Page 58 of One for the Road
Did my jaw hit the floor? It felt like it. “Not really, we’re neighbours.” It was true, yet my voice came out too high pitched. The way it always sounded when I lied. “We’ve known each other for a while.”
I don’t know what reaction I’d expected when Cameron learned about Alistair and me. Quietly accepting or entirely unbothered would have made the top of the list. So,the squared jaw and flared nostrils caught me completely off-guard.
“Annie told me you guys had put in an application for the Cairn & Crust – I didn’t want to believe it.”
So, she had seen it. Seen it and not approved it.
Oblivious to the information he’d let slip, Cameron shook his head. “Look, I’m not trying to insert myself in your business—”
A laugh tore up my throat. “And yet here you are.”
He didn’t miss a beat. Inching closer, eyes searching mine the way they used to when he was trying to sweet-talk me. “I get how hard this has been on you and that you must be lonely, but – I’m not sure it’s a good idea to bring random men around Teddy.”
Her name was a grenade exploding between us. My entire body jerked. “Alistair isn’t a random man; he’s the village doctor. And Annabelle islivingwith you.”
Could he be any more of a hypocrite?
“That’s different, Lala. Annie is my girlfriend. We’re committed to each other.”
“You barely even waited a week to move her into Teddy’s life!”
“You’re right; I did a shitty thing.” To his credit, he looked guilty. Face pinched, full lips twisting into a pained grimace. “And I get how this sounds coming from me, but I’m always going to look out for you. My relationship with Annie doesn’t change that I will always care about you.”
He reached for my hand, but I snapped back, pulling out of his reach. “Maybe I don’t need you to care for me.”
Idly, I became aware we were beginning to attract stares.
I didn’t care.
Cameron didn’t seem too either. “I was your first everything, Lala. First kiss, first love. I’m the only man you’veever—” He broke off, and my cheeks burned. “I don’t want you making rash decisions that affect our daughter because your heart is broken. You should have informed me the second you brought him into your life,” he finished, as though I were a child who needed scolding.
Part of me wanted to laugh again, but something sharp was lodged in my windpipe, making it impossible.
I don’t know what was worse. That he was questioning me as a parent or that he presumed I must still be so torn up over him, four months on, that he couldn’t even contemplate my looking at another man, much less dating one. I mean, I didn’t want to date anyone, but that wasmychoice. A choice that had nothing to do with him.
“So you want to know every tiny detail of Teddy’s life now? She fell over and cut her knee last month. Should I haveinformedyou about that?” I spat. “Or how about when she caught the chickenpox over the Easter break and cried for three days straight? Did you expect me to call you then?”
His eyes flared, surprised that I was actually arguing back. I could hardly believe it either. “Yes. I’m her dad.”
A trap. And he was so arrogant he’d walked straight into it. “That’s funny,” I sneered, glaring up at him. “Because when I called, it went straight to voicemail. Three times.”
He winced, running a hand down his perfectly shaved face. “Shit. We were slammed at the restaurant around then, I barely even had a chance to look at my phone. Why didn’t you leave a message?”
I laughed sadly. Always an excuse. Always someone else to blame. “I shouldn’t have to leave a message to get you to call your daughter back. Or beg you not to cancel your weekends with her.”
“I’m sorry, okay? I’ve been distracted and busy; it’s a shitty excuse. But my concerns about him are still valid.” He blew out a slow breath. “You forget that I grew up here, I remember Alistair from school. I know how ambitious he is, how quickly he’ll throw people under the bus to get what he wants. Look at what he did to Juniper Ross. The entire village was gossiping about how he punched his own brother in the face when he came home last autumn,” he said quietly, letting the warning hang. “That’s the kind of man you’re bringing around our daughter, Isla.”
The words hit their mark. Left room for that niggle of doubt – that I was way over my head with Alistair – to creep in. Followed quickly by a rush of disgust. Disgust for Cameron.
Yeah, Alistair had his own baggage. A lot of it.
But that washisbusiness. Information I wasn’t entitled to as his fake girlfriend.
Even if Cameron did believe we were a couple, it was brand new. Alistair didn’t owe me the same loyalty as a man whose child had grown inside me and nearly torn my body in half during the birthing. A man who’d asked me to stay home and raise his family, while he made a life for himself. A man who’d asked me to accept his gorgeous, successful high-school girlfriend asmyfriend, then turned around and blamed me for his betrayal becauseour relationship had grown stale.
I’d been so blindly trusting.
And he’d taken that trust and twisted it into something nasty.
