My emotions just seesawed in the span of two minutes. I’m back to smiling. “Yeah, Lil,” I whisper, my gaze flitting to her as she sleeps.
I don’t trust her fully. I can’t. I end up going through my phone’s history to see what she was up to yesterday evening. My stomach drops. Tons of Celebrity Crush articles, Twitter, Tumblr—shit. I scope out those. No porn. Just television fandom stuff. She also Google searched “when should I take a paternity test” since it’s something we’ve mentioned to silence the rumors about Ryke. I don’t want to think about it right now.
I almost shut off the phone, but it buzzes.
Are you up? I need to talk to you. I’m in the kitchen. – Connor
Instead of texting back, I just carefully climb out of bed and put on drawstring pants before I leave.
{ 32 }
LOREN HALE
After walking down the hallway, I descend the stairs, skipping a couple steps at a time, and then I enter the large clean kitchen.
In khaki shorts and a navy collared shirt, Connor pours himself a cup of coffee, no dark circles under his eyes or any visible signs of exhaustion. It’s already been four weeks since Jane was born and he’s a pro. “Should I expect to be as well rested as you?” I ask him, heading to a cupboard.
He turns around while I search for cereal. “Your normal sleep cycle is ten hours,” he reminds me. “Mine is six.”
“Noted.” All I see is Ryke’s granola cereal on the shelf, so I take out the box. “What’d you need to talk about?” I open the fridge and grab the milk.
“I want you to hear this from me before it appears anywhere else.”
I slow my actions, not frozen in place, but more cautious of this conversation. I wrack my brain for the subject matter, and I come up blank. “Yeah, okay,” I say, pouring milk in my bowl. I put the cereal back and wait for him to speak.
But in a rare moment, he has trouble producing words.
I stop moving and just lean against the counter, eating my cereal unhurriedly. “I can handle whatever it is,” I remind him. “Is it Lily?” The granola lumps in my throat. I drink some of the milk to wash it down.
“No,” he says quickly. He stands opposite me, cupping his coffee, and his blue eyes flit up to mine. “It’s about me.”
I frown and set my spoon back in the bowl. “Are you getting shit at Cobalt Inc. for the Mexico stuff?”
“When I kissed you?” he says with the tilt of his head.
I flash a half-smile. “I could’ve kissed you, you know.”
“But you didn’t. I kissed you,” he says easily. “And no, I’m not getting flak from anyone directly, and I couldn’t care less about rumors.”
“Really? The Connor Cobalt that I first met was all about his reputation.”
“My reputation has superseded anything I envisioned back then. It’d take more than a dare in Mexico to hurt it…” He sips his coffee. “You don’t need to worry how people perceive me. It’s something I’ve micromanaged my whole life. I’m equipped to deal with it now.”
“So what is it then?” I ask outright.
“It’s…” He stops short and lets out a laugh. “I almost never explain this to anyone…most people wouldn’t view me the way I’d want them to. They wouldn’t really understand. So I just keep it to myself.”
He looks up at the ceiling as he collects his thoughts.
And he starts by saying, “I admire certain qualities in almost every person, but I don’t think like everyone else. My ideas and beliefs would be considered strange, and I’ve lived by the notion that I understand me, even if everyone else sees someone lesser, someone…they need. But as long as I know who I am, nothing else matters.”
I don’t understand completely, and off my confusion, he keeps explaining.
“I manipulate people’s emotions. I’ve been with different people because they needed someone to love them and I needed something from them. Rose used to call me an ‘immoral asshole’—I wouldn’t disagree. I’ve never claimed to be moral.” He stands straighter and adds, “If you look closely at the things I say, you’ll see more of me.”
I process all of his words, but I can’t hone in on the details, the significant parts of what he just said. All I wonder is if he’s manipulated me before. If he saw a guy that craved love, in almost any form, and he took advantage of that. We’ve been down this road before, and I can’t even remember what I told myself to let it go, to accept it and move on.