Page 146 of The Single Dad

When I wake up the next day, my head is pounding, and my eyes feel dry. I feel hungover on emotions, every bit as stressed and upset as I was last night when I drifted off.

The fight I just had with Cole was like nothing we’ve had before, and it rocked me to my core. I’m generally a non-confrontational person, preferring things to remain peaceful and simple, and conflicts like that almost always shake me.

But beyond that, it’s also the worst tension that has ever existed between me and Cole. Just when I was starting to think that everything was falling into place—that we might be able to do this thing, for real…

I force myself to climb out of bed and dress myself, as if this was any other day. As if I didn’t cry myself to sleep last night.

I still have a job to do, and contrary to Cole’s accusations, I intend to do it well.

I go downstairs, into the kitchen, earlier than I normally would. Secretly, I’m hoping that Cole will still be asleep, and I’ll have a little bit of time to whip up breakfast and coffee—a chance to get myself on solid footing before I see him.

Unfortunately, there’s no such luck. Cole is already up, sitting at the center island with his hands folded in front of him. When I walk into the kitchen, he gives me a cordial nod.

“Good morning.”

I nod back, uneasy. “Good morning. Is Archie up yet?”

He shakes his head. “No, not yet. Not for another half hour.”

His voice is monotone, his posture stiff. A wave of discomfort rolls through me; god, I hate how stilted this interaction is. I hate that any of this happened.

I hate it so much, in fact, that I decide to tell him so. I open my mouth to say something—maybe something like, I don’t like how we left things yesterday, or, can we talk about this? I want to fix things.

Before I can decide on a good way to start this conversation, Cole speaks.

“I think it would be best if we ended this.”

I blink, stunned, all of my carefully-organized thoughts scattering to the wind.

What?

“This thing between us needs to end. It’s over,” he adds, as if I didn’t hear the first part.

“What do you mean, over?”

He blinks at me, his face like a mask. “We both agreed that the extra dimension to our relationship would end when either of us said so. I never should have let it get this far, to be honest, but at least we can end it now, before anyone else gets hurt.”

Hurt? I shake my head slowly, trying to clear my mind and, simultaneously, deny what he’s saying. Before anyone else gets hurt?

“My focus right now needs to be on Archie,” Cole continues. “I love him, and I need to take care of him. I owe it to my sister. I can’t afford to be distracted like I have been lately.”

I’m too rattled to respond. There’s something horribly businesslike in his tone, a cool distance, as if he’s trying to rewind time back to the night we first made that agreement. As if he’s trying to dismiss everything that’s happened since, all of the feelings that have developed.

We’ve become close since then. We’ve been vulnerable in front of each other. Cole has seen sides of me that no one else has seen. I thought that feeling was mutual, and now, I don’t know what to think.

He’s reducing everything we were to nothing. Like this whole situation had nothing to do with our emotions at all. Like it was just a simple, cut-and-dry case of a wealthy single father fucking the nanny.

I feel sick to my stomach. I have to put out a hand to steady myself against the edge of the counter.

Part of me wants to beg him not to do this, but what the hell could I say? He’s clearly already made up his mind. There’s a finality in his tone, a line not to be crossed.

And besides—I’m not going to reduce myself to that.

I don’t want to beg someone to love me. It’s not who I am.

So instead, I nod, my teeth clenched tight. I blink rapidly to hold back the stinging tears. They’re not just tears of sadness; I’m angry, too, deep in my chest.

He’s handling this as poorly as he possibly could. There’s no honesty in his words, no trace of the open-hearted, sensitive man I’ve seen glimpses of. In order to shut me out, he’s shut himself off completely.

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