There were dead birds all up and down the street. Walking over to one that lay in Becky’s yard, I kicked at it, but there was nothing weird about it, other than it was dead.

  “What do you think did it?” Becky asked, walking up behind me.

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Bird flu?” I joked. She shot me a look, telling me she didn’t think I was funny. “What? I don’t know what you want me to say. I have no idea what killed the birds. Maybe there’s a bird virus going around. I’m sure the police will send someone to check it out.”

  “You don’t think maybe this, along with all the other things that have been happening are a bit suspicious?”

  “What things?” I crossed my arms over my chest and stared her down. Becky was starting to freak out over weird shit. Or maybe she just really missed a good conspiracy theory. Either way, there was nothing going on here.

  “I’m talking about the robberies and the dead dog.”

  “Okay, first, the robberies were all stupid shit, and that stopped, right?” She shrugged, giving me a grudging look. “And the dog got hit by a car when it ran out in the road. Now, I’m sure that it’s disturbing to have a bunch of dead birds on the street, but what exactly do you think is going on here?”

  “I don’t know,” she huffed. “Maybe someone is testing out a deadly virus to kill humans with, and they wanted to make sure
that it was viable airborne.”

  I nodded, like any of that made sense. “So, someone tested out a virus to see if it was airborne, but it only killed birds, and miraculously missed all the humans.”

  “Hey, I didn’t say it was a perfect theory.”

  I held back the snort that almost escaped. I had to remind myself that it was never a good idea to laugh at your girlfriend. “It’s not a theory at all. It doesn’t even make sense. Whatever happened here is most likely something that all these birds ate, and then it made them sick.”

  “Yes!” she shouted, her eyes going wide. She started pacing her driveway, her fingers picking at her lips as she started mumbling to herself. I held her cup of coffee in my hand and, without thinking, took a sip. It was disgusting. How did she drink this shit? I spit it back out and pretended that I hadn’t just backwashed into her coffee. Maybe she wouldn’t drink it now that she had a bird flu case on her hands.

  “Okay,” she mumbled. “So, someone fed the birds and wanted to kill them all. But why? Why would anyone want to kill all these birds?”

  I rolled my eyes as she started pacing again. Was she actually expecting me to answer? Because the answer was that no one would kill a bunch of birds. What would be the point? There was no point, but Becky needed a mystery to solve, so I indulged her.

  “Maybe someone had a treatment done on their lawns. It’s springtime and people are starting to get everything ready for summer. It’s possible that the birds ate something that was toxic.”

  “But wouldn’t the company know better?” Becky asked.

  “It wouldn’t be the first time that someone or something has died because a company didn’t realize they were basically laying down poison.”

  “You’re right. I should have ground samples taken and I should call a private lab that can run tests on all these birds. I need to get ahead of it before the company realizes what they did.”

  Right. I nodded and pretended that she wasn’t acting totally illogical. It was like she thought she was Erin Brockovich or something. She was probably going to question all the neighbors and start asking for their medical records. God, I really hoped that she didn’t break into any companies to steal documents.