Page 117 of Cooper

That gets her.

I see the three little dots indicating that she’s responding.

NATALIA: You didn’t offer me the same courtesy, but I’m fine. Staying with my parents for a while. Please don’t text again. I’ll reach out when I’m ready.

Ouch. That stings.

I’ll reach out when I’m ready.

So she’s not as mad as she is hurt.

That was never my intention.

But what’s done is done.

Now I have to come up with a plan on how to get her to forgive me.

A stop at a jewelry store, a meeting with Sandor to get a couple of days off, and then a road trip to Vinake.

Where I’m going to have to grovel.

And I will.

Whatever it takes.

THIRTY-EIGHT

Natalia

I’ve beenwith my parents for a week, and the inevitable restlessness is setting in. I’m trying to relax, and I slept well the first few nights, but now insomnia is back. No nightmares, but instead of the peace I’d been seeking, there’s just a strange feeling of discontent.

I don’t belong here.

This will always be my childhood home, but it’s nothome. It’s not where I live or work or play. Or where Casey and I spend time giggling over something we see on TV. It’s definitely not the home where I sleep next to or make love with Ryan.

Ryan.

I miss him.

So much it hurts.

But I’m still struggling.

I haven’t come to any conclusions or figured out who I want to be when I grow up. Hell, at this point, I don’t even feel like a grownup.

I just feel alone.

My parents have been much more supportive than I thought they’d be, not nagging me about anything and only offering advice when I ask. But I know they’re worried. Femke checks in on me a lot, her face pinched with concern, and my mother is trying to singlehandedly feed me enough to last me the next year.

Last night’s texts from Ryan don’t help.

In fact, they make everything worse.

Reading that he loves me, that he’s sorry and wants to talk, guts me. I want to talk, touch him, be with him again, but I have to be sure. About everything. I know it won’t work if I leave the Protectors and he joins them, but I can’t ask him not to. Not when he’s apparently left everything to become one of us.

Besides, I don’t know what that would mean for us as a couple. Would he resent me for asking him to quit? And if he does, we would almost definitely have to move to the U.S. so he can work, and I don’t know what I would do.

I could be a bodyguard for Westfield & Carruthers, but that seems counterintuitive. If this job is too stressful, that one will be too. I’d just be trading a cause I feel passionate about for the safety of strangers.

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