Until There Was You(102)

He returned his eyes to his beer. Fascinating beer, Sam Adams. Nice color. Very…amber. “Listen, you’re fun, and I like you, but I can tell you’re getting…attached. I’m sure you want to settle down, have a couple kids, whatever, and that’s great, but I’m not looking for that.”

She was listening. She’d always been good at that. Liam forced himself to go on, his chest actually hurting. “This was supposed to be fun, and it has been, but…it’s run its course.”

Her eyes were huge, her mouth slightly open. Then she took a quick breath, pressed her lips together. Swallowed. Nodded. “Yeah, no. I understand.” She took a sip of her wine. Her hands were shaking. She must’ve noticed that, too, because she folded them and put them in her lap.

If she’d thrown her wine in his face, that would be something he could react to. If she called him names, he could agree. Slapped him—hey, it wouldn’t be the first time he’d been slapped.

“Liam,” she whispered, “I don’t need much.” The words sliced into his gut like a razor. “I mean, I know you have to think about Nicole, and I wouldn’t expect anything else. But I don’t see why we have to…stop seeing each other. I can… I mean, what we have, it’s…it’s enough. We could just keep things the way they are, right?”

Liam looked at his beer, because it was too hard to look at her. “I’m sorry, Cordelia.”

Because she deserved more, of course. She was the type who was meant to be married, to have a bunch of kids and animals, a big noisy family and a guy who loved her with all his heart. A guy she loved with all hers. And while she might be in the throes of a mighty crush on him—just as she’d been a long time ago—he didn’t want to sit around and watch her learn, bit by bit, that he was no one from nowhere, and the only thing he had going for him was his daughter, and he had to protect that child, not just from the Tates, but from the Tanners of the world, from Nicole’s own mistakes and the random accidents of life. He couldn’t take his eye off the ball for even a minute.

“So that’s it, then?” she whispered.

“I’m sorry if you thought something else,” he said, trying to sound matter-of-fact.

“No, it’s…it’s okay.” She sat for another minute. Her mouth quivered, and Liam hated himself more than he could ever remember. He looked down, not trusting himself to blow a perfectly effective break-up. In a few minutes, she’d be out of here, and he could go home and wash his hands and check on his kid and beat his head against the wall and do all those other fun things that made up his life these days.

“Do you remember that cat?” she asked suddenly.

He looked up. “What cat?”

“Joe. The little stray you fed back when you worked at Guten Tag.”

He hadn’t thought of that cat in years. But yeah, he remembered. “What about him?” he asked.

She looked at him steadily, her usually pixie-cute face solemn. “I always thought that said a lot about you,” she said, her voice shaking a little. “That you took care of him. Fed him and tamed him until that lady adopted him.”

And there it was, that completely baseless idea that he was somehow a hero. “He wasn’t adopted, Cordelia,” Liam said tonelessly. “He got hit by a car.”

Her mouth opened. “But…you told me yourself. Some woman came around—”

“I lied. He got hit by a car, and I buried him near the Coast Guard station.”

“He got hit?” There were tears in her eyes.

“Yeah.”

“Why did you—”

“Hi, Liam, how are you?” Taylor “the Teeth” Bennington Linkletter swayed over to him and placed an oily kiss on his cheek.

“Hey, Taylor. You know Cordelia Osterhagen, right?”

“Mmm.” She didn’t even bother to glance at Cordelia. “So, want to come over to my table and meet some of my friends? We’re having a girls’ night out, and they’re all wondering who this incredibly hot guy is.” She dropped her voice to a 1-900 whisper. “They cannot believe I slept with you.”

He looked at Cordelia. Maybe she needed one more nail in the coffin. “Yeah, sure, I’ll say hi. We’re done here, right, Posey?”

She flinched. “Yeah. Yup. See you around.”

Liam put down a twenty and, without looking at Cordelia, went to the table of giggling, overperfumed women, flirted briefly—no idea what the hell he said, but they ate it up—and, when Cordelia left, he counted to fifty-five then left the bevy of women and walked home, toward his daughter, toward fatherhood.

But the whole way, he thought about that dopey little cat, who didn’t even have the sense to stay off the road. Taking care of that cat had been the highlight of his day back then, the idea that he could tame something that had never been shown much kindness. The first day Joe had taken food from him, it was like a small miracle. He remembered its rusty purr, the little bumps of its spine when he petted it, how quickly it fattened up on tuna fish and pork scraps. It was the closest thing to a pet he’d ever had. He’d wanted to take him home, but his uncle said no.

Then one day, when Liam was riding his battered motorcycle home, there was Joe, lying on the side of the road. He wasn’t dead yet, but he was a mess, his back legs broken and bloodied, looking up at him with giant eyes and an expression of utter confusion. Didn’t make a sound as Liam whipped off his T-shirt, wrapping the cat in it as gently as he could, then holding him against his stomach as he raced to the vet.