Hat Trick, page 19
She was sucking in breaths as fast as she could exhale them in huge bursts of noise while a nurse tried to stick something her ear. The little girl, not so little anymore, had bandages covering the left side of her face. Curly brown hair formed a wild tangle around her head.
“Ma! Ma! Mama!” she hollered between sobs, shoving the nurse away and trying to climb out of the railed bed. When her deep blue eyes met his, she blinked, as if registering something, then resumed her wails of dismay. The harried-looking nurse glanced up at him.
“Can you calm her down, Dad?”
“I—I’m not sure.”
“Give it a shot. I need to get her vitals.”
Taking a deep breath, he reached for her, which sent the girl scurrying to the other side of the bed, clutching at the nurse now, her voice hoarse as she kept up her “Ma! Mama!” mantra.
“Okay, baby. Let me just do this. It won’t hurt,” the woman said.
“Hurt!” the girl declared before shoving her thumb into her mouth and grudgingly sitting to let the nurse take her temperature and blood pressure, all the while staring right at Declan.
Lowering the railing on his side, he sat, keeping his hands on his lap, staring at her, willing her to recall the countless hours he’d held and fed her, walking the floors of their cavernous house while she cried her way through the nights. The sight of the bruising on her left arm and leg, combined with the bandages on her face, sliced into his gut. The once-forgotten sound of her voice as she whimpered for her mama while hanging onto the nurse lit a fire in his chest. He gulped and tried to touch her, but she shrieked and clambered up the nurse’s arm.
“It’s all right, sweet pea,” the woman soothed. “Let me get you something to drink. You’re thirsty, right?”
“Drink!” Agnes yelped, not taking her eyes from Dec’s.
He stood, feeling foolish and furious and useless. When it became clear that Agnes would not tolerate being returned to the hospital bed, the nurse shot him a sympathetic glance before carrying her out into the hallway.
Emily jumped to her feet when they all exited the room. She stood next to him, watching while the nurse got the little girl a Styrofoam cup and straw. He couldn’t take his eyes off her—his baby girl—as she grabbed it with two chubby hands and started sucking, gulping, getting a little choked, then resuming as if she hadn’t had liquids in days.
He hadn’t realized his hands were clenched until Emily put her hand over one and whispered, “Relax. She’ll be able to tell you’re upset.”
“What is she, a dog?”
“No, she’s a toddler. They’re even more in tune, trust me.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets and watched as the nurse whispered something to the girl and then pointed to him. Still clutching the cup, Agnes took her mouth off the straw long enough to say “Da?” Then shake her head so hard she almost dropped the cup. “No! Mama!” Then she did drop it, and resumed her sobbing, burying her face in the nurse’s neck. Declan felt Emily’s hand slip into his and he gripped it tight, his brain spinning and finally settling on the fact that he’d been put on this planet for a single purpose—to get his baby girl back.
The week he spent in the faceless, impersonal hotel was one of the most frustrating of his thirty-two years. Desmond had arrived and immediately filed for temporary custody on his behalf, stating issues with the child’s safety that were clearly established. Cassandra had a record of DUIs in Michigan, California, and now Oregon. She had no job, no chance of one, and a string of credit card defaults.
He’d figured it for a slam dunk. Never mind the girl refused to be alone in a room with him, lest she start screeching in terror.
“Maybe this isn’t what she wants,” he said over a weak cocktail at the start of the second week of the child protective services court-based torture.
“That’s not really what it’s about and you know it. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.”
He glanced over at Emily. She’d left the morning after that first, challenging night, needing to resume her own life, he presumed. When she’d shown up again after a week of non-communication with him, he’d been so thrilled he hadn’t been able to repress the huge grin. He’d missed her calming presence, if not her open-palmed, get-a-grip methodology.
“Yeah. All right.” He downed the watery liquor and motioned for the bartender. “This place is hell.”
She chuckled and sipped her gin and tonic, mesmerizing him in a totally inappropriate way for a split second as her lips touched the edge of the glass. He’d come to rely on her—her advice, her funny texts, their light flirtation—so much he didn’t even realize it until the past week. Her presence alongside him in the courtroom when he’d been told, flat out, that the court was leaning toward letting Agnes stay with her mother due to “recently revealed facts” about his “violent past” had gone a long way toward keeping him from leaping over the railing and throttling the stupid cow of a woman he’d once believed he loved.
They both looked up when Desmond slid into the seat on Declan’s other side with a heavy sigh. Declan gripped his empty glass.
“I’ll take that as a bad sign,” Declan made himself say.
“You take it correctly. I’m sorry,” Des said, as he ran a hand down his tired-looking face. “Fucking bitch pulled the Erica card. That was pretty much all she wrote.”
Declan focused on the mirror behind the shitty hotel bar in the crappy town where he had to leave his daughter. “I don’t get it,” he whispered. “She’s clearly not competent.”
“Doesn’t matter. She was winning anyway, thanks to several things, including being ‘the mom.’ “ Des hooked his fingers around the words and spit out another curse.
“She has to stay here, get a job, find competent child care, and be subjected to weekly visits from CPS. You get to visit.”
Declan shoved himself away from the bar and stood, chest heaving and mind locking in on one thing—getting Agnes away from that crazy woman before she killed her. “I’ll just…take her. Like she did the first time. I mean, that was okay with the courts—for her to fucking kidnap my own kid and take off for the fucking West Coast.”
Emily glanced at Desmond, then at him. The last few hours he’d spent with his little girl passed through his consciousness, and he had the brief image of himself toting the screeching child through an airport, up in the air, and then into life in Michigan. He half fell into his seat. “Oh, fuck it.”
“No, we won’t be doing that,” Desmond said before downing the shot of whiskey he’d ordered and lifting a finger for another one. “I’m fighting it. But for now, we need to talk about what’s happening with you.”
He sensed Emily tensing up next to him. He shot her a glare. “You came out here to soften this blow, I guess?”
“No, I wanted to check on you. Being a dickhead won’t work with me anymore, so stop trying so hard.”
Desmond chuckled, then raised an eyebrow when Declan glared at him. “Lady speaks the truth. Now, you have to sign this.” He slapped a piece of paper in front of Declan.
It took him a few minutes to comprehend the words before he dropped it in front of his attorney. “I’m not signing this. Fuck them. That guy was the worst official in the entire universe of piss-poor officials.”
“Dude, if this were being judged by the public, you’d win. However…” Desmond slid the paper over and handed Declan his heavy fountain pen. “It’s not. And the judge says if you don’t sign this, admitting to your guilt and to a one-year suspension, you will never play professional soccer in the States again.” The man raised a dark eyebrow. “Unless you’re looking to drop down to the farm leagues—say, in Toledo, maybe?”
Declan gulped, took the pen, dashed off his name, and grabbed his freshened drink. “Well, fuck me six ways to Sunday, eh folks?” He held up his glass. “No job. No kid.”
“And hardly any booze in the drinks,” Emily said, touching her glass to his. He flinched when her hand landed on his thigh. “We’ll get her back. You take a year off from playing and focus on getting your life straight. Right, Des?”
Desmond held up his shot glass, downed the brown liquor, and tucked the document into a folder. “I’m calling it. Behave. I think Emily got your flight arranged already, Dec.” He put a hand on Declan’s shoulder and squeezed. “I’ll make this right, man. If it’s the last thing I ever do.”
Declan frowned and shook his head. Emily’s hand had not moved and was heating the skin beneath his trousers a bit too much. He squinted at her, realizing she must be over halfway to being soused. The illicit thrill that gave him was both sexy and highly irritating. He plucked her hand off his leg and put it on the bar. “No,” he said. “Married ladies don’t touch loser soccer players in ways that might get them into trouble.”
“Hmph,” she said, downing her drink. He shook his head when the bartender pointed to it. “Fuck you. I’m not driving.” She waved the guy down and nodded, shoving her empty across the bar to him.
“What’s wrong,” he asked, facing her, willing to be nice. She had hopped a plane and flown across the continent to sit with him as he accepted the many layers of shit that fate had dumped on him this day. When she shook her head, Declan had to force thoughts of their one hookup out of his brain. Unable to resist, he touched her tear-streaked cheek. “Emily?”
“You’re not the only one whose life’s upside down, you selfish prick.” She kept her gaze across the bar and downed her drink in three gulps before putting both her hands on his thighs, much too high up for it to be considered anything but sexual. “Take me to bed, won’t you? It’ll help us both forget this…crap.”
Her lips hovered over his, the juniper-infused gin she’d been drinking filling his nose. With only the slightest of hesitations, he kissed her, sliding his hands up into her hair in the dark, nearly deserted bar. Brain spinning with disappointment and need, he parted her lips with his tongue and let himself slip into that place he’d found once, during yet another Cassandra-induced crisis. The place he wanted to never leave—the place that included only himself and Emily Keller.
Her hands moved closer to his crotch, nearly tipping his barstool over in the process. She broke the kiss, leaving him breathless and hanging. “I love you, I think,” she whispered, before jumping off her seat and heading for the hotel lobby. He threw some money on the bar and followed her, his mind already shifting gears into much more pleasant territory.
He caught up with her as she was ducking into the glass elevator and stuck his arm between the closing doors. He had her pinned in the corner, hands on her ass and lips covering hers before the doors shut behind him. They groped their way up to the fifteenth floor, but when the doors opened and she took his hand to lead him toward her room, he stopped.
“What?” She turned, crossing her arms over her tousled blouse, her gorgeous face flushed, her green eyes snapping.
Moving away from her and calling on every reserve he possessed, he said, “No. I’m not doing this.”
“Oh? What? I don’t do it for you, either? Wow, I’m really on a fucking roll.” She whirled around and nearly fell off her shoes as she tottered down the carpeted hall.
Declan cursed under his breath and followed her, repeating the words, No. Don’t. No. Don’t over and over in his head.
She dropped her key card as she was trying to slide it into the lock so Declan grabbed it, opened the door, and held it for her. She tugged him close, pressing her lips to his again and making him groan and grip her arms. “No. Emily. I need you as a friend. Not…this. As much as I…oh fuck, stop it, would you please?” He took her hand off his zipper.
“I want to be your friend too,” she whispered, slumping against the wall just inside the room. “But…I want…”
“It’s all right. I want it too. But I think we’re really better off in the long run without—whoa—you all right?”
She lurched into the bathroom and dropped to her knees in front of the toilet. He grabbed her hair, waiting her out while she puked. After a few minutes, she spit, swiped her mouth with the back of her hand and dropped onto her butt, leaning against the side of the tub.
“Beat it,” she said. “I’m sick of you already.”
He wet a cloth and wiped her face, helped her to her feet, and handed her a preloaded toothbrush. Once she’d finished, he pulled her out of the bathroom. “I hate you,” she mumbled as he guided her to the bed, took off her shoes, briefly toyed with taking off her jeans, and decided against that for the betterment of mankind. “You’re an ass.”
He nodded, sliding her under the covers and reaching for the lamp. “Yes. I am. Keeping thinking that, love. You’re better off.” He kissed her forehead and peeled her hands off him when she tried to grab at him, still muttering how much she hated him.
“It’s all right, Emily.” She sighed and rolled over, arm draped over her eyes.
“Go ‘way. Leave me alone. Hate you.”
He put a water bottle on the bedside table and shut her door behind him, leaning his forehead against it for several minutes, contemplating his fucked-up life and how much he wished he could tell Emily the truth—that he did love her and he had loved her and would likely never stop loving her—even while acknowledging that would be the worst thing to ever happen to her.
Chapter Twenty
Emily
Even though the clock seemed to have stuck on the five-thirty mark, Emily didn’t give in to the urge to pour the entire bottle of an expensive Italian red wine into a glass and suck it down. She kept glancing from her phone to the tablet, anticipating messages from various people, and really only wanting to hear from one. She sighed and scrolled through the conversation she’d been having with Declan over the past few weeks.
His laughing acceptance of her apologies over her bad behavior that last night in Oregon, and the comfortable way they eased into a lightly flirtatious and harmless friendship, had been such a relief. Especially now. She shut her eyes against the urge to call him, stopping herself with the reminder that he had his own set of problems. No need to burden him with the second failure of her marriage.
Stop obsessing, Emily. Focus. You have something important to do tonight. Don’t get bogged down in wishing things were different. Make the change you need to make.
“Em?”
She flinched at the sound of Marcus’s voice. Her heart sped up and her throat dried out. She flipped the tablet screen to a different set of messages, letting their hard, ugly reality give her a fresh boost of resolve.
“In here,” she said, surprised by her voice’s lack of a tremor. She waited, tapping her fingertip on the tablet screen.
“Hi,” he said, removing the heavy cufflinks and rolling up his sleeves. “What’s up?”
“I’m moving out,” she said.
He grabbed a glass and filled it with water, drank it, refilled it, and drank that before facing her. “Oh? Soccer boy toy freed up for your use, is he?”
“No. But I’m pretty sure you’re on the verge of telling me about this.” She flipped the tablet around on the island and pushed it toward him. “Right, Marcus? I mean, since it seems your newest gal pal jumped the gun and shared it with me first.”
He frowned and looked down at the screen, scrolled through the entire overtly sexual conversation between himself and a woman not his wife, then looked up at her. “Emily, I…”
“No, Marcus. Just stop. I know you love me, in your way. But I’m done pretending that I’m the only one you want, and listening to you lie about that fact.”
He set the glass down and put both his hands on the counter, head drooping. She slipped out of her high-heeled designer shoes, sighing with relief when her feet hit the cool wood floor. Her heart had stopped racing, her pulse was steady, her face free of the flush of angry jealousy. When she slid her rings and car key across the counter so they rested alongside the tablet, its screen revealing the text exchange someone had sent her anonymously, he met her gaze. His silvery gray eyes were hard.
“I love you, Emily. I just—”
“You’re just incapable of loyalty, that’s all. You don’t ever stop loving me even while you’re fucking these…these girls.” She pointed to the tablet. “Plenty of people have advised me that since I don’t really care how much you screw around, I should stick it out, let you keep paying my bills. But…” She pulled a folder out of her briefcase and set it down between them. “I’ve had my attorney draw up divorce papers. You have to take care of Michelle, but I don’t want anything else. I’m sick of feeling bought and paid for, the wife who knows about all this…this shit.” She pushed the tablet too hard, sending it to the floor with a clatter. “And still lets you saunter in on a Friday, pour a glass of wine, and pretend that we’re normal. This is not…fucking…normal, Marcus. I’m done with it.”
“I’ll move out again,” he said.
“No, I’m moving out. I found a condo to rent.”
“You’re not going to rent…” His jaw was clenched so tight she could barely hear him.
“Oh, spare me the alpha male chest beating, Marcus, please. I can take care of myself. I won’t deny you time with your daughter. But she and I are moving to our new place tonight.”
“Emily. Don’t. I’ll stop. I promise.”
“No, you won’t. And while some may call me crazy for caring, I care. So I leave you in the good hands and apparently mouths of Tina, Jackie, and whoever else you’ve been boning. I can’t look myself, or my daughter, in the face and keep living this stupid lie. This isn’t the 1950s, Marcus…or…France. You don’t get to have a wife and a girlfriend, sorry.”
She slipped her feet into a pair of clogs and got close enough to him to pick her tablet off the floor. It was the hardest thing she could remember doing, walking away from the man she’d been so very much in love with for so long and who had betrayed her trust time and time again. Until this last time. Shocked by her lack of tears, but only a little, considering how many she’d shed over Marcus Keller, she patted his arm and walked out the garage door to the waiting used Jeep Cherokee, sold to her by Jason for a crisp five-dollar bill.
