Page 91 of Rejected Heart

If I thought it was possible to fix things between Liam and me, I would have jumped at the chance. I just wasn’t sure Liam wanted that.

“I don’t know what I could do to prove to him how I feel if telling him wasn’t enough.”

For the first time since he’d walked into my shop, Cooper offered a small smile. “Maybe he doesn’t want you to tell him. Maybe he wants you to show him.”

“What?”

Cooper turned Rosie around in his hold, so she wasfacing me. I couldn’t help but smile at the girl. “My daughter turns a year old in just over a week. We’re having her first birthday party next weekend at my grandparents’ lake house. One o’clock. Liam will be there. And I know that he, along with the rest of the family, would love nothing more than to see you there, where you should have been all along.”

My breath caught in my lungs, and tears filled my vision. Words failed me.

But even if I knew what to say, or could have brought myself to speak, it wouldn’t have mattered. Because Cooper said not another word and turned around to leave.

23

LAYLA

“You looklike you want the ground to swallow you up. Either that or the couch to take you prisoner.”

I flopped down on said couch, sighed, and rolled my head in my mom’s direction. “I’m reconsidering my plans for today.”

“What? Why would you do such a thing?” She sounded genuinely shocked that I was at odds with the decision I’d made.

I didn’t think there was anything to be surprised by. “I’m terrified. What if Cooper was wrong about all of this? What if I show up there, and Liam asks me to leave?”

My mom laughed.

She actually laughed at me when I was under such duress.

“Well,ifthat happens, I guess it’ll be merely theworst you can expect. But you have to understand that’s the most unlikely case. In fact, if I were a gambling woman, I’d be willing to bet that Liam will be delighted to see you. Shocked, perhaps, but most certainly delighted.”

I closed my eyes and shook my head.

I’d come home from the consignment shop one week ago and told my mom about Cooper’s visit and subsequent invitation to his daughter’s first birthday party. After getting over the shock of learning that Cooper was now a father, my mom didn’t hesitate to urge me to go to the party. Apparently, she’d taken notice of how sad I’d been ever since the night of the sunset picnic and believed this would be the perfect opportunity to improve my mood.

For some strange reason, I took her advice. I’d gone out and even purchased a small gift for Cooper’s daughter. But now that the day had arrived, now that I should have gotten in my car five minutes ago in order to arrive on time, I was having second thoughts.

“I think you are entirely too optimistic.”

“Of course, I am. I want you to be happy. But it’s more than that, Layla. If you’ve been honest and truly regret your actions from all those years ago, if you wish you hadn’t turned down Liam’s proposal and left Landing, this is your chance to do something about it and make it right.”

With my head resting back on the sofa cushion, I slapped my hand over my forehead and dragged it downthe front of my face. “But nothing went like it was supposed to. I had all these plans to build a career that I’m happy about and successful in. I wanted to be worthy of him, and I never made it happen.”

Like she’d been slapped across the face, my mom’s head jerked back, and I’d realized I’d said something I shouldn’t have, something I hadn’t ever admitted to her. “What did you just say?”

I pressed my lips together and shook my head. Maybe she truly hadn’t heard me. “Nothing.”

“You don’t think you’re worthy of being with him?”

“I… I just… I wanted him to be proud of me, and I wanted to know that if he ever left me, I’d be able to make it on my own,” I admitted.

There was nothing but heartbreak and agony in her expression. “Liam is not the same as your dad, Layla. You felt that way all this time?”

The last thing I had wanted to do was make my mom think that she’d given me anything less than the very best she could as I was growing up. She hadn’t done a single thing wrong but trust that the man she loved would always be there for her. That was the way it was supposed to be. But it wasn’t, and we’d both suffered for it—her more than me.

“It wasn’t so much that I thought Liam was like my dad. But I’ve lived that reality, and I guess it scared me to think about the possibility of it happening. I realize now that it wasn’t fair to put it on him, but at the time, I just wanted to do something to become successful before Iagreed to marry him. I tried so hard to find a way, to find something that was going to be lucrative while making me happy. Unfortunately, I never achieved that.”

She blinked back the tears that had pooled in her eyes. “Maybe because you already found it.”

---