Page 61 of Craving Cooper

“Sure. I’ll bring it right over.”

She leaves, and Cooper and I just stare at each other in her absence, because we know she’ll be back… and sure enough, she is, returning within minutes with fresh glasses of wine. She puts them down, removing the empty ones, and then takes her time, re-arranging the silverware and topping up our water before she eventually moves away. The second she does, he takes my hand in his again.

“Is that what made you decide to leave Southern California and come here?”

“Yes, and no. It’s what made me decide to leave. Coming here was a bit more haphazard.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t know where I wanted to go, so I stuck a pin in a map.”

He laughs, and I join in, relishing the sound we make together.

“I guess it must have been fate, then.”

“What must have been fate?” I ask and he leans in closer.

“That brought you to my door.”

Chapter Fourteen

Cooper

When I asked Mallory to tell me about her childhood, I’d expected to hear about sunny days spent on wide Californian beaches… maybe a father who taught her to swim, or to surf, and a mom who’d watched from the shoreline, loving the bond between her husband and daughter. In my head, it was an idyllic childhood, not too dissimilar from my own, but with the addition of the Pacific Ocean on the doorstep.

My father didn’t teach me to surf, but he gave me swimming lessons from an early age, and both of my parents were really supportive of my decision to go into medicine.

“You have to follow your dreams, son,” my dad said when I announced my intention to become a dentist. He and mom must have known they wouldn’t see very much of me over the coming years, while I went away to study, but they never stood in my way. They never even made comparisons with Brady, who’d been my best friend since we were tiny, and had stayed here in Hart’s Creek, following in his father’s footsteps by joining the sheriff’s department.

They were the most unselfish people I’ve ever known, and even though they’re no longer with us, I’ll always appreciate their love and the support they gave me when I was growing up.

Which is why I can’t imagine how it must have been for Mallory.

Because it seems there were no sunny days for her. There wasn’t a father either… just a mom, who sounds like she was incapable of love.

What must it have been like to grow up in an environment like that… her mom flitting from one man to the next, some of them beating her, all of them leaving in the end? She glossed over her mom’s death like it didn’t matter, and although I find that hard to believe, I guess it didn’t. Other than a change of address, her life didn’t really alter. There was still no security in it for her… no sense of belonging. No love.

It’s no wonder she moved in with Jonah the moment he asked.

Hearing her story makes sense of all kinds of things… like why she got that look of delight on her face when I told her the job I’d just offered her came with an apartment. There might have been a few thousand miles between us, and a fairly bad video link, but I saw the way her eyes lit up, and the excited smile on her face. I didn’t get it then, but I do now. Just like I understand why she wanted to keep Saffron when she turned up out of the blue, like she did.

Mallory wants a place she can call her own. She wants a home and all the trappings that go with it, and that’s completely understandable.

I just hope she realizes how serious I was when I said I’d changed… because I have.

And I never want to change back.

The waitress pops up beside us again, bringing our entrées. I have to let go of Mallory’s hand, but I keep my eyes fixed on her, even when the waitress asks whether we need anything else, just shaking my head in reply to her question. There’s something odd about the way Mallory’s glaring at the waitress. I remember her saying she used to work in a restaurant, though, and wonder if the waitress is doing something wrong. Whatever it is, I can’t say I’ve noticed, but Chester said she was new, so I guess it’s possible.

“Is everything okay?” I ask, the moment she’s gone.

Mallory looks at me, taking a breath. She tilts her head, like she’s trying to decide what to say, or maybe whether to say anything at all, and then she leans forward. “If you must know, I’m sick of the way that waitress flutters her eyelashes at you, and says the word ‘sir’ at the end of every sentence, like she’d happily let you tie her to your bedpost and spank her ass.”

I laugh, unable to help myself, and even though she narrows her eyes at me, I have to say, I feel slightly relieved. Before tonight, I’d built up an image of Mallory as someone who’d speak her mind, who wouldn’t be afraid to say what she wanted… and how she wanted it. It’s been a thought that’s fueled a lot of my more explosive orgasms during the last few days. Listening to her story, and the way she struggled to explain her relationship with Jonah, though, I’d started to wonder. Had I read her wrong?

It seems not, and I reach across the table, taking her hand again, holding both it and her gaze.

“How did you know I have bedposts?”

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