Chapter Text
Lucy finds her dad in the kitchen, Tupperwaring leftovers and setting things in order. Folding her arms one over the other, she leans against the counter and tries to work up the courage to ask him what she wants to ask him. Before she can speak, however, he notices her presence.
“Sweetheart.” He pauses in the middle of scraping pot roast bits into the garbage. “Thanks for helping out tonight, keeping Mr. Howard entertained.”
She fights a blush – he has no idea just how entertained she’d kept him, that’s for sure. “Sure, dad,” she says, clearing her throat. “No problem. He’s an interesting guy.”
He goes back to scraping with an agreeable nod.
It’s only when he moves to turn the faucet on that she manages to blurt out, “Can I ask you something real quick? About Vault-Tec?”
It’s been nagging at her ever since the supply closet, really, Cooper’s urging for her to quit. The brief glimpse of honesty she’d gotten tonight has been enough to pick at that scab; what she really wants to do is ask Cooper about it, but she’d rather avoid another fight if she can. This, she decides, is a nice compromise.
Looking almost delighted, Hank pauses, sets the dish into the sink, and gives her his full attention. “Of course! Don’t tell her I told you this, but Barb has had nothing but good things to say about you lately. I don’t think it will be long before you’re more than just an intern.” He winks conspiratorially as he speaks.
She bites her lip and fidgets, unsure what to make of that. “Yeah, okay. That’s good. I wanted… to ask what exactly it is you do there?” She can’t help the uncertainty that takes hold of her – Cooper had been so adamant that she quit; there must be something she’s missing. But she knows her dad. He isn’t a bad person, he wouldn’t be a part of something she herself couldn’t handle. Would he?
Smile fading a little, Hank rubs at the back of his neck. “Well, I can’t get into anything specific until you’re cleared,” he admits.
“Cleared?” she echoes.
Hank shrugs. “For classified information. I’m sure Barb will tell you more about it when she decides you’re ready to apply. I wouldn’t worry about it, though. You haven’t done anything that would make them deny you.”
Her heart starts beating a little faster, and she shifts uncomfortably off the counter. Classified information? She’s tempted to ask him what kind, but she suspects she won’t get much more out of him than she already has. If there’s one thing she knows about her father, it’s that he takes his job seriously.
“What I can tell you,” he continues, “is I’m proud of what I do. And I’m very proud to have you following in my footsteps.”
She summons up the best smile she can when unease is still eating away at her stomach. “Thanks,” she says, then, before he can comment further, “Hey, is it okay if I take the humidifier home?”
###
On Monday, she goes back to work. She pays more attention to the information Barb has her inputting, but it says nothing more than it ever has. Of course it couldn’t be that easy – she’s not going to find anything out sitting around passively like this, waiting for dirty secrets to fall into her lap. She’s going to have to go looking for them.
This takes the form of Lucy forcing herself over to Barb’s office and rapping on her doorframe.
Barb looks up, over the rim of her reading glasses, and waves her in. “Miss MacLean. Did you need something?”
She hesitates before forcing herself to step into the office. Slowly, fingers fiddling with the hem of her shirt, she makes her way to the chair she’s almost used to by now and lowers herself into it. She crosses her legs at the heel then uncrosses them. Lets the silence stretch out so long Barb has to prompt her to speak again.
Lifting her head and squaring her shoulders, Lucy sucks in a deep breath. “I wanted to discuss my future at Vault-Tec.” She injects her voice with as much self-confidence as possible – the key is to sound like she’s looking forward to the prospect instead of dreading it.
Barb glances up from her paperwork, taking off her spectacles and laying them carefully aside. “I admire your taking the initiative,” she says in a tone Lucy can’t really read. “What exactly did you want to discuss?”
She smoothes an imaginary wrinkle out of her skirt and recrosses her heels. Then, forcing herself to stop fidgeting, she picks out her words one by one. “It isn’t that I’ve found my time as an intern invaluable, of course, it’s only that I have higher ambitions than data entry. I’m not asking to be placed anywhere before I’m ready, only… only I guess I’d like to know what I can expect out of my time here should you decide to keep me on.” Her palms are starting to sweat; she places them firmly in her lap and hopes Barb won’t notice.
The slightest hint of a smile takes hold of Barb’s mouth. “Sometimes, you remind me an awful lot of your father,” she says. “He was sitting right where you are now, once, and he’s become one of our most valuable leaders since. I’ve every confidence you’ll be as much of an asset.”
Setting aside her paperwork, she moves her chair in closer to her desk and leans forward. Arms propped on her desk, she holds Lucy’s gaze. “I can assure you, your expertise as an engineer is going to be invaluable to us. I can see you having a shining career in the weapons department.”
Every cell in Lucy’s body goes cold. Maybe, she thinks as she digs her nails into her slick palms, she misheard. “Weapons department?” she asks faintly.
Barb hums. “Yes, we have quite a few contracts with the Department of Defense. Handle the smaller assignments well enough and there might even be a place for you with your father in the nuclear sphere.”
“Nuclear…” she echoes helplessly. This whole conversation is surreal; she’s starting to doubt her own hearing. Starting to doubt that she isn’t still in bed dreaming, honestly.
The rest of Barb’s sentence slowly filters through. “Wait.” Her brows draw together. “With my father?”
“Not directly under him, of course,” Barb says, waving her hand as if to swat away what she thinks is Lucy’s concern. “Probably not even on the same contract. But I see no reason the two of you couldn’t have similar positions.”
Lucy stabs her nails deeper into the meat of her palms to keep herself from saying something she’ll regret. Namely, what the fuck? She’d known Vault-Tec wasn’t a charity long before Cooper had ever said anything, but this is worse than she expected. Designing and developing warheads? She doesn’t want to set the world on fire – she just wants to keep a roof over her head.
Even worse, apparently her dad doesn’t share the same qualms. He’s worked for Vault-Tec as long as she can remember.
She wants desperately to leave this office, but she’s not sure her legs will hold her if she tries to stand. She does anyway, abruptly and clinging to the back of the chair. “Well,” she says and is shocked by how calm she sounds, “this has given me a lot to think about. I appreciate your honesty, Miss Showalter.”
At Barb’s nod of dismissal, Lucy walks carefully outside and away from the windows. Down the corridor to the small cubicle that counts as her office. She lowers herself into the well-used office chair and stares blankly at her wispy reflection in the blank computer monitor. A bright future at Vault-Tec building nuclear WMDs for the low, low price of her hopes and dreams of making the world a better place. She’d have a more than comfortable life, she knows that much. She’s seen her father’s bank accounts, and she’s aware how much a home like theirs in a place like this costs. But it’s never been about the money.
Face blank – she doesn’t want any of her coworkers getting suspicious – she powers up the computer and navigates to job sites. It’s past time she takes Cooper’s advice.
###
Her next few days are filled with applications and origami. The former she works on near-ceaselessly, most of her spare time filled with polishing her resume, writing tailored cover letters, and answering inane personality questions like what kind of iced beverage she would be or what her favorite life experience has been. Not, she wants to say, filling out this application with all the information already available in my resume. But thank you for asking.
The latter is sparked by an impulse purchase on a grocery run to Target – she’d been wandering aisles and the beginner kit had caught her eye. Now that she doesn’t have Steph to hang out with, she figures she needs a new hobby and something to give her a break from applications. So she slips it in her cart despite the fact that she’s never so much as touched a slip of origami paper before. At worst, she’ll litter her apartment with colorful balls of paper.
Whenever she starts to go cross-eyed from applying, she pulls out one of the tiny sheets and the instruction book and loses herself to the delicate art of coaxing a shape out of it. She’s halfway decent at it too; the diagrams and creases just make sense to her, and soon she has a veritable zoo of animals scattered about. She even puts a silver foil octopus next to Cthulhu.
“Look,” she tells him. “Your cousin has decided to visit.”
She becomes almost rabid about monitoring her email, can barely go an hour without checking it once or twice. Every time the chance for an interview comes up, she schedules it. Several days, she has to practically sprint back to her cubicle after her “lunch break” to make it back within the hour, but she can’t feel bad about it. Vault-Tec is not her future.
In all the rush, she barely has time to think about Cooper. This time she’s the one who takes days to respond, if she manages a response at all. A pink box or two — penance for imagined sins — show up at her doorstep after a week, but she only carts them inside, dumps them on the dining room table, and plops down in front of her laptop to finish up an application. Whatever is in them, she decides, can wait until later.
It’s a matter of weeks before she hears back from her first choice – and the news is good. They have an opening for someone willing to work for a pittance on a new low-income housing project. It will house some three hundred families living below the poverty line. It will give them a new lease on life. It is, the interviewer warns her, an on-site position. Lucy will have to leave Los Angeles.
She spends a long time rereading the email. The position itself sounds perfect, and it might be the only chance at getting away from Vault-Tec she’ll have anytime soon. But leaving Los Angeles…
She glances around the apartment. Moving out wouldn’t be the worst thing; she’d wanted to downsize anyway. She hasn’t so much as said a word to her father since finding out what he actually does for Vault-Tec, a fact which seems to have confused him every time he’s hailed her in the hallways. Getting some real distance from him appeals.
It’s Cooper that makes her pause. Things between them are tenuous – maybe even tenuous enough that moving any sort of distance will spell the end for them.
Shutting the laptop without responding, she picks up one of her origami creations, tucks it carefully into her purse, and grabs her keys. There’s someone she needs to talk to.
The day is beautiful. Sunshine bathes everything in butter-yellow, and there’s enough of a breeze to keep it from being beastly hot. The sky is so blue, it looks like it goes on forever, and there isn’t a scrap of cloud to be seen. And as far out as she is, birdsong is louder than the traffic.
She steps out of the car and walks by memory through the maze of headstones until she reaches the most familiar one. Pure white marble and recently cleaned – her dad must have come by not too long ago.
Pushing that thought from her head, she seats herself on the springy patch of grass and crosses her legs. “Hi, mom. I made you something.” She removes the origami from her purse and sets it in front of the headstone. “It’s supposed to be a rose,” she says, “but it’s not very good. I only started learning a bit ago.”
A brief burst of wind threatens to carry the paper rose away, and Lucy has to scramble to catch it. She tucks it in more firmly against the marble, pausing to trace her fingers along the carved name imprinted upon it. They’re warm – from the sun, logically, but she likes to think it’s her mom’s way of reaching out.
Sitting back, she crosses her feet at the ankles and wraps her arms around her shins. Chews at her bottom lip a little before she manages to say, “I met a guy. To be honest, I’m not sure you’d really approve. But I like him. I’m pretty sure he likes me.” She waits a beat, as if she’s going to get some sort of answer. Nothing but the soft rustle of the origami rose.
“I think I’m going to leave LA.” The words are quiet, cautious. She’s testing them out for the first time. “Not forever,” she hurries to reassure her. “You’re here, and so is Norm. For a while, though. There’s a job in Bakersfield, and I need some time away from dad.” She clutches her shins a little tighter, stomach clenching. “Did you… know what he did? Does?”
Some part of her hopes not. If Rose knew nothing, then Lucy has nothing to hold against her. She plucks at the grass, ripping out a few pieces and silently apologizing to the groundskeepers. She can’t bring herself to ask if that’s why she left him, in the end. It would hurt too much to not get an answer.
Clearing her throat, she forces herself to uncross her legs and stand. “Anyway. Norm is doing okay; I just saw him at dinner last night.” She rattles on about things that don’t really matter, all the little details of her life that make up the moments Rose probably would have never cared about if she were still alive but that Lucy likes to let her know all the same.
The shadows are long before she finally manages to pull herself away with one last touch of her fingertips to the headstone. Still warm. She closes her palm around it as if it were something she could carry with her, presses it to her heart, and can’t bring herself to say goodbye.
When she gets back to the apartment, she goes straight to her computer and accepts the job. She spends the rest of the night crafting a two-week notice.
It takes a bit the next day for her to peel her fingers off the steering wheel and walk into the office. She’d almost left the two-week notice behind in favor of quitting immediately, but it’s not like she’s going to get any closer to building nukes in the next fourteen days than she already is. Might as well stick this out and leave with as much grace as she’s able.
Still, that doesn’t make the walk to Barb’s office any easier. She clutches the letter like a lifeline, half-wishing she could just slip it under her door and spend the rest of the day hiding. Instead, she knocks and waits for Barb’s permission to come in.
One deep inhale, one long exhale, then she walks in and hands it to her without hesitation.
Barb’s eyebrows lift marginally. “What is this?” she asks even as she scans over it.
“My two weeks.” Lucy clasps her hands behind her back and lifts her chin. “I wanted to thank you again for the invaluable experience I’ve had here, Miss Showalter, but I’ve found another opportunity to pursue.”
For a second, Barb seems stunned into silence. Then the tiniest shift: her brow furrows, and she finishes Lucy’s notice. Placing it carefully onto the desk, she folds her hands over it, clears her throat, and gestures for Lucy to take a seat.
After a moment’s hesitation, she does.
Barb tilts her head. “If you’re feeling unfulfilled here, I’m sure we could-”
“No,” Lucy cuts her off immediately. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but there isn’t anything you could offer to make me stay.”
A sigh, then Barb sinks back in her chair. “Well, that’s certainly definitive. Should you find this new opportunity lacking, Vault-Tec will always be here.”
Lucy was sure enough of that. War was an eternal business.
She goes back to her cubicle thinking that was easier than she’d hoped it would be – though she can’t say why exactly she’d thought it would be so difficult. As it turns out, however, she isn’t getting off so neatly as all that. An hour or two after she leaves Barb’s office, Hank drops by her cubicle.
It would look a little too unprofessional to flee, even for someone who’s just quit, but Lucy puts a laser-focus on her computer screen and doesn’t stop typing even as she greets him with a stiff, “Mr. MacLean.”
“Lucy.” That one word is infused with so much quiet anger, she actually looks at him. Seeing him, one wouldn’t think he was anything other than mildly upset, but she’s only seen him like this once: the last time he and Rose had been in the same room.
It’s enough to make her turn her monitor off and give him her attention. “I mean, dad.”
He doesn’t bother to acknowledge the audience they have, other workers slowing to gawk at them. Vault-Tec is a well-oiled machine; anything even slightly out of the ordinary tends to stick out.
Lucy feels it, though, the weight of everyone observing them. She opens her mouth to ask if he maybe wants to take lunch early, but before she gets the chance to speak, he finds his tongue.
“Barb just gave me some very interesting news.” He leans in a little closer, jaw lock-tight. “News I hope she misheard.”
Faced with the full force of his disapproval, her mind whispers that this would be an easy out. Brush it off as a momentary lapse in judgment, apologize, and shred the two weeks’ notice. Stick it out. She’s been here a few months already – what’s a few more years?
Swallowing, she gives herself a shake. No, she’s made a decision, she needs to stick by it. She has her reasons, even if her dad doesn’t understand them.
Still, she’s not quite as forceful as she’d like to be when she says, “She didn’t mishear. I’ll be gone in two weeks.”
His lips work at nothing for a moment, forming and discarding words faster than he can think them. “What are you thinking?” he finally asks. “This is the best opportunity you could ask for, and you’re just throwing it away!” He’s practically hissing; maybe he’s more aware of being watched than he appears.
“Maybe we can go outside,” she suggests faintly. She can feel him like a bonfire at her back as he follows her out of the building and into the parking lot. This is going to be harder than she thought.
She turns to face him with her arms folded over her stomach, her own personal shield, and lifts her chin. “I’m not throwing anything away,” she says, and this time she speaks like she means to. “I’ve got another job lined up, one I’m more interested in doing, that’s all.”
Hank presses his lips together. “Sweetheart, if things aren’t interesting enough for you, I’m sure Barb can find something else for you to work on, just until your clearance comes through.”
“There isn’t anything here I want to do,” she says. “Especially not what you do.” She’s not sure she really meant to say that last part, but it’s out now, and he’s looking at her like he can’t believe what he’s just heard.
Now that she’s started, it feels like she can’t stop. “I didn’t want to end up at Vault-Tec anyway; it just sort of happened. I’m sorry it can’t be a family thing like you wanted, but I became an engineer to help people, not shoot rockets at them. I can’t believe… I can’t believe you ever thought I’d want to do this. How could you know me and think that?”
Plain confusion overtakes Hank’s face. “What are you talking about? I thought you’d be happy to work with me! Here, doing good things.”
It hits her then, like a bird on a window. Of course he did. She’d made herself into the perfect little soldier – always bowing to authority, always doing precisely what was asked of her. Always ready to do The Right Thing.
Only, it turned out they had different definitions of right.
Nauseated, she reaches a hand out to brace herself against the wall. This is where playing the good girl has gotten her? A stranger to her own father? Fuck. That.
“Actually,” she says, forcing herself to stand on her own, one hand on her stomach. “You’re right. The two weeks’ notice was a mistake. You can tell Miss Showalter I’ll be leaving effective immediately.” She starts digging for her keys, already working out logistics. She has savings enough to get her through two weeks, though she’ll need to stay mindful about how much she’s driving. She still has to make it to Bakersfield.
“Lucy.”
Something about his tone makes her lift her head, meet his eyes. In that moment, he’s as much a stranger to her as she is to him.
“I’m very disappointed in you,” he says, all flat robotic.
A month ago, she thinks she would have crumbled at those words. Now she stares back at him and says, “Don’t worry, dad. The feeling is mutual.” Then she yanks open the car door and sequesters herself inside before he can say another word. She breezes out of the parking lot without a backward glance.
###
The rest of that day is a flurry of cardboard boxes and masking tape. She collapses onto the sofa at the end of the day, muscles like wet noodles, brain little more than a puddle. Her phone buzzes – a text – and her heart clenches. She can’t take anything from her dad, she just can’t.
It’s Cooper’s name, however, that flashes onto her screen.
Lucy?
She swallows thickly. There’s only so long she can put off telling him, especially with the decision she’s made today. But she can do it a little longer.
i’m alive she tells him, and that at least seems to be enough for now as he says nothing further.
It takes her a week to pack up her kitchen and the rest of the apartment, minus the absolute essentials, and half of another to work up the courage to talk to Cooper. Leaving her approximately four days before she’ll be driving away from Los Angeles for who-knows-how-long.
Hands trembling, thigh-highs wrapped around her legs (she doesn’t have a whole lot of clothes left to choose from), thumbnail between her teeth, she hits the call button. He picks up on the first ring, like he always does.
“Hello.”
The only way she gets through this is by refusing to think about it. “I have something I need to tell you, and I need you not to talk until I’m done, okay?”
She waits for his quiet, “Okay,” before stuffing one hand between her thighs and inhaling deeply.
“I quit Vault-Tec. You were right, I didn’t really want to work there anyway, and I just… well, I couldn’t stay there. So I quit. And I found a new job building houses for people, which is what I actually want to do, so that’s good. I start soon. Like, in less than a week.” She curves forward, grip white-knuckled around her phone, forehead pressed to her kneecaps. It will make no difference at all, but she closes her eyes. “And it’s not in LA. So I’m moving. I guess that’s it.”
Silence on the other end of the line. She’s about to crawl out of her skin by the time he says, so warmly the sun could live in his voice, “Good.”
She rolls her head to one side, wondering if she’s misheard. “Good?” she echoes.
“You deserve a hell of a lot better than Vault-Tec, Lucy.” A beat, then he ventures into stickier territory. “Where’s this new job?”
Licking dry lips, she finally peels her head off her legs. “Bakersfield. It’s only an hour and a half away, but…” But we still haven’t said what we are. But I understand that’s a lot to ask. But I don’t want that to matter.
“Bakersfield?” he muses. “You know, I’ve been thinking about buying a ranch up that way.”
Her heartbeat consumes her, rushing so loudly through her ears she barely hears herself ask, “You have?”
He hums. “You’d give me a good excuse to have a look around. Provided you wouldn’t mind my dropping by, of course.”
Barely able to believe that could mean what she thinks it means, she nods then realizes he can’t see her. “Of course.” She bites her lip, not sure what else to say besides thank you.
He fills in the gap. “I’d like to see you before you leave.”
“Just tell me when and where,” she says, the barest hint of cheek in her tone. She hangs up feeling almost silly for having worried so much and full of anticipation for where Cooper might take her. Everything, at last, is coming up Lucy.
###
Two days before she’s set to leave, she gets a text from Cooper. Nothing but an address and a time. Seeing as said time is less than two hours away, she scrambles to get ready. Spreading all the lingerie he’s ever given her on the bed before her, she wastes several precious minutes debating between them all – before ultimately deciding to go as they’d first met, sans any at all.
She sweeps it all into a box, tapes it up, and adds it to the stack of cardboard that’s been overtaking her apartment. There isn’t much left of her wardrobe to choose from, and she ends up in a plain black dress she probably picked up in a thrift store somewhere. It at least nips in at the waist, but she frowns at herself in the mirror. Not exactly what she would have chosen to be sent off in. Still, it will have to do.
She turns to makeup to save her. Most of that is still strewn around her bathroom, and she whittles most of her time away painting her lips red and her eyes black. When she examines the finished look, she has to admit she’s worked a miracle. It’s taken the dress from passable to possibly even sexy – and left her with barely enough time to get to the place, as she realizes when she plugs the address into Maps.
The sounds of traffic have never been so unwelcome; she groans and shoots off a quick text that she’ll probably be a few minutes late. Her stomach flips as she wonders if that will be enough to earn her some sort of punishment. Maybe if she’s lucky.
The clock tick, tick, ticking away distracts her from paying too much attention to where she’s actually going until she realizes she’s almost there and in a neighborhood that looks distinctly… residential. Nice houses, sure, nicer than any she’s ever stepped foot in before, but. She has the sneaking suspicion he’s given her his address. Immediately, her palms start sweating.
A moment later, sure enough: the GPS tells her she’s arrived right as she cruises past a driveway. She drives a good half a mile farther, trying to psyche herself up to actually turn into it. Scraping together the courage, she makes a three-point turn, parks herself in the drive, and sits unmoving so she can take in the edifice before her.
It’s a house, arguably. One might call it a mansion and one might not be wrong to do so. There’s landscaping that puts her dad’s patio to shame and enough glass to make her worry about the local bird population. There’s a pool in the backyard; she knows without even looking. This is the kind of place to have a pool. Perhaps even a hot tub. She cannot let herself think about what Cooper might look like in a swimsuit, wet and dripping.
It takes a few minutes more – now she really is late – before she manages to unlock her joints from the familiar, comforting leather of the steering wheel and mount the shallow stone steps to his doorway. Jesus Christ, it better be his doorway. If she’s at the wrong place, this is going to be embarrassing as hell.
Squaring her shoulders, she rings the doorbell. The time it takes for the door to open could be years for all she can tell. When it does, her shoulders slump in relief. She wasn’t mistaken. That’s really Cooper.
“Sorry I’m late,” she says, and it comes out closer to a rasp than she’d like. Really, she shouldn’t be so intimidated by a building.
“Well now.” Cooper leans against his doorframe and gives her a long, appreciative once-over. “Don’t you look pretty.”
Flushing, she tugs self-consciously at her dress. “So this is going to sound like a stupid question,” she mumbles, “but this is your house, isn’t it?”
With a rumbling laugh, he opens the door wider and steps aside in clear invitation. “Last I checked. I thought you deserved at least one date before we went long-distance.”
She almost creeps past him, wondering how he’d managed to so casually glide about her dad’s house when all she wants to do is ogle everything around her. The entryway is just an entryway, but it’s also his entryway, so she’s enchanted.
There isn’t much there, which is probably the only thing that gets her to move. Her feet carry her over mahogany wood into a spacious hallway, the room to the right clearly a living room with its overstuffed armchairs and sofas draped in luxurious-looking furred blankets. To the left, something she thinks is probably a study, mostly dark wood and low-wattage lamps that lend it an atmosphere soaked in brandy and cigar smoke. A vintage-looking-but-probably-not-vintage record player rests atop a restored stereo cabinet. Books stand in rows like crooked teeth, and if she had her way, she’d examine their titles like he’d examined hers.
The scent of something heavenly prompts her onward, however, even before Cooper’s guiding hand in the small of her back. The hallway loses its walls, opens up into an open-plan dining room separated from the kitchen only by a long, thin island that could easily double as a bar. Judging by the amount of alcohol bottles stowed along its length, she supposes it does.
The table is small, room enough for only four, and made even more intimate by candles flickering in the air conditioner. The flames reflect off the glass tabletop, setting it a-sparkle. There are already two places set, and she almost apologizes a second time for her tardiness.
“Did you… cook?” she asks, staring at the plates heaped with fettucini alfredo if her nose has it right.
He lifts his eyebrows. “You say that like you can’t believe it. I’m a single father; I’m not going to let my daughter starve.”
“Well, it smells amazing,” she tells him, inhaling deeply and hoping her stomach won’t growl. She steps toward the table, but he slides smoothly in front of her, hands on her shoulders to keep her where she is.
“One more thing.” He’s almost somber, and her heart flutters. He can’t possibly have set this all up just to break things off. He’s not the kind to look nervous, but he does now, all twitching fingers and skittering eyes. Then he forces himself to meet her gaze. “I know I haven’t always been the most forthcoming, but tonight, I’m your open book. Whatever you want to know, I’ll tell you. I figure I owe you at least that much.”
Suddenly, she finds it harder to swallow. A home-cooked meal and the answers to all her questions at her fingertips… It hadn’t been the direction she thought the night would take, but it is a welcome one.
Questions crowd the tip of her tongue, one after another after another, but she doesn’t allow herself to voice any of them. This will be hard enough for him without her turning this into some sort of inquisition. She starts off with something easy as he pulls out her chair for her. “Is this really a date?”
“Goddamn.” He chuckles. “I knew I was a little rusty, but dinner, candles, everything, I thought it was obvious.”
She raises her eyebrows. “Nothing about you is obvious, Cooper.”
He ducks his head as though conceding the point and uses the movement to press a kiss to her cheek. Before he draws away, he whispers, “Yes, Miss MacLean, this is what it looks like when I’m serious about someone.” Then he takes his own seat across the table, leaving her palms sweating and her heart attempting to beat its way out of her chest.
It takes her a minute to reboot before she can pick up her fork. “So, um.” She casts about for another question that won’t send him running for the hills and settles on, “Is Janey with Barb tonight? And is she doing any better at school?”
The expression on his face makes her think that might have been more of a minefield than she intended, but he doesn’t back down from his promise that easily. “Yes to the first question. As for the second, I’m afraid not. Her lifestyle is too unstable, if her mother is to be believed. Of course,” he scrapes his fork across the plate, “that was her excuse when I was in the film industry too. I’m starting to think nothing is going to be stable enough for her.”
A beat of silence, then he sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Sorry. This is why I don’t usually talk about this. You don’t want to hear about this shit.”
“No-” Lucy reaches out to rest her hand atop his, strokes her thumb gently across the ridge of his knuckles. “If I didn’t want to know, I wouldn’t have asked.”
He scrubs his other hand over his chin before letting it fall with the barest hint of a smile. “Fair enough. But I’m not doing all the talking. Tell me about this new job of yours.”
Despite her desperation to learn more about Cooper, she can’t help getting distracted. There hasn’t been anyone who she could really gush to about her new job yet – a few encouraging texts from Steph hardly count, and her dad is obviously out. She almost forgets to eat as she tells him about the grant paying for the housing, her role-to-be in designing the buildings, the kinds of people she thinks it will help. She goes on for what is probably far too long, but he doesn’t voice a word of complaint.
When she’s exhausted just about everything regarding that topic, she clears her throat and bulls right into her next question without giving herself time to think about it. “Are you really going to come all the way to Bakersfield to visit me?”
“As long as you were serious about wanting me to,” he says without hesitation.
She sinks her teeth into her lip to keep from smiling obnoxiously. “I was.” She hesitates, fidgeting in her chair and trying to work up her courage to ask the first question that had popped into her mind when he’d offered to tell her anything. “Um, and since we’re talking about ourselves, I might as well tell you I’m on birth control. Just in case you were, uh. Hoping for something else. Given where… how you… the whole coming-inside-me thing. So I guess I’m wondering, were you hoping for something else?”
Her cheeks are as hot as they’ve ever been, and he doesn’t help anything by staring at her for so long she wonders if she hadn’t actually spoken at all and that whole speech had been in her head.
Eventually, however, he pushes his plate forward and folds his arms on the table so he can lean in closer. “Lucy, I’m in my late forties, divorced, and inclined toward having sex with strangers. I had a vasectomy years ago.”
Now it’s her turn to stare. She can’t even say why she’s surprised – now that he lays it out like that, of course it makes perfect sense, but the thought had never even crossed her mind. For the first time, it really hits her how big a difference there is in the years between them.
“Oh” is all she can think to say.
“Jesus Christ, your opinion of me,” he mutters, an edge of humor to the words, a gleam in his eye as he sits back in his chair again. “Just how irresponsible do you think I am?”
“Oh God.” She drops her face into her hands and rocks her head back and forth. “Let’s forget I ever said that, okay?” she practically begs, voice muffled through her fingers.
He laughs lightly, and she silently resolves not to ask any more questions. She’s thoroughly embarrassed herself enough for one night. Instead, she applies herself to the pasta, mumbling, “This is delicious by the way,” and not speaking again until her plate is clear. When she does, it’s something perfectly safe: an offer to do the dishes.
He appears scandalized that she’d even suggest it. “I didn’t invite you over to do housework.”
“You didn’t,” she says amiably, already standing and reaching for his plate, “but I was raised to believe that fair is fair, and it is fair for me to do the dishes when you’ve cooked. So I will be taking that now, thank you.” Before he can protest further, she hurries into the kitchen and turns on the tap.
She can just hear him pushing out of his chair while she gathers up the dishes scattered around the kitchen. A moment later, he calls out, “You like Patsy Cline?”
Judging the water to be warm enough, she stoppers up the sink. “I don’t really know who that is,” she calls back. “Some old country singer?”
Another moment of silence, then the strains of a song she recognizes but would never have been able to name come warbling out of what is definitely the record player. What starts off as a simple heel tap graduates to a complementary humming graduates to near-full-body swaying as she scrubs away alfredo sauce.
She’s lost enough in the song to almost jump when Cooper slides his arms around her, the gurgling of the water masking his footsteps. Almost immediately, she melts back against him as much as she can with her forearms still submerged. She goes practically boneless when he bends to nose along her neck, lips skimming just below her jaw.
“You didn’t ask the one thing I thought you were going to ask,” he murmurs, and the sound of his voice so close to her ear ignites something low in her gut.
She has to lick her lips before she can formulate a response. “What’s that?” Her grip on the sponge has slackened to a dangerous degree – much more and she’ll let go of it altogether.
He closes his teeth around her earlobe and tugs just enough for her to feel it. “What I want.” It’s more a growl than a sentence, and she loses the sponge completely.
Squirming, she doesn’t even bother to try grabbing it again. “What do you want?” she rasps.
“More of this.” He slides his hands over her, wrists to shoulders (trailing water droplets like speckles of candle wax) to hips where he edges his fingers just past her hemline. “But the other parts too. I won’t stop wanting those.”
She abandons the dishes to their watery grave, lolling her head back against his shoulder and pressing the swell of her ass back into him. “Good,” she whispers. It’s a relief to see this softer side of him, to be sure, but she’s tried the regular boyfriend thing and ended up nothing but bored. It’s time she let herself accept she needs more than that.
As if she’s given him permission, he sneaks his hands under her dress and groans to find her bare. “God, you’re fucking perfect.” Removing one hand, he runs it up the column of her throat, tilts her chin up so he can capture her mouth in a searing kiss.
She turns into him, palms against his chest, letting him take whatever he wants. For tonight, she’s only going to worry about being his.
Her breath leaves her in a sharp gasp as he hikes her up – as though it doesn’t take any effort at all – and guides her legs around his hips. She wraps her arms around his shoulders and doesn’t break away from his mouth for so much as a second as he sweeps her into what she presumes is his bedroom.
Soft mattress on her back, the heat of him above her, between her legs. She peels her eyes open because she can’t not take advantage of the chance to see the inside of his bedroom. Even as he kisses his way back down her neck, hands busy on her thighs, she marvels.
Most of it is wood and warm. The nightstand, the dresser (no tentacle dildo atop it, she notes), the display cabinet with its trove of awards. She likes his taste, she realizes. Despite the size of the room – because it’s massive, half the size of her whole apartment – it feels close and homey with its earthen colors. A jewel-green rug eating up the floor, lighting mostly from lamps instead of overheads, yellow-toned and tempered by opaque lampshades.
The bed upon which she’s spread (and getting spreader, his hands pushing her knees apart, his head disappearing below her dress) has to be a king-sized of some variant, though she can’t peg Alaskan, Californian, or otherwise. The sheets enveloping her are a rich brown that puts her in mind of dark chocolate and just as luxurious. She rolls her shoulders, luxuriating in their silken embrace and already knowing it will be a tragedy to sleep anywhere else.
After that, she gets distracted; goddamn, but he does know how to use his tongue. She comes with those soft-ass sheets twisted around her fingers then almost immediately hefts herself onto her elbows. “Come here,” she says, already grasping for his shoulders.
He does, amusement glinting in his eyes as she drags him in for a kiss. The taste of her on his tongue is enough to make her groan. She’s so intoxicated by it, she doesn’t notice him undoing her dress until it slips from her shoulders.
Wriggling out of the rest of it, she slides herself farther up the bed, spreading her limbs and smushing her face into a pillow. “Your sheets are insanely comfortable, by the way.”
One of his eyebrows lifts just a little. “That’s what you’re thinking about right now?”
With a light laugh, she lifts herself onto her knees and starts rolling his shirt over his head. “If you were used to sleeping on the kind of bed I’d sleep on, you’d appreciate this too.” So saying, she tugs off his shirt and sends it over the side. “Of course,” she half-purrs, trailing a finger over his belt buckle, “you could always give me something else to think about.”
Wrong – or right – thing to say. He has an arm around her back and her legs out from underneath her so quickly it makes her head spin. Dimly, she hears the clink of his belt buckle, but it’s still a shock to feel the leather of it biting into her wrists (when did he even grab those?).
Arms crossed above her head and bound, she can do little more than blink up at him pleadingly. She clears her throat as he unbuttons his pants, slowly enough to make her squirm. “Actually,” she says, voice strained, “there is one other question I forgot to ask earlier.”
He pauses, damn him, resting back on his heels and staring down at her with his head cocked. “Well, go on.”
“The lasso you used in that movie,” she pushes her chest forward a little, “was that you or a stuntman?”
His smirk is positively wicked as he hooks his hands under her knees and drags her toward him. “Oh, that was all me, sweetheart.” Then he pins her bound wrists to the mattress and sets out to explore seemingly every inch of her with his mouth.
She’d already ached for his cock; this makes her throb. He’s relentless, tongue scraping over her nipples and stomach and hip bones and jaw but stubbornly avoiding the one spot screaming for attention.
“Cooper–” She strains uselessly against his grip, and he has the audacity to laugh at the attempt. A flush travels all the way down to her chest, making her even more heated than she already was. She rolls her hips as high as she can and shakes them a little in invitation. It’s all she can do not to whimper like a goddamn puppy.
He rests his hand between her breasts and slides it downward, trailing fire in his wake. When he finally skims down to her entrance and slips two fingers into her, she keens with relief. It takes barely any time at all for her to reach her second climax, and a thin sheen of sweat settles over her body.
She shudders as he reaches over her to undo the belt; it joins the rest of his clothes on the floor. Hauling herself into a sitting position, she pulls him to her and kisses him roughly, teeth catching his lower lip and tugging.
He follows her back down to the mattress, and as he goes, all those glimpses of someone more gentle hiding underneath coalesce into a new version of him. He cradles her cheek, deepening the kiss into something tender that makes her heart stutter. Nothing seems to be more important to him than keeping her close; he hitches her leg over his hip and slides an arm around her back to crush her chest against his.
She molds herself against him, kisses every inch of skin she can reach. When he pushes himself inside her, she lets her head rest against his shoulder with a sigh. For once, there isn’t any teasing or desperation – just long, gentle strokes that nevertheless make her feel like she’s falling apart at the seams.
There’s the briefest flash of disappointment when he comes – knowing what she does now – but that is something to think about later. Now all she wants to do is curl into him and try to remember how to breathe normally.
She doesn’t even realize she’s falling asleep until her chin drops onto her chest. Forcing her eyes open, she blinks blearily up at Cooper. “I guess I should… go home now.” The very last thing she wants to do is get dressed and face the LA streets, but like hell is she going to impose.
Cooper lifts his hand to rest the back of his fingers against her cheek. “I would prefer if you didn’t.”
“You mean I can stay here? In your bed? With you?” she asks, already yawning and wiggling her way toward the pillows.
He laughs lightly. “That would be the idea, yes.”
She curls up around herself, forgoing clothes – not like she has pajamas anyway – and snuggled underneath those luxurious covers. Already half-asleep, she mumbles something about how she’s sorry she hadn’t brought anything and she’ll get out of his hair early enough–
He cuts her off with his lips to her temple and a low, “Sleep, Lucy.” A command she’s only too ready to obey.
She wakes to cold sheets and the sizzling smell of bacon to lure her from the bed. She changes almost furtively into the wrinkled dress of the night before and runs her tongue over her teeth. She’ll have to brush them as soon as she gets home.
For now, though, she follows her nose to the kitchen where Cooper is standing over the stove in nothing but low-slung drawstrings that have her contemplating jumping his bones. Hunger overtakes lust in the end. She pounces not on him but on the plate of bacon piled beside him, sticking a piece in her mouth and hitching herself onto the counter to eat it.
“Big day for you tomorrow,” he says, and she hums in agreement. “You need any help packing up?”
She shakes her head. “It turned out Steph owned most of the stuff in the apartment. I’ve really only got a few boxes and almost everything is packed already. It’s just getting it all into the car, which-,” because she can sense the offer on the tip of his tongue, “-as much as I’d like you to muscle your way through for me, I need you to let me do on my own.”
Thank God he doesn’t ask why because it’s not something she can articulate anyway, it’s just something she knows. This is a slate she has to wipe clean without any help. Instead, he only inclines his head and fishes another piece of bacon out of the grease.
She takes her time eating through breakfast – which also includes poached eggs because Cooper is nothing if not refined (at least in some areas of his life) – and saying goodbye. The farewell involves many half-starts to the door only to be pulled back and persuaded into what will surely be the last kiss this time. Eventually, by some miracle, they make it outside where Cooper actually lets her go with a promise not to let it be too long before he makes it out to Bakersfield.
She rides that high through shuffling up and down the stairs with box after box of belongings. Her arms and shoulders ache something fierce by the time she’s Tetrised the last one into her car, the apartment empty for the first time since she and Steph had met. She cleans meticulously – like hell is she losing her security deposit – and snaps a pic once she’s done, sending it to her old roommate with the caption, end of an era!!
Thoughts crowd for attention as she pulls the door shut behind her. She’ll have to talk to her dad again at some point; hell, she’ll have to move back to LA at some point. For all Cooper’s talk, he might never make it out to Bakersfield either. But whatever happens, she reminds herself, it’s hers. She feels ready for that in a way she never has before.
She relishes the sound of the engine turning over and tightens her grip on the steering wheel. “Bakersfield,” she tells the road before her, “here I come.”