Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 60360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60360 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
Caleb had always done his job well, first in the Army and then on the force, his flexible opinion on the value of rules and regulations notwithstanding. But he’d never had a calling, a passion. He’d never had a drive and determination other than the vague notion that evil existed in the world and because he could root it out, he should.
Truthfully, and he would admit it to himself, if no one else, he was jealous of Izzy. She had a family and a purpose. He’d had neither while growing up. It did no good to dwell on it, though. The past was the past and he could never do anything to change it. Being jealous of Izzy just made him feel weak by comparison. And if Caleb held his anger tightly in check, he never, ever allowed himself to feel weak.
He stepped further into the kitchen and she became aware of his presence. She took off the headphones and tossed them onto the table.
“You keep odd hours,” he told her, while punching the button on the coffee maker.
She winked at him. “Whatever it takes to get my man.”
She’d meant him and it was just a joke, but jealousy of a different kind reared its ugly head. This was a feeling wholly unknown to him, and therefore very, very dangerous. He had nearly convinced himself that the whole conversation needed to be shut down entirely, but his brain or his dick or some other unruly part of him wouldn’t let it go.
“Is there someone waiting for you back home?” he asked. It was a perfectly reasonable question, he told himself. She had a life there, a life she’d be going back to after she found the Paul kid. Caleb was interested in her life. It was only polite.
“You mean do I have a Denver? Like your Sioux Falls? Yes,” she told him and his grip tightened on the coffee mug he was filling. “But he’s going to be waiting a long time.”
Caleb turned to her and regarded her for a moment. “You’re… not going back?”
Izzy shook her head. “Not to him,” she declared. “We had a good thing—casual, fun, no strings.” Her gazed darkened. “But he fucked it up. Big time. The biggest.” She shook her hair out across her shoulders. “I don’t do forgiveness,” she told him, meeting his eyes with a steady gaze. People are who they are and they don’t change. When my trust is gone, I’m gone. There’s no going back.”
Caleb crossed the room and handed her a mug. “What did he do?”
He couldn’t think of a mistake so big it could kill a relationship, at least not a casual one, but then again he’d never had a relationship, casual or otherwise. So he couldn’t pretend to be surprised at his own ignorance.
Izzy wrapped her hands around the mug and gazed into its glossy, dark contents. “He rented a cabin. Weekend getaway kind of thing. I didn’t mind. I like the mountains. I can always use a vacation. If he wanted to spring for it and invite me along, it sounded like a good time. On the first night, I caught him going through my bag. He found my birth control pills and buried them in the trash.”
Caleb sat stunned, unable to wrap his mind around such a thing. “Jesus fucking Christ.”
“I didn’t let on that I’d seen him. I came into the room and said I was looking for my toothbrush. I pretended to notice my pills weren’t there. He said I’d probably forgotten them at home. ‘No big deal,’ he said. ‘We shouldn’t let it ruin our weekend.’ And surprise, he’d brought two really nice bottles of wine.”
“Izzy,” he replied quietly. “Jesus.”
“So I told him I knew what he’d done. That I watched him do it.” She sighed, annoyed, and took a sip of her coffee. “He said it was a mistake. That he loved me so much, that I could love him, too. I just needed a nudge.”
Caleb slammed his mug down, sloshing liquid everywhere. “What the fuck?!” he demanded in sympathetic outrage. “A nudge? A fucking baby is not a nudge!”
“I know. How you feel now? Well, I almost fucking shot him. He had no right to do that. No right at all.” She sighed again and leaned back in her chair. “So, he’s done. For good. He knew me, knew I didn’t want kids. But he thought, well I don’t know what the hell he thought. We never did quite mesh. He never really got it. He never really understood. I’m not a mother. I’m no one’s mother. My own mom, Christ, well let’s just say it’s not in my genes. My life is the way I want it. I do what I need to do.”
“So, you don’t ever want kids?”
Izzy shook her head. “I’ll take the house and the picket fence, but not the two kids in the yard.”