Chapter Twelve
“Mommy,” a soft, girlish voice whispered, weaving through Katie’s mind and tugging at her subconscious.
“Mommy, wake up,” the sound came again, this time with a gentle pat to Katie’s cheek that definitely roused her.
She blinked her eyes open and stared at her daughter, who was standing at the side of her bed. Going by the light coming in from the bedroom windows, it was morning, and judging by the heavy, masculine arm draped around her waist and the hard length of an erection prodding against her ass, Connor was still in her bed, his warm body spooned behind hers.
Crap! He’d stayed the night, and clearly they hadn’t locked the door.
A jolt of panic had Katie scrambling up in her bed, which proved to be an unwise idea since she was still naked beneath the blankets. She pulled the sheet up to make sure she stayed covered from her chest down, and her quick movements jostled Connor awake, too. She heard him release a soft, oh, shit, beneath his breath, and much more carefully, he sat up beside her, being equally strategic with the covers around his hips.
“Hey, sweetie pie,” Katie said in a cheerful voice that sounded forced to her own ears. “What are you doing up so early?” It really wasn’t early. A glance at her cell phone on the night stand showed it was 7:28 a.m., and her daughter was due to leave for preschool in half an hour.
“I woke up all by myself,” she said, then glanced at Connor curiously. “Why are you in Mommy’s bed?” she asked, her tone guileless. “Did you have a bad dream? Mommy only lets me stay in here when I have a bad dream.”
Thank God for a child’s naiveté, Katie thought, grateful that Val’s mind went to such an innocent scenario.
“Yes, princess,” he said, striving for a light tone even though his voice was still gruff from sleep. “I did have a bad dream.”
“Oh.” She leaned her little arms against the mattress, seemingly in no hurry to go anywhere, and continued her chatter. “Did Mommy kiss away your fears and hug you to keep you safe from the monsters like she does for me?”
An abrupt chuckle escaped Connor from behind Katie, but she wasn’t as amused and needed to divert Val’s attention, and quickly. “Honey, why don’t you go and get dressed for school, and I’ll meet you in the kitchen for breakfast in a few minutes.”
“Okay.” Val skipped from the room, and as soon as she was gone, Katie jump out of bed and closed and locked the door.
Grabbing a pair of underwear from her dresser, she pulled them on, and continued with a bra, jeans, and a T-shirt before turning back to Connor, who was now sitting on the edge of the bed with the sheet still draped around his hips.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” she said, unable to keep the edge of anger from her voice. “How did this happen?”
He scrubbed a hand along the stubble covering his jaw, then pushed those long fingers through his already disheveled hair. “We both fell asleep. It’s not that big of a deal, Katie,” he said, trying to placate her.
She stiffened defensively. “Yes, it is a big deal. It’s misleading and confusing for Val.”
He met her gaze and held it steadily. “Then maybe it’s time for us to renegotiate our arrangement.”
He was completely serious, and her heart pounded hard and heavy in her chest, because she wasn’t sure she could give him what he was asking for—something far more serious than an affair. The kind of commitment that she was afraid to believe in because, in the past, it always ended in pain and misery for her.
She pulled in a deep breath as everything that had happened last night came flooding back in an overwhelming wave of emotion—mainly, the honest, candid way he’d confessed his love for her. That same sentiment shone in his deep blue eyes, promising her so much if she would just take a chance and trust him.
Except her deep-seated fear of rejection, the same one that had colored her childhood and had carried over into her adult relationships, kept her from giving him what he wanted, what he deserved. For her, love never lasted, and the men who’d come and gone through her life always grew bored and moved on. That was all she knew, and it was just a matter of time before Connor did the same.
A huge, aching lump formed in her throat. The two of them had clearly come to that crossroads, where she was now forced to decide which direction to choose when it came to her and Connor . . . and for her daughter’s sake. To keep things amicable between them, Katie knew it was time to let him go as a lover, in order to keep him as a friend.
* * *
Connor stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, a sense of dread balling in his stomach. He didn’t have to be a genius to realize that Katie had just done a one-eighty on him out in the bedroom. That having Val find the two of them in bed together had all her doubts and insecurities about them rushing to the surface.
He’d known they’d get to this point eventually, where Katie would have to make some difficult decisions about their relationship. He didn’t want to be the guy who fucked her when the mood struck. He wanted to be the man who loved her, took care of her, and was a part of her life on a daily basis, twenty-four seven.
He’d given her six weeks to come around, while doing his best to prove to her that he wasn’t like every other guy in her past, that their relationship wasn’t a replica of her parents’. Today was the day he’d find out if any of his efforts had paid off, because he couldn’t continue with this part-time arrangement with Katie and she was going to have to make a choice—all of him or nothing at all. His stomach twisted at the latter thought, which was a very real possibility.
He splashed water on his face and dried it with a towel, then walked back into Katie’s bedroom to get dressed. She was already out in the kitchen with Val, and he joined them as soon as he was fully clothed. He knew Katie heard him walk over to the coffeepot on the counter and pour himself a cup, but she didn’t look at him as she made Val a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for her lunch.
Connor sat down next to his daughter at the table, who was eating her bowl of cereal. After taking a bite of her breakfast, she scooped up more of the Honey Nut Cheerios and held it toward him.
“Want some of my O’s, Daddy?” she asked, cheerful, bright-eyed, and completely unaware of the tension between the two adults in the room. “Or some of my juice?”
He smiled at her. “I’m good, princess. You need to eat all that yourself so you go to school with a full belly.”
She set her spoon in her bowl, then lifted her shirt and pushed out her stomach with an adorable grin. “I already have a full belly!”
“Looks like we need to make more room for your breakfast then,” he teased, and gently poked a finger against her midsection, which made her suck her tummy back in and giggle.
“I like you being here for breakfast,” she said happily as she picked up her glass of orange juice. “I want you here every morning.”
God, he wanted that, too. So much. But the tense set of Katie’s shoulders said otherwise, and instead of answering—because he had no idea how the next hour or so was going to shake out between him and Katie—he took a drink of his coffee instead.
Val finished eating, and after taking her dishes to the counter by the sink, she came back and lifted her My Little Pony backpack from the rung on the back of her chair and slipped her arms through the straps. Once that was done, she leaned against Connor’s leg and looked up at him with hopeful eyes.
“Will you take me to school today?” she asked, so sweetly his heart squeezed tight in his chest, because it was such a natural thing for him to do . . . if they’d been a family.
Before he could respond, Katie was next to Val and replied for him. “Daddy has to go to work,” she said, tucking her lunch into the little girl’s backpack, her voice strained. “So I’m going to take you and Leah.”
Val pouted. “But I want Daddy to take me since he’s here.”
Connor wasn’t going to contradict Katie or undermine her decision. He would never instigate a power struggle with Val in the middle, no matter what happened between the two of them. However, he hated how confused Val seemed to be, that Connor was there, yet he wasn’t able to do something as simple as drop her off at school.
He set his coffee mug on the table. “Come here, princess,” he said, and when his daughter was close enough, he lifted her so that she was sitting on his lap, a hint of sadness in her big blue eyes. “I have to go to work, but I’ll see you tonight, okay?” He’d always be there for Val. That would never change no matter what his relationship with her mother ended up being.
“Okay,” she said, but not happily.
He tapped Val on her cute nose, which he knew would make her grin, and it did. “And if you’re good for your mommy today, I’ll take you out for ice cream after you eat your dinner.” With or without Katie joining them remained to be seen.
She clapped her hands gleefully. “I want chocolate chip!”
“You got it.” He set Val back on her feet and watched as Katie grabbed her purse and car keys from the counter.
For the first time since bolting out of the bedroom before they could really talk, she finally glanced at him and met his gaze. The fear he’d seen earlier in her eyes had abated to a silent conviction, and he had no doubts that she’d already reinforced all those emotional walls that he’d spent the past six weeks trying to tear down.
“You can lock the door when you leave,” she said, her voice tight, as if she was trying really hard to keep her shit together until she was alone.
He didn’t say anything as she followed Val out the front door, because he wasn’t planning on going anywhere until she came back and he had his say, which she hadn’t yet given him the chance to do.
He spent the next twenty minutes making a few phones calls, one of which was to his partner, Kyle, whom he was supposed to meet at a jobsite this morning to discuss some renovation plans for a house they’d recently purchased. He rescheduled for later that afternoon, and once he’d checked in with one of his project managers who’d already left him a message, Connor went into the living room, sat down on the couch, and waited for Katie to return.
When she walked through the front door, she obviously wasn’t surprised to see him, since his SUV was still parked out at the curb. But everything about her was wary—her gaze, her demeanor, and the way she set her purse down on the coffee table but remained standing instead of sitting by him.
“I think you and I have some unresolved issues to settle,” he said, jumping right into the fray because, well, there was no easy way to have this conversation.
“There’s nothing unresolved, Connor.”
He arched a brow and didn’t hesitate to call her out. “Do you plan to completely ignore the fact that I told you that I love you?”
He saw a flicker of emotion in her eyes that resembled heartache and regret. “It’s not so much that I’m ignoring it . . . I’m really trying to think of Val and do what’s best for her.”
“And you think that ending our personal relationship is what’s best for her?” he asked, unable to keep the incredulous tone from his voice. “Or is it best for you because ending things means that there is no risk of you getting hurt?”
She visibly stiffened, as if his words had hit their intended target. “It’s best for both of us,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest defensively. “I don’t have a great track record when it comes to men, Connor. In fact, they always leave because I either wasn’t worth the effort for a long-term relationship or I wasn’t enough in some way to keep them interested. Even my own father didn’t stick around, unless he needed to use me as some kind of leverage against my mother.”
Her chin lifted a few determined notches. “So yes, in that regard, I’m being proactive, because if something happens between you and me and it ends bitterly, that will directly affect Val. She’ll get caught in the middle, and I refuse to put our daughter through what I endured growing up because my parents grew to hate each other. I . . . I can’t take that risk,” she said, her voice pained. “You and I are better off just being friends, instead of complicating things with sex and . . . emotions.”
Connor exhaled a deep breath, remembering that night after they’d visited his parents for the first time, when Katie had opened up and told him about her childhood—her parents’ nasty divorce, the constant custody battles that no young child should ever have to suffer through, and all the rejections that had left her unable to trust in any relationship.
Without a doubt, her emotional scars and insecurities ran deep, and while he understood that in her mind she was truly trying to protect Val, she was doing so at the cost of her own happiness. And all he could do was put everything out in the open between them and reinforce how he felt about her. The rest would have to be up to Katie.
Standing up, he walked over to her, ignoring the way she eyed him so guardedly because there was nothing she could say or do that would change the fact that he loved her. Given the chance, he knew he wanted to marry her, but she wasn’t there yet . . . and quite possibly never would be. The realization made him feel as though someone had stabbed him in the chest with a sharp knife and given it an extra twist for good measure.
He uncrossed her arms from where she’d folded them in front of her and took her hands in his. Her brows creased in sudden confusion, because his gentle actions contradicted the heated argument they’d just had. All he had left to give her was the truth, so that’s what he did.
He tenderly rubbed his thumbs over the backs of her hands. “When I met you over three and a half years ago in that Denver airport, I saw a vulnerable woman who’d been hurt by some asshole who clearly hadn’t appreciated how beautiful you are, inside and out. His loss was my gain, and I was lucky to have that one amazing night with you that I’ll never forget, because we created the best thing that has ever happened to me. Our daughter.”
She swallowed hard, clearly affected by his words, but remained quiet, so he continued because he didn’t need a response from her. He just needed her to hear what was in his heart.
“I thought about you constantly during all those years, because what we had in one night was stronger than anything I’ve ever felt for any other woman . . . and still is,” he said, meaning it. “If my feelings for you can withstand three and a half years of not even being with you physically, and all based on one night together, then you can bet that I’m the kind of guy who can go the distance. I don’t give up when things get tough. I believe in love, and I believe in what we have together. I want to fight for you, for us, but you have to give me something to fight for.”
She shook her head and blinked back the tears he saw forming in her eyes, not giving him what he desperately needed from her—some kind of affirmation, or a kernel of hope that she wanted to at least try.
“I want you to be mine,” he said, not caring how possessive that sounded, because it’s exactly how he felt. “I want to go to bed with you at night and wake up with you in the morning, without worrying about sneaking out of the house before Val sees us together. I want us to be a family, Katie, except you’re too afraid to take a chance on the real deal, and whether you want to accept it or not, that’s what we have. A strong relationship with the potential of being so much more, if you would just trust me with your heart. I promise I won’t ever break it.”
“Connor . . . I just . . . can’t.” She tugged her hands from his, and as soon as she severed the connection between them, Connor knew there was nothing else he could say to convince her that they were meant to be.
* * *
“Arghh!” Katie exhaled the frustrated sound and scrapped the graphic ad she was working on, the fourth version since Connor had picked up Val to take her to see her new baby cousin, who she was completely enamored with—enough that she kept asking for a baby brother of her own and couldn’t understand why Katie couldn’t just make it happen.
Connor and Val had been gone nearly three hours, and with the house quiet, she’d planned to get caught up on the work that had piled up over the past week and a half since she’d ended her affair with Connor. Since he’d walked out her door after baring his soul and had gotten nothing in return because she’d been too petrified to let go of all her emotional childhood baggage—and some adult issues, too—and be strong and confident and have faith in every promise he’d made.
Since that day, her creativity had been in lock-down. It was as if her mind was rebelling against the rash, short-sighted decision she’d made to push Connor out of her life, and instead was forcing her to think about everything she’d given up and lost.
Well . . . not lost yet, her brain taunted her. But she did stand to lose a one-of-a-kind man who been nothing but dependable, loyal, and the kind of father to Val that Katie wished she’d had growing up. Because despite everything he’d said to her that last morning, it wasn’t fair to think or believe that he’d wait around for her forever. Not when she hadn’t given him any reason to.
The ache in her chest that had been a perpetual reminder of what an idiot she’d been to let him go seemed to increase day by day, as did her doubts and convictions when it came to her reasons for doing so. Every time she saw Connor—which was every day, since he saw Val in the evenings after work and on the weekends—only made her realize how much she missed him. Not the sex, but just being with him, and the three of them doing things together as . . . well, a family.
That no longer happened. In the beginning it had been Katie’s choice to opt out of the time Connor spent with Val, even though he’d initially asked her to join them on their outings—because for one thing, it had been too painful to be around Connor, and for another, she’d been trying to establish those boundaries between the two of them and wanted to make the custody arrangement as easy as possible on Val. Except it had only made it more difficult and confusing for the three-year-old little girl, who’d grown used to them being a trio, and now her mother was no longer part of the equation.
Katie understood that confusion, because she was experiencing it herself more and more. Tack on the fact that she missed Connor so much, and was it no wonder that she couldn’t get a damn thing done, work-wise?
Her doorbell rang, startling her out of her thoughts, and she figured Connor and Val were most likely back from his sister’s. Inhaling a deep breath to gather the fortitude to face him for the few minutes it took to drop off their daughter, she headed out to the living room and opened the front door—and found Avery standing there instead.
“Hey,” Katie said, surprised to see her friend.
Avery lifted a plate with some kind of decadent confection sitting on top. “I brought you a lemon loaf cake with icing,” she said with a grin. “I think you and I need to have a girl talk, and what better way to do that than with dessert?”
Katie had an idea of what kind of “girl talk” Avery was interested in having, and honestly, she was shocked it had taken her friend this long to force the issue of what had happened between Katie and Connor. The first time she’d asked, which had been the day everything had changed between the two of them, Katie hadn’t been ready to talk, for fear of having an emotional breakdown over her decision. But enough time had passed that having a conversation about Connor wouldn’t reduce her to tears or the sobbing mess she’d been at night when Val was fast asleep in her bed and Katie was all alone.
“Come on in,” Katie invited, and the two of them headed into the kitchen. “Would you like coffee or iced tea?”
“Let’s go with iced tea,” Avery said as she set the lemon loaf on the counter, then took down two smaller plates from the overhead cupboard.
While Katie filled two glasses with their drink of choice, Avery handled the cutting of the cake. They sat down at the table, and Avery gave her the chance to taste just one bite of the delicious treat before she spoke what was on her mind.
“So, what is it going to take to make you come to your senses about Connor?” she asked, point-blank. “I’ve spent the past week and a half seeing you depressed and watching that gorgeous guy who clearly adores you looking equally miserable, so clearly, neither one of you is happy just being friends.”
Katie winced at her friend’s blatant, and accurate, depiction of her and Connor. “Yeah, it’s been . . . rough.”
“That man is as rare as gold, you know that, right?” Avery asked, as if Katie wasn’t smart enough to figure that out for herself . . . which was almost true. It had just taken her a bit of time to see what she could potentially lose.
“I pushed him away. Hard,” she admitted after swallowing a bite of her lemon cake. “I just . . . panicked. I had horrible flashbacks of my parents’ hellish divorce, and all the guys in my past who never stuck around, and I suppose a part of me just felt like I wasn’t good enough for a man like Connor.”
Avery’s mouth literally fell open. “Not good enough? Did he ever make you feel that way? Because if so, I’m going to have to kick his ass.”
Katie laughed. “No, never.” All she’d ever felt with Connor was beautiful and alive and happier than she could ever remember. “Even as I was pushing him away to protect my heart, I knew it was already too late, that I’d already fallen in love with him. I was just too scared to put it out there because it made me feel so vulnerable.”
“Oh, honey,” Avery said, more gently now. “He’s not like all those other jerks you’ve dated. You know that, right?”
“Of course I know that,” she replied without an ounce of doubt in her voice. “I knew that when I ended things, too, but everything happened so fast between us, and it was so intense, that I kept waiting for it to all fall apart, because it always has before. I thought it’d be easier to make a break now, rather than months down the road, but God, I miss him so much.”
“So, what are you going to do about it?” Avery took a drink of her tea, eyeing Katie over the rim for those few seconds before she put her glass down again. “You are going to do something, right?”
“I want to . . . ”
“But?”
“What if I hurt him too badly, and he doesn’t feel the same way any longer?” she asked on a rush of breath, before she lost the nerve, because that was one fear that was still lingering inside her.
Avery burst out laughing. “Are you freakin’ blind, Katie? Yes, you probably hurt him when you pushed him away, but your baby daddy is the least egotistical guy I’ve ever met. I’ve seen him standing at your door while he picks up Val or drops her off, and the way he looks at you . . . Jesus, you are freakin’ blind because everything about his body language tells me he’s just waiting for the day that you finally come to your senses and give him the chance he deserves.”
Katie thought back to everything Connor had said to her, the sincere words he’d spoken coming easily because she’d not only memorized them but she replayed them in her head every night while her mind played a game of what if. Most specifically, what if she’d trusted him with her heart that day . . . and the answer was always the same. She’d be happy, she’d be in love, and the three of them would be a family. How could she have ever doubted that it would be any other way?
The doorbell rang, and Katie’s heart began a heavy, nervous beat inside of her chest because it was most likely Connor and Val. She looked at Avery, who gave her an understanding smile.
“It’s now or never,” her friend said, as if she knew exactly what Katie had been thinking. “For now, don’t obsess about the future. Just take one day at a time with Connor. Let him show you exactly what kind of man he is, and let yourself believe you’re worth everything he has to offer you, and Val.”
“Okay,” she said, and stood, her stomach now joining in on the bout of nervous jitters.
Avery gave her a hug, then looked into Katie’s eyes as she offered her last bit of support. “Trust me, you’ve got this.”
Together, they walked through the living room and when Katie opened the door, Avery immediately looked down at Val and said, “Hey, kiddo. Want to come over and play with Leah? And have dinner with us, too?”
“Yeah!” Val said enthusiastically. “Can I, Mommy?”
“Sure. Have fun, and be good,” Katie said as the two of them were already hand in hand and heading down the walkway toward Avery’s.
Which left her and Connor standing on opposite sides of the door, awkwardly alone since Val had been their buffer for the past week and a half.
“I guess I’ll go,” he said, but before he could turn around, Katie grabbed his arm to stop him. A slight confused frown formed on his brow as he looked at her. “Everything okay?”
“Yes . . . no . . . ” Oh, God, she was already a blabbering mess. “I was hoping you could come inside and we could talk for a few minutes?”
“About Val?” he asked, because that’s all they’d really discussed since that morning.
She shook her head and swallowed to ease the sudden dryness in her throat. “No, about . . . us.”
That frown of his remained in place as he hesitated a moment, just long enough for a wealth of doubts to swirl through her before he put her out of her misery. “Okay.”
He walked into the house, and she shut the door behind him. They were in the small living room, a few feet apart with him staring at her as he waited for her to speak, and all she could think was, how in the world did she ease into this conversation? And then it came to her.
“I wanted to tell you that I’m sorry about everything that happened that morning,” she said, knowing he didn’t need clarification of which morning she was referring to. “For the crazy way I reacted and for pushing you away and for doubting everything you said to me. It was so wrong.”
“You don’t owe me an apology for the way you feel,” he said, his voice a little gruff and uncertain.
She bit her bottom lip as she prepared to take that leap of faith with him. “Yes, I do, because I was wrong, and my issue was, is, that I feel so much for you it scares me to death.”
“I know,” he said simply, the look in his eyes softening, but he remained right where he was, when she wanted so badly for him to close the distance between them.
So, she continued, wanting everything out there—her fears, her insecurities, the doubts she never, ever should have had about him. “You were right . . . it was easier in that moment to just let you go instead of risking getting hurt.”
“And now?”
She couldn’t stop her hands from twisting anxiously in front of her. “And now, I know how much it hurts not to have you in my life. And how much it hurts to be in love with someone, with you, and being so scared that I might have totally screwed everything up.”
The corner of his mouth twitched imperceptibly, and he raised a dark, challenging brow. “Say that again, Katie,” he ordered softly.
There was no doubt in her mind what part he wanted her to repeat, and she did so with every bit of the emotion that was trying to burst free from her. “I love you, Connor. So much.”
With a relieved groan, he walked the steps it took to reach her and immediately pulled her into his arms. “Jesus Christ, Katie,” he said against her ear, his own voice rough with joy. “It took you long enough to figure it out.”
“I know, and that’s why I’m sorry,” she said against his strong, muscled chest as she squeezed her arms tight around him. “Because I should have known right then and there that you are a man of your word, that when you say you’re in it for the long haul, you mean it.”
He pulled back slightly, just enough to take her face between his hands so he could look into her eyes. “Baby, I’m rock solid, and don’t you ever forget that. I don’t give up, and I’m not going anywhere, ever. I love you, and when you’re ready, I’m going to marry you.”
She couldn’t stop the tears that filled her eyes, and did her best to blink them back. “I want to be yours, Connor. I want to be a family with you and Val. I want it all,” she said, trusting him completely, without any fears.
A big grin spread across his handsome face. “Ahhh, I like it when you’re greedy.”
She laughed at the sexual innuendo in his voice. “That’s what you get for being so good at everything you do.”
“Hmm.” Desire flickered in his darkening gaze as he brought his hands down to her ass, then a little lower to her thighs. “How long before Val gets home?” he asked as he effortlessly lifted her, and she automatically wrapped her legs around his waist, their minds already back in sync.
“Oh, a few hours,” she said, anticipation in her voice as he started down the hall toward her bedroom.
“Perfect,” he murmured, the heat in his eyes making her breathless. “We have a lot of lost time to make up for.”
She agreed, and as he pushed her back on the bed and came over her, his mouth hot and hungry on hers and his hands slowly stripping away her clothes so he could worship every inch of her, Katie let herself be loved by the man who would always have her back, take care of her and their child, and most importantly never, ever leave.