He pauses slightly, before a soft laugh tickles my inner thigh. “You know, when Harwood has me picturing my happy place, it’s right here.”
And with that casual comment that feels anythingbutcasual in the way it buries itself deep into my heart, he tightens his arms around my thighs and makes me forgeteverything.
Chapter 18
ALEX
“Alex.”
This house has Tudor windows. Maybe they’re the original windows from when it was first built, the glass slightly warped. There’s a glass conservatory with sweeping views of rugged green landscape and the North Sea beyond, a pond that looks straight out of a fairy tale.
I hit Save. You know,just in case.
The next one has nine bedrooms. An old manor house nestled in acres of trees and grass and glittering streams. An art studio that Evie might like. A room overlooking the garden that I know Fleur would love.
Save.
“Alex.”
“Huh? Shit, sorry.”
“I have other clients who actually make use of my time.”
I close the property website on my laptop, where the location on the filter drop-down has accidentally ended up in Scotland, rather than New York City.
It happens.
Robert is looking at me over his glasses like he’d quite like to throw his notebook at me. “Sorry. Distracted.”
“Has something in particular happened this week?”
“Something in particular happens every week,” I grumble. He raises an eyebrow, like he’s not accepting that as an answer. “I thought I saw my father.”
“When?”
“Before London. I was in a coffee shop and … I wassosure. And I felt like he’d come to the café to … I don’t know, taunt me … and I ran out and I confronted this guy in the middle of the fucking street, and it wasn’t him, obviously, and I just felt like …”
“Felt like your mother.”
I nod, swallowing thickly. “Doesn’t that worry you? That I’m turning paranoid? Isn’t that how it all starts?”
He blinks, shoulders sinking on a long exhale. “No, Alex. I’m not worried you’re on that path. Stress can do incredible things to a brain, and you’re under a lot of it.”
“Do you think it’s genetic?”
“What?”
I sweep a hand over myself, at how exhausted I must look. “I don’t know … this. If I had kids, would they be miserable, too?”
I’d hate that.
“Is that something you worry about? Your future children?”
Jesus Christ.“Does the final exam for being a shrink involve answering every single fucking question with another question?”
He laughs, sipping his tea. “Pretty much. You’ve never mentioned kids before.”
I’ve never considered I might have a future before. I shrug. “If Ophelia wanted kids and I … if I’d make them … I think I got issues from my mom and my dad. I don’t want her to … I don’t want to …” I trail off, unsure what I’m even asking. I don’t want to end up like my parents.I don’t want her to end up with a son like me.I don’t want that future for Ophelia.
