Trusting You

by Ketley Allison

  “I’m not trying to appeal to your weakness,” he says. “So, let me prove it. Come to meetings with me, search this place up and down, talk to my buddies. Do everything you need to do to become comfortable with me again. Just…please…” His expression wrenches before he schools it. “Don’t take Lily away. Not until you do everything in your power to prove she’s not safe.”

  I’m torn. I’m ripping apart in a way I didn’t think would ever happen again, not after Paige. The conflict, the terror and worry, all come to the forefront as I look into Locke's eyes and want to believe him.

  I still see the Locke of last week and how prioritized he is with Lily. The eagerness to learn so he could raise her well and the determination to become a better man. A few nights, I assumed he was out banging women, letting loose his frustrations with mindless, nameless sex before coming home again revitalized and ready to take on a burgeoning toddler.

  Instead, he was going to NA meetings and teaching himself the meaning of a better life. I can’t ignore that, as much as I want to with this jerk—I can’t disregard his patience, his love, his commitment to growing the hell up.

  CPS looked him up and down. Social workers have been in and out of his apartment ever since I let him know he had a daughter. I have to believe I was right to track him down, to give Lily a father.

  I got it wrong once, assuming Locke was out being his old self with his buddies. I could be…

  I keep his stare, but I ball my hands into fists. “You have three weeks to prove me wrong.”

  Locke’s shoulders sag as he releases a long-held breath.

  “Three weeks,” I repeat. “If you so much as swallow a Tylenol, I’m taking her and never coming back.”

  “Deal,” he answers without hesitation. “I swear, I haven’t taken any—”

  I hold my palm up. “I’m here to observe. That’s all. I don’t need any more excuses.”

  His eyelids lower like he’s coming to a brutal realization. “Carter…”

  “That’s all I’m going to be to you,” I say as I stand. “No more…nothing like what happened last night is going to happen again.”

  I can’t look at him while I say it. I’m staring at the floor, at Lily, readying to turn, when he does the most unexpected thing.

  Locke pulls me into his arms. I’m slack, my arms dangling, but he holds me tight.

  I don’t return the hold, but I can’t fight him off, either. God help me, I don’t want to.

  Lily’s delighted by the action and pulls herself up on my pant legs and then smacks Locke’s bare calf. He grunts when she latches on to a few leg hairs, but he doesn’t loosen his hold.

  “Thank you,” he says, and his heart’s beating so hard, it’s ramming into my temple.

  “I don’t expect you to bare your soul to me, Locke,” I whisper into the fabric of his shirt. My breath is hot against my cheek. “But please, no more secrets.”

  “No,” he says, resting his chin on the top of my head. Lily’s babbling in the background during this disarming family moment. “No more secrets.”

  22

  Locke

  Those goddamn pills.

  They were nearly my downfall, stripping away the few things I had left. Namely, my daughter.

  And I haven’t even fucking taken any.

  That much is true, and I was honest with Carter when she asked. I haven’t swallowed any oxys—not half, not one—since my buddies’ “intervention” six months before. Why I keep them is a different story and one I completely fail at explaining to Carter.

  They’re a reminder of my strength, that tiny orange bottle. The ability to look at it, entirely full with mind-numbing, beckoning white tablets, and know that I won’t snort them despite them asking me to.

  A fail-safe, if you will, when times get tough and close to impossible. It’s a private conflict, though—one I won’t tell Ben, Ash, or Easton about, the closest people I have to family. Fuck if I’ll ever tell my sister. But sometimes, at my weakest moments, usually in the dead of night when not even cars outside are honking at intersections, I creep out of my bedroom, step into my kitchen, and fish for that antifreeze bottle. I pull those babies out and look at them. Hard. And tell myself that whatever I’m currently going through, nothing compares to the crash of a year ago when I lost everything. They’re a reminder never to go back to drugs as a solution. Now that my body’s broken, I only have my brain, and fucking up both is a waste of whatever life I have left.

  Don’t get me wrong—it took me a long while to accept that whatever new future awaited me was worth it.

  Actually, I’m not at that point yet. Any future not involving football doesn’t seem worth anything, except for…You guessed it.

  Lily.

  She’s changed it all.

  What I didn’t consider was how much the woman that came with Lily would spin me sideways, too.

  I want to explain all this to Carter in a better way, but she won’t let me. The last time I looked at the bottle, I must’ve fallen asleep while it was still in my hand. Or the pain finally crashed into my brain enough to knock me out. Either way, the bottle fell out of my grip and rolled to the floor. By the time I woke up, their location was long forgotten because Lily demanded full attention.

  Carter has to know all of this. She has to understand I’m not the guy she thinks I am.

  But these last few days, I’m finding it difficult not to blabber out sentences whenever I run into her. Which is a lot, since we live together. I’m also having an insanely hard time deleting what happened that one night when she was spread out before me. All of her, bending to my will, arcing into my tongue, making sounds and moans I want to cause again.

  Sometimes, I catch her coming out of the bathroom, damp and in a towel, and I want to lick every droplet of water off her shoulders until I can suck on her lips. Other moments, she’s cooking dinner, whatever she’s making—and she’s a damn good cook—sizzling and crackling in the pan, much like my chest does whenever I’m near her.

  Now that Carter’s keeping me at a distance, all I want to do is get closer. Fuck, I want her to like me again, and hell if I know what to do with that. I don’t usually care what women think of me. I enjoy them, they enjoy me, and we go our separate ways. But Carter is regarding me in this weird, detached way that’s making me crazy. Like she’s emotionless, but I know that’s not true. I’ve seen her fired up. I’ve caused more than a few of those sparks, and this numb-ass Carter is not the woman I’ve come to look forward to seeing every day.

  I want her back.

  I want the three of us back to the way we were, and that has me speeding in the opposite direction at the same time I want to make a U-turn and see what happens.

  No woman is supposed to do this to me. Especially after I lost my status, my career, my fucking golden ticket. Carter shouldn’t want anything to do with me. She has every right. It’s what I deserve because I have nothing to offer in return.

  I’m so close to accepting this and going through the rigors with Carter until she leaves for good, except the past week keeps haunting me. The special moments between us two, most involving Lily, but some not. Watching movies together when Lily is asleep, having quiet conversations while she naps, holding Carter close when she’s upset, witnessing Carter’s excitement when she showcases her paintings at the coffee shop. I got to see all that. Me. Carter let me in on her happiness, and her happy moments come few and far between these days. And I got to share in the rarity of them.

  Damn it. It’s going to make this all the more difficult to say good-bye. The inevitable farewell is coming up quickly, so maybe it’s best to revert to friendly strangers. It’s definitely better for my asshole heart that keeps kicking up its beat whenever she enters my apartment.

  You’re no good for her.

  Nope. I’m not.

  “Aaaaaaahkeeeee!”

  Lily’s nose is touching mine when I lift her up for another bench press. I’m lying on the floor, the questionable sme
ll of my rug reaching my nostrils, doing physical therapy exercises I’ve neglected. Carter’s off surveying her paintings, leaving Lily and me to our own devices.

  Which, of course, means bench pressing.

  I figure Lily weighs a solid twenty-one pounds. Why not use her as a weight while I get this over with so we can both have some fun?

  “Bah!” I say as I bring her down again. She erupts with laughter, squealing and wriggling in my hands where I’ve hooked her under her arms.

  “Dada!”

  I raise her up for another press—

  Hold up.

  My head lifts off the floor. “What’d you say?”

  Lily blinks at me from her frozen height.

  “Did you say dada?”

  “Dada!”

  I’m agape. Yep, I’m using the word agape. I’m staring at my daughter like I’ve never seen her before, her dangling toes scraping against my chest as my mouth drops open and my ribs expand, filling with, filling with—

  “Hey, I’m home.”

  I didn’t hear the jangle of keys against the lock, didn’t register much, really, since hearing two glorious syllables. I’m still flat-assed against the floor, but I tilt my head to see Carter’s upside-down face, bland, as has been her usual standard in greeting me these days.

  But her eyes skim down my body before landing on Lily, still swaying in mid-air. “What’s going on?”

  “Exercise class,” I say as I pull into a sit-up smoothly, Lily now resting against my thighs. “Say it again.”

  “Say what?” Carter asks.

  “No, I mean Lily. C’mon honey, tell Carter what you just told me a few seconds go.” I’m so gleeful I’m pretty sure my cheeks are resembling Santa Clause right now. “Dada. C’mon, say it with me. Da-da.”

  Lily throws up her hands. “Dada!”

  “See?” I crank my neck so I can see Carter. “Did you hear that?”

  Carter’s hovering near the door, casual in a leather jacket and jeans, but her lips are trembling like she’s holding back a smile.

  “You know you heard it,” I say, beaming.

  Carter cracks. “Holy shit.”

  I fake a stern look. “Language.”

  “Holy moly!” Carter amends, clapping her hands. She gets down on her knees, grabbing Lily’s hands. “You said dada!”

  “Dadadadadada!” she replies.

  “I’m determined to believe she means me with those consonants,” I say.

  Carter glances at me quickly, as if to inquire, You know what consonants are? And I instantly want to erase any doubts she has about my smarts by tonguing brand new consonants against her plush lips, but I resist, preferring this moment instead.

  Especially when she pulls me into a hug. “Locke, this is amazing. Lily’s first word!”

  I recover from the shock of her touch quick enough, swinging my free arm around her waist. “Celebrate with me tonight,” I murmur into her hair.

  I might as well have dropped a bomb between us. Carter scoots away. “Locke, don’t ruin…”

  “I don’t mean a date,” I say and quell any disappointment. “The guys and I were going to hang tonight, listen to Easton go back to his roots. I think you should come.”

  Carter pulls at her lower lip, and I swallow the explicit growl that wants to unfurl out of my throat.

  “It’s probably not a good idea,” she says. “Besides, someone needs to watch Lily.”

  “Astor’ll do it,” I say automatically, knowing that she will. She’s been blowing up my phone wanting to see more of Lily, and I’ve been resisting blowing her up for dogging me out to Carter before I had a chance to do it. But, this is a good reason to see my sister again. “And you haven’t been out since that night”—we explosively almost had sex—“you went out with Astor. And I think you should see some Brooklyn nightlife while you’re here.”

  While she’s here. That begs repeating, since sometimes I forget how soon Carter’s going to move back to Florida.

  You’re no good for her. This can never work.

  But her eyes slide sideways. She’s watching Lily, and I’d pay anything to listen to what’s going on behind that gorgeous caramel stare. “I guess…”

  “You gotta come.”

  “I mean…” She pulls at a loose strand of hair, all curly and swirly from the humidity of an incoming storm. “I did sell a painting today.”

  “You what?” I rise to a stand, taking Lily with me, my knee nothing but an afterthought. I offer a hand and pull Carter up as well. “Dude, that’s awesome!”

  A giggle escapes her, a happy, unexpected twirl of sound that she covers with her hand. “I know, right? Who’d’ve thought someone would want to buy my stuff?”

  “Was it the flower-face one?”

  Her gaze flickers as she studies me. “You know that one?”

  “It’s…yeah. When you had them here, it was the first I opened and, hell, Carter, it was stunning.”

  She doesn’t scoff at me or call me a dumb jock who doesn’t know shit about art. “Really? You think so?”

  I ask, “Is that the one that sold?”

  “Yeah, it was.”

  “Then there’s your answer, sweetheart.”

  She clasps her hands in front of her. “Oh, my God. I sold a painting.”

  “You sold a goddamned painting.” I grin.

  “I sold a goddamned painting!” She squeals, then claps a hand over her mouth, her eyes wide and on Lily. But Carter recovers by leaping into my arms.

  When she jumps, this time I’m ready for her. I carry both my girls and even do a little spin. Carter’s hand slips, skimming down my bare back, and I swear she leaves a chemical trail behind.

  “I—” She feels the moment, too, because Carter immediately backs off.

  “So, come tonight,” I say, giving Carter the escape from any awkwardness. “Celebrate.”

  Carter looks to Lily. Maybe Lily can answer, because she claps her hands, then begs to be let down so she can explore the room. If only decisions could come that easily.

  “And,” I add, “while we may be going to our favorite bar, I won’t be drinking. My vice of choice is tonic with lime these days.”

  “I wasn’t wondering,” Carter says, but we’re both remembering that one time a few nights ago when Carter did a full inventory of my kitchen, then my closets, and under every bed—including under Lily’s crib. That last one was a hard hit to my solar plexus. But as expected, Carter found nothing.

  “I’m not sure if your friends like me,” Carter says instead of elaborating.

  “They don’t know you. Give them a chance. Tonight’s the perfect opportunity.”

  I didn’t get into why she wanted them to like her, but I figure in any case, it's points in my favor, so I’m not about to push it.

  “You’re not going to let up, are you?” she asks.

  Carter asks it in a way that tips up one side of her mouth, an expression I haven’t seen since that brutal morning where she found the pill bottle.

  “Not a chance,” I reply.

  “Okay. Yeah, I will. If you can get Astor to sit.”

  “She’ll be here in a hot minute,” I say and mean every word. “Let’s shower up and get ready…separately,” I assure, and I feel like I’m talking to a skittish horse. “You go first.”

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  Carter hovers, hesitating over something I wish I knew the answer to, but in the end, decides to pat me on the arm. “Congratulations, Dada.”

  That warmth I felt at Lily’s trilling word returns in my chest. “Thanks, Carter.”

  She smiles at her name, but that’s all she’ll give me.

  The last I see of her is that sauntering ass in tight denim before she looks back once, then shuts the bathroom door.

  23

  Carter

  I’m in the shower and haven’t bothered to turn up the heat. I need the water cold, like chillingly, numbingly, cold so I can get the image of Locke out of my head.
/>   But what’s sexier than a hot, single dad doting on his baby girl? Anything? Anything?

  Add a perfectly sculpted bare torso to it.

  “Crap,” I say, then turn so my face is under the spray.

  I’ve been doing so well these past few days, pretending like Locke means nothing. Like our one night together meant old, faded copper pennies that one finds with dust bunnies under their couch. It’s taken all I have to stay quiet and unmoved while he wanders his apartment without a shirt on, plays with Lily while bending down and displaying his perfect ass, and puts her down for naps, Lily sleepily sucking her thumb while lying against his tanned shoulder.

  And now I get to add exercise to that list. His dewy, muscled body glistening as he makes Lily laugh, or lying flat on the floor, his hair thrown around by activity and Lily’s fingers.

  Was he shirtless so often on purpose?

  You’re mad at him. He lied to you. Kept the deeply important fact of his addiction, however brief he thinks it was, from you.

  That reminder is better than any cold shower. It’s been fueling my blank looks and uncaring stares this entire time. Because nothing, nobody, is more important than Lily’s well-being.

  I scrub hard at my scalp, hearing Lily’s “Dada!” in my head. It was a moment I couldn’t remain stoic for. The sheer glee on Locke’s face, like he couldn’t believe this creature he’s been caring for, doting on, can return the favor by showing him some love as well.

  Now he knows. All those hours of sleepless nights, the constant worry of being a bad parent, the insanely high octaves of endless wails, can culminate to a single, heart-rendering word, making it all worth it: dada.

  Or mama, but Paige hadn’t lived long enough to hear Lily speak.

  Another cold dash unrelated to my shower scrapes across my chest. I’m not sure, if ever, I’ll be able to think about Paige and all she’s lost without such hopelessness following suit.

  I let out a frustrated groan, wishing I could punch the tiles without getting seriously hurt, but settle for turning the tap off extra hard instead. I’m shivering, but revel in it since it centers me in reality instead of any wayward memories, whether they be about Locke or Paige.