Page 76 of Cooper

“I think we’ll just head home,” I say out loud. “I’d love to see my family at some point, but the timing isn’t good and I’m not ready for the questions that will arise if I bring home a boyfriend.”

“I don’t have to go with you,” Cooper says quietly. “I can head back with Marcus.”

“No. I honestly don’t have the time or mental bandwidth for a visit right now. I’m happy to make the drive—I do want to see the prison—but I don’t need any time with my family right now.”

I feel a twinge of guilt, because I genuinely love my family, but this is about timing and protecting my mental health.

I know a visit with Cooper won’t go well, and even if I go alone, it’ll just be a lot of questions about my life, why I’m not married, why I want to work at a job where I can get shot… nope. I’ll figure out another time when I can visit.

* * *

Cooper doesn’t sayanything about me not wanting to visit my family, and I feel like I should bring it up, but I don’t know how. We leave early the next morning, heading to the northernmost town in Limaj, Braksa, which is where the prison is located. The prisoner is in an armored van, which Marcus is driving, and Cooper and I are behind them in an SUV. It’s a long drive, close to eight hours, so we’ll get there late in the afternoon, get him settled in the prison, and then drive approximately two-and-a-half more hours, back in the direction from which we came, to Vinake, which is the area I’m from. We have two rooms booked at the local inn. They’re booked in Marcus and Cooper’s names, so I hope to avoid being recognized.

That’s really the only option unless we want to spend the night at the prison.

And I don’t.

Accommodations, even for the guards, are rudimentary and uncomfortable. Better than what the prisoners have, but nothing to write home about.

“We have to talk about what I said,” I blurt.

Cooper’s driving, and he glances over at me. “Okay.”

His voice holds a question and I’m not sure how to explain what I’m feeling.

“I don’t want you to meet my family because they’re going to be mean to you.”

I don’t know how I expected him to react, but I’m caught by surprise when he bursts out laughing. “Yeah, babe, you’ve told me that. Like twenty times.”

“Yes, but before it was all theoretical. If we go there, it’s going to be real.”

“What are you afraid of? Do you think your father will shoot me or something?”

“Oh. No. Nothing like that. But they’ll be rude and inhospitable. I’ll get lectured for being a woman with no morals and my father will ask you when you’re going to marry me.”

He shrugs. “I’ll tell them it’s too soon.”

“You don’t understand the culture here.”

“Maybe not, but I can hold my own with your parents, Natalia. I’m not afraid.”

“But I am.”

“Why? You’ve told me so many times how they make you feel bad about leaving even though you basically support them in the winter. Do you truly give a shit what they think?”

I sigh.

He has a point, and I know I have an unhealthy obsession with my family being what I wish they were as opposed to what they are.

“I guess I just want them to like you.”

“I think you really want them to likeyou.”

Ouch.

That hits a little too close to home.

“You’re probably right. Don’t get me wrong, I know they love me, but they struggle to show it, and it doesn’t make sense. I take care of them. I work hard. I work for our royal family, and while they don’t approve of everything Erik is doing, they do have strong feelings of tradition and nationalism. They’re proud to be Limaji, and I’m part of our country. How am I the bad guy?”

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