through the door of the coffee shop down the block from my house. When Raymond spotted me, he rushed toward me with his arms out. I knew better than to expect a hug. He wasn’t coming for me.
Raymond, the man who’d called childbirth icky and babies smelly, scooped Joey out of the stroller and nestled her in his arms.
“Hello, Precious Angel McChunk-Cheeks.” He ran his nose along her cheek. “Come with Daddy Raymond to pick out a donut. Sadly, you can’t have one. I’m going to take one for the team and eat it for you.”
“Hi, Ray,” I said flatly.
He flashed me a slightly sheepish grin. “Hey, Kit. Don’t mind me and Joey. We’re having a private conversation.”
Davida waved at me from a table in the corner. I pointed to the counter. I needed coffee before I could socialize. Last night had been another all-nighter. Somehow, Joey was all bright-eyed and cheerful, but I was seriously dragging.
Caffeine in hand, I fell into the empty chair beside Davida. Raymond and Joey were still wandering the coffee shop, giving me a minute to breathe, which was so fucking nice.
“You look worn out, darling,” Davida drawled.
“That’s because I am.” I sipped my iced coffee, and my eyes nearly rolled back in my head. I had no business splurging on designer coffee, but sometimes being irresponsible was the necessary decision. “Thank you for saying so.”
“I’ve told you a hundred times I’ll come stay at yours to help you at night.” Davida rolled her eyes. “Don’t bother saying no. I’m tired of hearing it.”
“You know I appreciate it.”
“But you’re pathologically incapable of accepting help,” she supplied.
That wasn’t it. The thought of having someone to tag team with at night sounded euphoric. But that meant allowing her to come into the wreckage I lived in. If she saw how dismal the condition of my house was, she’d want to help with that too, and I just couldn’t let her step in that way.
Maybe she was right. Maybe I was pathologically incapable of accepting help, but in my experience, help always came with strings. Not that I didn’t trust Davida. I truly did, especially after she’d been by my side for every second of Joey’s birth, but I couldn’t let go of my wariness and the little pride I had left.
I might get there, but I wasn’t to that point yet.
She patted my hand. “Have you heard from Liam yet?”
I scoffed. “No, and I don’t expect to. He only goes where the fun is. Once the excitement wore off, being a dad wasn’t exciting to him.”
“That twat. I hope he contracts syphilis and his dick falls off.”
“There’s modern medicine to prevent that kind of thing now.”
She shrugged. “This is my dream, and we don’t have any medicine that will work on twats.”
“Fair enough.” I drank my coffee around my grin. “He’s probably using his dick enough that syphilis isn’t outside the realm of possibilities.”
She arched a brow, eyeing me carefully. “Does that bother you? Knowing what he’s doing on the other side of the world?”
I put my coffee down and swiped my index finger through the condensation, considering her question. “It does and doesn’t. I never thought of him as a potential boyfriend or husband. I’ve known him too long to think he’d be good at either. But that man was my friend, you know? He knew my history, my trauma, everything. And he just left me.”
My eyes started to sting, and I dug my teeth into my bottom lip. Hormones were a bitch. I didn’t want to cry. I wasn’t sad over Liam. Not anymore. If I ever saw him in person again, I’d have to hold myself back from punching him in the face, though. Everything we’d experienced together had now been tainted by the fact that he was a little shit weasel.
“I could give a damn who he hooks up with, but yeah, it bothers me that he’s living this carefree life after abandoning me and Joey.”
And stealing from me. Leaving me financially screwed. Ruining my credit.
I didn’t mention that. Davida didn’t need to know how deep the pit truly was.
She shook her head. “I feel sorry for him. He’s missing out on knowing his beautiful daughter, but he’s too stupid to realize all he’s lost.”
“He doesn’t care.” I lifted a shoulder. “I can’t think about him. If I do, I’ll be miserable, and I really don’t want to feel like that.”
Davida flicked her fingers. “Then let’s not waste time talking about someone so trivial, I barely remember his name. What was it again?”
That made me laugh, and dear god, was it a relief to push some of my gloom away. “Yes. Let’s talk about something slightly less painful: work. How’s Daniel fairing these days?”
Raymond walked by with Joey as I asked my question. “Terrible. He’s got this…hollow look in his eyes he didn’t have when he first started. The poor man has seen things in his short time at Levy Development.”
Davida nodded. “A week or two ago, Daniel told me Elliot had ripped him a new one over the paper he writes his daily schedule on. Apparently, it isn’t the same size you used. Daniel showed him the notebook, but Elliot would not believe it wasn’t Daniel’s fault.”
Oh shit. That wasn’t good. How had I never considered my meticulous, detail-focused boss wouldn’t notice an inch missing from the bottom of the schedule paper?
My only choice was to deny, deny, deny. Though, I was surprised Elliot hadn’t mentioned anything to me in his endless emails.
“Strange,” I murmured. “Poor Daniel. Sounds like Elliot’s in his finest form.”
Raymond swooped by again. “Daniel hasn’t cried yet, at least not publicly, so it could be much worse.”
I propped my chin on my fist and smiled at Joey-Girl in Ray’s arms. “Apparently, the bar is in hell.”
“He isn’t so bad,” Davida said with a straight face. “Remember the chairs.”
I sighed. I did miss my chair. “Like I said, the bar is in hell. One generous gesture doesn’t cancel out making a temp cry.”
Raymond lifted Joey up to his face and baby-talked in a way that always got her open-mouth smiling and drooling buckets.
“Uncle Elliot is a really grumpy billionaire,” Ray singsonged. “His piles of money are an uncomfortable throne, so he takes his aches and pains out on us peasants. Mommy sometimes charmed him into being nice. The rest of us have no such power.”
“He was never nice,” I interjected into their private conversation.
But that wasn’t strictly true. There were times Elliot was kind and considerate to me. Even generous. Then there were the tender minutes he’d held my belly, feeling Joey move with an awed expression.
Maybe he wasn’t as bad as I was making him out to be…
When I got home from my coffee date, I was welcomed by a new email from Elliot.
From: [email protected]
Catherine,
Is there a reason I don’t have a reply from you in my inbox? Is your internet down? Or are you ignoring me?
I recognize you’re on leave, but as you once told me, babies sleep a lot, so you should have ample time to reply to me.
I hope your lack of response isn’t a preview of what it will be like when you return. Should I expect to wait hours or even days to hear from you? If so, I might need to keep Leafy-Daniel around as my backup assistant.
Please tell me where the notebook you always use to write my schedule is. Daniel found one that is almost alike, but it’s longer, so it can’t be the one.
Yours,
Elliot
I sat back against my headboard, heaving a heavy breath. He wasn’t wrong. I had time to reply. I just chose not to. In a few weeks, I’d be back under Elliot’s thumb, and as entertaining as his emails were, I had to draw a line in the sand somewhere. With Joey here, I couldn’t be at his beck and call at all hours anymore, and he’d have to get used to it.
This one, I wanted to nip in the bud ASAP, though.
From: [email protected]
Elliot,
I’m not sure what you’re talking about. There should only be one notebook in my desk. If that’s what he’s using, it’s the correct paper.
As for your other questions, my internet is fine, but I was away from my computer. I still have three weeks left of maternity leave, and I plan on using them to the fullest. Don’t expect instant replies, and you won’t be disappointed.
If you feel the need to keep Leafy-Daniel, by all means, have at it. But if he’s staying, maybe try being a little nicer so he won’t shake quite as much. That sounds awfully distracting.
I hope you’re well.
Sincerely,
Catherine
P.S. I’ll now call you Stick-Elliot. You can guess where I think the stick is.
As always, I carefully deleted my postscript, almost certain I’d be fired if that one went through.
Now, I had to figure out how to explain the mystery of the notebook to him in person. I had three weeks to come up with a believable story, solve my living situation, and cross my fingers Joey was accepted into one of the day cares she was wait-listed for.
Everything was fine.
My world definitely wasn’t crumbling around me.
If I kept thinking that, maybe it would be true.
