The Perfect Homecoming (Pine River) (23 page)

SEVENTEEN

Emma filled each dog bowl with a cup and a half of kibble while the four dogs sat anxiously, each of them drooling, awaiting the signal that they were allowed to eat. As she filled Roscoe’s bowl, she thought she heard something outside and paused.

Roscoe whimpered.

“Yeah, okay,” she said, and finished filling the bowls. “Eat,” she said, and the four dogs lunged for their individual bowls.

She sealed the lid to the bucket of dog food—which they now had to keep in the house, as Rufus had chewed a hole through a lid—and pulled on her mittens. She picked up the bucket and walked outside the garage, strolling toward the house, her mind miles away. In sunny California. With a pair of gray eyes. The strain of having Cooper discover her awful secret had taken a toll—Emma felt as if she were moving in a fog, her life as she’d known it fading away, and a new, harsh light spilling down on her.

A movement caught her eye as Emma moved slowly past her car. She glanced up and stopped midstride. Cooper was on the porch, peering through a window. Only then did she see his car, parked just behind hers.

He turned and started down the steps. He’d only managed one stair when he noticed Emma.

Her pulse began to pound. She put her hand to her head and her knit cap, then self-consciously looked down at the big coat she wore, the rain boots she’d donned to walk down to the barn.
Why was he here?
He had what he wanted, he’d been so disgusted—

Emma suddenly panicked and dropped the bucket. The sound of it hitting the hard ground startled her and she said, “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Hey,” he said, and put up his hands, palms out, almost like he was surrendering.

“I thought you left. Did you come alone? Who else is here?” she exclaimed, and whirled around, turning a complete circle, expecting someone to leap out at her.
Who, Carl?
That made no sense.

Cooper lowered his hands. “It’s just me, Emma. Calm down. I was hoping we could talk a moment.”

“No,”
she said flatly, backing away, her foot knocking into the bucket she’d dropped. “
Why?
About what? We’ve said all there is to say. I mean
you
certainly have, and I damn sure don’t have anything else to say.”

“Just humor me,” he said, taking a step forward.

Humor
him? “Are you kidding? I am completely humiliated, Cooper! What more do you want?”

“I don’t want that. I never wanted that,” he said firmly. “The medal is behind us,” he said with a flick of his wrist. “It is what it is. But I
. . .
I really want to talk to you.” He seemed a little anxious, almost uncertain. As if he wasn’t sure why he was here.

His uncertainty only made it worse for Emma. She felt like a leper. She wanted to die, to crawl under the porch or a car until he left. “God, Cooper, do you have to drag this out?” she pleaded, pressing her mittened hands to her temple. “Please, just
say
it, whatever it is you think you have to say and leave me
alone
.”

“Could we go inside?” he asked, jerking his thumb at the house. “It’s cold as hell out here.”

“No! The last time I saw you, you threatened to have me arrested. You
abducted
me.”

“I didn’t—” Cooper sighed. “I’m not abducting you. I’m
asking
you. I only suggested we go inside because it’s freezing.”

Emma didn’t know what to do. She didn’t want to go inside, didn’t want to hear whatever he felt the need to say to her now that she’d been exposed. She folded her arms, debating.

“You do that a lot, you know.”

Emma looked around her. “Do what?”

“Fold your arms across your body like that. You do it when you’re unsure. It’s like you’re protecting yourself. But you don’t need to fear me, Emma. Let’s go inside.”

How did he see that? Emma dropped her arms. “No. There is nothing left to say, nothing to talk about.”

Cooper ran a hand over his head. “Okay. If you’re uncomfortable with the idea of the house, what about the garage? Or the barn? We can even sit in my car if you want. Give me fifteen minutes, Emma. What have you got to lose?”

He had a point—she’d already lost herself completely. But why did he care? “I don’t understand why you’re being so
weird.”

He actually smiled a little. “I find it highly ironic that you, of all people, would say that.”

He was right—it was ironic. Emma frowned. She folded her arms again. “Okay, seriously,” she said, calmer now. “What do you want? Why did you drive all the way out here? I mean, I lied, I fessed up, you were disgusted, and you left. So
go
already.”

“Because I’ve had time to think. Because I want to smooth things out between us before I go. I don’t want to leave it like
. . .
like it is, Emma. Who knows when we might run across each other again and work an event?”

“I quit, remember? I won’t be back in LA, so you don’t have to worry about it.”

“God, you’re stubborn,” he said. “Never say never. You know as well as I that you could end up in LA again. Surely you eventually have to work again. I don’t want to stumble across you at some event and it be so strange that we’re both uncomfortable. Where’s the harm? Fifteen minutes.”

“We hardly know each other, Cooper. We’re not going to see each other.”

“We
obviously
know each other,” he scoffed.

Emma ignored that. “Is this an intervention?” she demanded. “Did you swoop up here to put a friendly arm around me and tell me everything is okay?”

“I have no idea what all I want to say, but I am pretty sure that ‘everything is okay’
is not on the list. Let’s go inside and talk about this like adults.”

“Not until you tell me why!” she demanded.

“Because I care!”
he shouted, casting his arms wide. “That’s it, Emma! That’s all there is—God help me, I don’t know why, but I
care
about you!”

Emma’s heart slipped from its mooring, then struggled to swim back to safety. She stared at this man, this gorgeous hunk of kryptonite, unable to absorb what he’d just said. “Care
. . .
about me?” she asked, to be doubly sure she hadn’t misunderstood him.

He sighed and held out his hand to her. “Yes, Emma.
You
.”

She looked at his hand.

“I promise not to harass you. I promise not to abduct you. And I promise to leave soon—I have a plane to catch today.”

“No lectures?” she asked uncertainly. “No judgments, no condemnations, no surprises?”

“Do I need to draw blood, too? I promise.”

He
cared
about her? That seemed so
. . .
impossible. But at that moment, Emma’s heart was racing so badly she was in danger of taking flight. She didn’t believe him. She was afraid to believe him. But those words,
I care about you,
banged around in her head with such a clatter that she couldn’t ignore them.

She had no idea what to say to that, and she wasn’t going to risk speaking and saying something completely wrong. So Emma dipped down and retrieved her bucket, then clomped up the steps, brushing past him without making eye contact. She was afraid to look at him, afraid he’d laugh or disappear if she did. She walked to the door and opened it, then held it open. Only then did she dare to look back at him.

Cooper was quick to grab the door and follow her inside.

Emma dumped the bucket and her boots and stalked into the living room. She was on edge—no one ever said they cared about her, and she was alarmed by how ill-equipped she was to even believe it, much less accept it.

She yanked the mittens from her hands and the knit cap from her head and tossed them down, then unzipped her down coat. She shrugged out of that and threw it onto the couch, too, and turned around to face Cooper. “Okay. You’ve got five minutes. Start before I change my mind.” She punched her hands to her waist and lifted her chin, as if she was preparing for a fight.

Cooper sighed a little. “Does it really make you so uncomfortable for someone to say they care?”

How did he know that? “I just find this all a little suspicious.” Emma unthinkingly folded her arms again—until she realized what she was doing and dropped them. “I mean, what, you just woke up this morning after being furious and thought, ‘Yeah, I care about her’? No way.”

“No, it wasn’t like that.” Cooper shook his head. “Look, I’ll be honest—I was intrigued by you at the bat mitzvah,” he said, looking at her pointedly. “You weren’t wrong about my interest in you that night.”

Emma’s eyes widened. “So you really
did
follow me here like Carl’s lap dog!”

“Wrong,” he said, frowning. “I didn’t
follow
you, I looked for you. I didn’t come because of the bat mitzvah. I came because Carl paid me a lot of money to find and retrieve that medal.”

“And now you have it. So I’m guessing you’re no longer intrigued. Which makes you what? Disgusted? Repulsed? Did you come back out here to get a really good look at this train wreck”—she gestured to herself—“so you can go back and tell your friends?”

He recoiled a little as he took her in. “Are you always so hard on yourself?”

“Yes! Does that bother you?”

“What bothers me,” he said, “is that I can’t wrap my head around why you would take things from men.” He threw up a hand before she could cut him off. “I know it’s not my business, I know I’m prying. But I want to know. I want to understand why. Because I’m
still
intrigued with you. Even more so now that I know you’re not just another pretty face.”

“Oh my God! I don’t believe you!”

“Here’s the thing—if no one asks, if no one challenges you, then you end up going down a path so far that I don’t know if you can come back. I would hate to see that happen, Emma. So I am asking you as a friend.”

He looked sincere, but Emma was shaking, mortified to her core. “Don’t waste your time,” she said low. “There is nothing to figure out.”

“That’s not true,” he said quietly.

She felt her entire body sag with the weight of her dysfunction. How could she ever explain it? “Don’t, Cooper,” she pleaded. “Don’t try and get involved. I am begging you. Because I will probably let you, and you’ll end up disappointed. Whatever is going on with me is
really
messed up.”

His gaze did not waver from her. “I happen to be pretty good at messed up.”

“No, you aren’t,” she said weakly. “Even your brother can’t prepare you for someone like me. You should go back to LA and forget about this.”

Cooper shifted closer. “I did
want to go back to LA yesterday. I wanted to get as far from you as I could possibly get.”

Yes, she had seen that in his face yesterday, and it was painful to remember. She winced and glanced down.

“I thought that I had known women like you all my life, women who will take from and use men without batting an eye.”

Who knew truth could sting so bad when it mattered most? No wonder everyone hated Emma’s truthfulness. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” she admitted weakly. “I take and I use.”

Cooper shook his head and stepped closer. He was just before her now, his presence strong and confident, while she felt like a jumbled mess of nerves. “But then I cooled down and I thought about it, and I don’t believe it. I don’t know why you do
. . . that,
” he said, gesturing to space, apparently unable to find a word for what she did, “but I don’t believe that you are really the kind of woman you present to the world.”

“Yes, I am. I am
exactly
what you thought I was yesterday,” she said, and poked him hard in the chest. “Don’t try and romanticize me.”

“It’s hardly romantic,” he said quietly, and impulsively reached out and pulled a tress of her hair from her collar.

She shoved his arm away from her, frantic that he not touch her. “You can’t help, Cooper! What kind of trip are you on? You want to figure me out?” She suddenly shoved both hands against his chest. “I
do
it—I use men!” She shoved him again. “But don’t get your hopes up, because I don’t always
sleep
with them. Believe it or not, it’s not a sex thing, it’s anything
but
a sex thing. You want to know the whole ugly truth? It’s all about my father! It’s all about getting older men to pick
me
, to choose
me,
” she said angrily, shoving him again. “It’s about control! Anyone with a brain and a current copy of
Psychology Today
can see that! So are you satisfied?” she asked, shoving him again, harder still, the fury sparking in her, building, morphing into a monster inside of her. It was fury with herself for ever having allowed this to happen. Fury for ever having believed Grant or Laura, for ever letting their affair screw her up so completely. Emma hated herself for it, despised, loathed,
hated
herself. “Okay, so you’ve made me say it, you’ve made me humiliate myself even more.” She balled up her fist, hitting him as hard as she could in the chest.

He didn’t move.

She hit him again.

Cooper didn’t even blink.

Why didn’t he move? Why didn’t he speak? She shoved him again with all her might and glared at him, looking for the reaction of disgust.

There was none. “It’s okay,” he said calmly. “I’m strong enough to take it. I’m strong enough for you, Emma Tyler.”

No, no,
no one was strong enough for her! No one could endure her, and Emma despised Cooper for thinking he could. She cried out and launched herself at him with both fists, pounding them into his chest. Cooper caught her hands, easily held them. “Is that it?” he asked. “Or is there more?”

“Shut up,” she said, her voice shaking. “Shut
up
.”
She launched again, but this time
. . . this time
, her lips met his.