I ruffled his hair, and he groaned. “The Justin Bieber look was very fashionable with you young’ns.”
He slid down the sofa and rested his head on my shoulder. “Mom and Dad are still angry,” he murmured, his voice flat. “I tried talking to them again, and they wanted to know if I’d come to my senses yet.”
I kissed his head and clasped his hand. My heart hurt when I thought about them, but Jacques made it better. So did Trav and Linc. “I miss them too.”
“I understand that they’re angry, but why can’t they see it from my point of view?” He could barely contain his frustration and hurt. His tone changed, his words becoming shorter and his voice rising further from the whisper we’d been using with every word he spoke.
I turned into him and admitted, “I understand how they feel. If the situation were reversed, I think I would have reacted the same way.”
Jacques sat up, his brow furrowed and his lips turned down in a frown. “But you don’t have a problem with the age gap between Cara and Monroe,” he pointed out. “How is this different?”
I stroked his fingers with my thumb, looking at the differences between our hands. His were strong and smooth; mine were showing the beginnings of age, my pores deepening and fine lines starting to appear. “The age gap isn’t the problem. Your mum and dad feel like I betrayed their trust and stole their son’s innocence and future.”
He barked out a disbelieving laugh. “That’s ridiculous. I’m hardly a blushing virgin.”
“You’ve never introduced Trav and Linc to them as your partners, so they don’t know that you’ve been in a serious relationship for years. Regardless, their feelings don’t have to be logical.”
“Still….”
“It’s important you acknowledge those feelings, Jacques. I hope my friendship with them isn’t beyond repair.” I blinked back the sting in my eyes and exhaled heavily. “I don’t want to lose them. But more importantly, I never want your relationship with them to suffer because of me.”
“If they can’t get it—”
“I think they need to understand your position to be able to really move past what’s happened. But if they can’t, then I want you to honor their wishes not to hear anything about me. It’s only a year—you three can go and visit them without me, or if they come here, I’ll stay in the guest cottage.”
“Not going to happen. It’s all or nothing.”
“You know, when my ex didn’t support Cara moving here, I didn’t tell him he was going to lose his daughter if he didn’t change his mind.” I pursed my lips, biting back the instant anger at David. It wasn’t so much the cheating now—Jacques, Trav, and Linc had all helped me move past that—it was me needing to persuade him to do the right thing by our daughter, an action that should have been second nature to him. It was the first thing our daughter had ever asked for help with, and he’d refused.
Jacques tightened his grip on my hand, and his jaw bulged as he ground his teeth.
“I should have, but I didn’t. He wouldn’t have wanted to hear it from me, nor did I want him to think I was swaying her opinion of him.” I sighed and shook my head, annoyed that I was still angry at him.
“You still changed David’s mind.”
“I did,” I conceded. “It helped that I was here. It also helped that Cara had run her business plan by me. I tweaked a few parts of it to include information he’d want to see in there and sent it to him.”
“And, what, he said he’d be a good dad because of that?”
I huffed humorlessly. “Basically. I appealed to his business brain. Cara had a plan, and he decided to invest in it. I think he figured out that the payback—a relationship with his daughter—would be far greater than if he continued to stonewall her attempts.” I shrugged. It really was as simple as that.
“My parents don’t think like that, though. They’re all about trust and loyalty and ethics.” His voice held a note of bitterness in it, and I couldn’t help my laugh.
“All the important things,” I reminded him. We were quiet for a moment, and I added, “The greatest joy in my life was raising my daughter. I know for a fact that your mum and dad share that view. My relationship with my parents wasn’t the same after they found out about David. I lied to them about his age, and I lied to him about mine. But now, instead of being happy that we’re divorced, they think I’m a failure. I’ve tried repairing the rift between us. I’ve tried talking, I’ve tried begging, I’ve tried yelling at them. But there’s a whole mountain of hurt there between us that I doubt will ever be summited. Don’t let that happen with your parents,” I begged, squeezing his hand to bring home my point.
“They’re trying to protect you the same way my parents tried with me. My parents banned me from seeing David—that made me sneak out and do stupid shit that I want to smack my seventeen-year-old self upside the head for. I was too young and dumb to understand they were trying to protect me. Don’t make my mistakes. Keep talking to them. Please.”
Jacques sighed unhappily. “They’re hurting you.”
I nodded and forced a smile, but it wasn’t a happy one. “I hurt them too. I’m hoping that we can get past it. I’ve reached out to them—the ball is in their court. But they still want a relationship with you. Don’t give that up easily. One day, they won’t be here anymore, and you’ll look back and regret losing them. I don’t want that for you.”
I was introspective tonight. Early morning reminiscing would do that to a person. I had regrets—everyone did—but maybe I could fix some of them. I’d done the best I could with Cara when she was little. I wished I could have been there more. We were solid now. We were close, and she knew I’d be there for her whenever she needed me. I wanted that to continue. I wanted to grow old watching my baby girl live her life and be happy.
No matter what happened in my life, I needed to be there for her. I was living in a bubble, but I could feel the pressure building. We were already three months into this marriage. No, fake marriage. I needed to remember that. It didn’t matter how hard I was falling for Jacques, Linc, and Trav. Permanent could never happen. Jacques and I had already pre-signed the divorce papers. That train was already in motion. I couldn’t very well jump off now. They were sweet and genuinely good men. But I needed to remember that this was temporary.
Still, it would have been nice to have had everything I’d ever dreamed of.
twenty-seven
