I motion to Kellen to step away from the excavator so we don't have to yell at each other, and we walk about twenty yards away, which puts us in the middle of the town hall parking lot.
"What's up?" I ask him.
"Sorry I didn't get out to celebrate Eden's party last night," he says. "Too much damn work to do."
"No worries," I tell him, because it wasn't a big formal thing. Missy put the word out and gathered people to have a good time together and let Eden know she was valued. Didn't bother me the mayor didn't come.
Kellen leans in and says, "I know. But I wanted to thank her for her donation. I know she wants it to be anonymous, but I was thinking of sending her a gift or something. Maybe you can give me an idea."
"Donation?" I ask with my eyebrows raised.
"You don't know?" Kellen asks with worry. "I just assumed she would have told you. You know...seeing as how you two--"
"What donation?" I repeat.
"Two days ago," Kellen tells me in a low voice, as if he's afraid someone out here in the middle of the parking lot might overhear. "She dropped off a check for a million dollars with a short note. Told me that she wanted it used however the town most needed it, and she wanted it to remain anonymous."
I whistle in amazement. "One million dollars?"
"Crazy, right?" Kellen says. "And we can definitely put it to good use. You know this town's been wanting to build a new outdoor sports complex for the high school."
That's true. Our current football, baseball, and soccer fields pretty much suck. The bleachers are old and splintered and the fields are barren. We don't even have an electronic scoreboard.
"So what do you think?" Kellen asks. "Flowers? Candy? I mean, what do you give a woman who just donated a million bucks to her town?"
I shake my head with a smile. "I'm thinking you say thank you and that's it. Eden didn't do it for any recognition."
I know this as sure as I know the sun rises every day. Eden was never one to bask in accolades. I could even see it at that awards show a few days ago. While she was honored and flattered, she was also embarrassed. She would be happier having them mail the award to her house, and would have done that but for Samuel coming in to give it to her.
Kellen nods as if this is wise advice. "I'll drive out to Goodnight House and tell her myself."
"Not tonight," I say quickly. "She has plans already."
"Maybe I'll just call her then," Kellen says as he starts to walk back toward the town hall. "Thanks for the advice, Coop."
"Sure thing." I wave at him as I start back for the excavator. I want to hurry up, pull these bushes out, and get home to Eden. I'm thinking now the shower can wait, but dragging her to the floor and making her come hard cannot.
--
"Jesus, Coop," Eden rasps out as I lift my face from between her legs. She's splayed on the kitchen floor, naked from the waist down. I didn't hesitate when I walked into the kitchen to find her putting a pan of something in the oven. I grabbed her, dragged her to the tile floor, and stripped her jeans and panties off. Then I fucked her with my mouth and she came gloriously hard.
She's panting when she asks, "What was that for?"
I shrug as I look up her body, her head raised off the floor to meet my gaze. My dick is hard as a rock and getting mashed painfully. I need to either fuck her or get up and go shower.
Eden comes up to her elbows. "Seriously...that was totally freaking awesome, but what did I do to deserve it?"
I crawl up Eden's body and give her a quick kiss, knowing she can taste herself on my mouth, which makes me hornier yet. Still, I want to get a shower because I'm dirty and sweaty. "No reason."
"No reason?" she asks skeptically.
"No reason," I confirm with a smile.
"You're lying," she says, calling me out.
"Am not."
"Are too. Coop, you're not getting laid tonight unless you tell me the truth," she says evilly.
Whatever. I can totally get her to spread those pretty legs for me.
"Coop," she warns.
I'll prove it to her.
I bend my head down and kiss her hard. While she's occupied--and I know she is because her arms go around my neck--I reach down and fumble with the button and zipper to my pants.
With my cock freed, I line it up and slide into her slippery heat.
"Oh God." Eden turns her face to the side and moans as I bury myself inside her.
"Knew you couldn't resist me," I whisper as I rub my nose along her cheek.
"Asshole," she says affectionately, and then rotates her hips to pull me in a bit deeper. And yup...that feels fucking fantastic.
I start moving, raising both of her legs with my palms to the back of her hands and I fuck her hard. I do it quick and nasty, hitting her deep so I can get her to come again. It doesn't take long with the taste of her in my mouth and my cock gripped by her pussy and Eden thrashing underneath me on the kitchen floor. We both come together in tandem violent explosions and I ease down onto her gently, supporting my weight with my elbows on the floor.
She looks at me with the sweetest, most sated smile, and it hurts to look at it. It hurts because I know I want to put that smile there every day. I want it just for myself and no one else, and I don't think that's possible.
"You donated a million dollars to Newberry," I murmur as I bend down to kiss her softly.
She jerks in surprise, and when I lift my head, her eyes are narrowed. "How did you know that? It's an anonymous donation."
"Relax," I tell her. "Kellen wants to get you something nice and asked my advice. No one else knows. But the real question is, why didn't you tell me in the first place?"
Eden shrugs. "It's not a big deal."
"A million dollars isn't a big deal?" I ask her dubiously.
"Not to me it's not," she says stiffly.
"It is to this town," I tell her gently. "You're amazing."
"And that's why you ate me out on the kitchen floor?"
"And that's why I ate you out on the kitchen floor," I reply.
"Remind me to give more money away." She giggles and then pushes at my chest. "But seriously, don't tell anyone, okay?"
"Your secret will go to my grave," I promise her with a smile, and I know I should let her up, but I don't want to move. My dick is softening, but it's still snugly inside of her. The tile is cold and hard, yet I want to stay here.
"I have to leave tomorrow," Eden says abruptly, her eyes guarded as she waits for my reaction.
My cock totally deflates and slips out of her.
"What?"
"Just for about a week," she says quickly. "My next movie isn't set to start filming for another five weeks, but they unexpectedly got access to a location that wasn't originally available. But now it is for a limited time so they want to get those scenes filmed ASAP."
"Where are you going?" I asked, slightly off-kilter that tomorrow Eden will be gone. I realize I'd actually had been making plans in my head for the next several days. Figured we'd go fishing, and out on a date with Clay and Jeannie, and possibly to Atlanta for the weekend to a nice hotel where we could fuck and order room service.
"It's a period piece that takes place in seventeenth-century London, and most of the filming will be there, but I'm leaving tomorrow for Ireland. There's a castle they got permission to film in."
"Jesus," I say as I push up off the floor and tuck my dick back into my pants. I reach a hand down and help Eden up. I hardly notice as she shimmies into her panties and jeans with a grimace, and I know she'd love nothing more than to get a shower right now.
Scrubbing my hand through my hair, I ask, "So you'll be gone a week?"
"Maybe ten days," she says with a slight wince.
"And then what? You'll come back here?" I know my voice sounds combative, but I can't help it.
"If you want me to," she says cautiously, but her voice is tinged with anger. "Do you want me to?"
"How long would you be here?" I ask her, because it
hits me. We really haven't talked about this expiration date. I know she's got a movie starting in several weeks, but I couldn't tell you the day, or any other detail for that matter. The fact that it's a period piece set in seventeenth-century London is all I know about it, and I feel like shit for not showing more interest.
But fuck...I was ignoring it.
Ignoring facing the fact that there would come a day she'd go back to her life.
"I'd be able to come back for about three weeks," Eden says softly, wringing her hands. "Then I'd have to go back to LA, get some stuff settled at my house. I'll be in Europe filming for about four months. But after that, I'll have a bit of time off, and I could come back. I know we said this would have an expiration date on it, but I don't want it to. I could make time to come--"
"Jesus," I say harshly. This is real and it's happening right now. My eyes pin on her and I tell her what I know she's got to be thinking too. "You realize we're in the same exact place we were fourteen years ago."
"How do you mean?" she asks with her head tilted to the side.
Okay, so apparently she wasn't thinking the same thing.
"I mean," I drawl with exasperation. "You have your life somewhere else, and mine is here. You have a career, I have a career, and they don't gel. We'd be facing a long-distance relationship again, and you and I both know that didn't work out the first time."
"But we're older now. More mature. And I've got more flexibility in my schedule. We could make it work if we tried."
"Just how would we make that work, Eden?" I ask curiously...and maybe with a little hostility. I'm pissed she's leaving because I don't want her to.
She shrugs but soldiers onward. "I don't know. I could cut back on the amount of movies I do. I could live here part time. You could travel with me some of the time, or come stay in LA. There are a lot of people that make these types of relationships work."
"What about kids?" I throw at her.
Her eyes go wide with surprise. "Kids?"
"Yeah, kids," I say flatly. "We stay together, we make this work, and say we have kids. Where do they live, Eden? With you in LA.? With me here in Newberry? Where exactly would their home be? And if you're off traveling and doing movies, do you take them with you? Or leave them with me? And what do I tell them when they want their mom and she's not here?"
My voice gets harsher as I throw these things at her, and Eden's eyes turn frostier.
"I don't know all the answers, Coop," she says as she spreads her arms out in frustration. "We'd have to talk about it. Figure it all out."
Well, of course that would be logical, but now I'm riding on fear and anger, and well...that makes me illogical.
"You said your life was lonely," I point out to her. "It wouldn't be that way if you stayed here and gave all that up. You could do that, Eden. Choose to just stay here with me."
Eden's eyebrows shoot high in surprise, but then her face goes sad with the realization of where I'm headed. She turns the tables on me. "How about you, Coop? Why don't you give up your life here, and you come with me? We'd have a posh life, we could travel the world together. Why don't you give up your life?"
My jaw hardens and I don't say a word. I don't need to, because she knows I'd never give up my business. I'd never leave Newberry. It's where I always wanted to be. Eden may have had her dreams, but I had mine too.
Eden blows out a gust of frustration over my silence. "Coop...I'm trying to find a compromise here. Let's talk about it. Surely we can find a way."
I'm shaking my head before she even finishes. "There can't be. Not on my part. I want my life here too much. But you've admitted to me it's a lonely life you lead. You've had fourteen years of it, enough money to live on the rest of your life. You could retire and come make your life here with me."
"But I love what I do," Eden says, and her voice is so small I want to pull her into my arms and assure he that we'll figure this out.
Except I don't.
Because I can't.
Nothing's changed from what we faced fourteen years ago. We are too different from one another and want things that don't mesh well together. I don't want to live a life split between homes. I don't want to travel. I only want Eden and I want her here.
"Listen," I say tiredly as I shove my hands into my pockets. "I want you to stay here with me. I want you to give up acting, and come make a life in Newberry, but I know you can't do that. Just like I can't give up my life here. I think we just need to accept it's not in the stars for us."
Eden's jaw drops and her eyes mist up. I ignore it and forge ahead, because I need to rip off this motherfucking Band-Aid. We've got history that has shown us plain and clear that this can't work, so why should either of us continue? It does nothing but make the hurt worse down the road.
"I don't think there's any sense in you coming back to Newberry after you finish filming in Ireland," I tell her, and then I have to swallow hard to prevent myself from taking those words back. Those words that just killed my relationship with Eden.
"You don't want me to come back?" she asks, her voice barely a whisper.
"Eden," I say softly as I step up to her and put a palm to her cheek. "We are not sustainable. And honey...you remember how bad it hurt the last time we ended things. We knew it was headed this way right from the start, remember? There was an eventual end to all this."
"And you're saying we reached it?" she asks sadly.
Leaning in, I kiss her on the forehead. "We've reached it."
She nods and I pull away from her as I say, "Listen...I'm going to go take a shower. I'm not really hungry right now, so if you want to go ahead and eat."
"Sure," she says, giving me a smile that's completely flat and gray. "Go take your shower. I'll eat and then work on getting my stuff packed."
I swallow hard.
Then I do it again, and again, forcing myself not give in.
Give up my life.
If she wants me, she can stay.
Please say you want me and you'll stay.
Eden just turns her back on me and walks over to the stove, fiddling around with something in a pot. I don't stick around, but head up to take the longest shower of my life so I can just ignore everything else around me.
Chapter 23
The frequent-flyer miles will add up...
Eden
"Are we going to talk about it?" Colleen asks me as we sip on Perrier in the Delta club lounge at JFK airport. We board in about half an hour for a direct flight to Shannon, Ireland. We could have gone direct from LA to London, then from there to Shannon, but the flights were full at this late date and this was our only option.
"Talk about what?" I ask as I flip through a magazine that someone had left behind.
"Why you just suddenly show back up in LA and won't say a word about Coop?" she says dryly. "You could have flown directly to Ireland from Georgia, you know."
"Nothing to talk about," I mutter.
"Talk anyway," she insists, and I look up to find her waiting patiently.
With a sigh, I close the magazine and set it down. "I have no clue what happened. One minute, we're having sex on the kitchen floor, and the next, he's telling me it's over."
"Okay, first...TMI on the sex," Colleen says dramatically. "But that doesn't sound like Coop to just kick you to the curb like that."
"It wasn't exactly like that, but it felt like that," I grumble.
"Explain," she demands.
"I told him I had to leave for a week to film in Ireland, but that I'd be back for a few weeks before regular filming in London. He was angry about it. Said that we were in the same place that we were in when we first broke up. My life was somewhere else, while his would always be in Newberry. He said we wouldn't work."
"And did you try to argue with him?"
"I tried to talk about compromise," I tell her dejectedly. "But he wasn't interested. I mean...things were going so damn well, and then, just boom, he's like, 'Don't come back.' "
And I took h
im at his word. While Coop went upstairs to get a shower, I turned off the oven and stove and grabbed my purse. I walked out the door, got into my rental car, and drove to the airport. I didn't look back.
Coop did text me when I was a good twenty miles outside of Newberry.
Where the hell are you?
I didn't respond.
He kept texting.
It wasn't until I was boarding my flight to LA that I finally answered him. I went ahead and left. You said we reached our expiration date.
His response was immediate. I didn't mean for you to leave right then.
I didn't respond. There was no sense.
When I arrived in LA, there was a barrage of texts from Coop that kept requesting, then begging, that I call him. He said he was extremely worried about me leaving so upset, but I wasn't swayed. He could stay worried for all I cared.
I was in Los Angeles only one day to pack my stuff for Ireland. That's where I'm headed now and I'm moving on with my life.
"Coop said don't come back?" Collen asks--jolting me out of my memories--not quite believing he could be so harsh.
"He said there was no sense in continuing when it wasn't going to work for the long term," I clarify.
"What an ass," Colleen mutters.
"I wholeheartedly agree," I quip. "But I can't regret that time with him. He taught me something valuable."
"What's that?"
"That this life I'm leading doesn't make me happy," I tell her honestly.
"You mean acting? You want to quit?" she asks incredulously.
"No," I assure her quickly. "But I don't think I want to keep the pace I'm keeping. Scale it back. Maybe try some Broadway. Maybe producing or something."
"Sky's the limit for you," Colleen observes. "You're hot right now."
"I don't want to be hot right now," I say tiredly. "I want to be me. I want to do something I love, and I do love acting. But I don't want it to be my whole life. Along with modeling, it's consumed me for fourteen years, and I need more than that."
"You need a Coop," Colleen muses, then looks down to her phone that chimes with a text. She's glued to that thing constantly.
"Not Coop," I say rigidly. If that man had cared about me at all, he would have talked about things more. He would have tried.
He wouldn't have given up.
I was willing to make big changes to my career to accommodate him in my life. He wasn't willing to do anything.