Page 5 of You Can Make Me
I stood from the table and blew out a breath, my eyes burning. “Coop,” I said softly. “Can I at least bring Gene out here? Him and Sam are so worried about you. Maybe they can help?—”
“No.”
He wiped at his mouth, wincing when he touched his left cheek with the napkin.
“I wish I knew what to do for you,” I whispered, more for myself than him to hear. I was fairly tech savvy, but I couldn’t control cell towers or satellite paths, and he had no patience.
Cooper put his hands on the table and leveled a glare at me from under his hair. “What do you know about the carnival?”
My gut churned, tossing around the sandwich I’d eaten in the car until my skin got clammy like I was going to vomit.
“What do you mean? What carnival?”
His nostrils flared. “The carnival where Dee Dee Miller worked. He met…Holland there. He mentioned it when I interviewed him. What else do you know?”
My mouth felt as if it would crack if I tried to speak.
Cooper hadn’t wanted to discuss his assault. He was secretive when he was on the computer and whenever I tried to get him talking, it was mostly one-word answers, and it felt as if things were going downhill. Now this? The carnival?
“That’s…that’s all. Why?”
Cooper shrugged and pushed back from the table. “Thank you for the sandwich.” Most of the time he was still his polite self, at least when it came to caring for him, but try to discuss anything that affected him, he’d snap at me and shut it down.
He pulled his blanket tighter, grabbed for his cane, and pushed himself to standing. He lost color in his face and sweat beaded on his upper lip. He tried to walk past me, and I stepped in his way.
“Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.” Enough was enough. I’d been tiptoeing around him for the three months that we’d been here, and I was desperate. His spirit was fading before my eyes. It broke my heart.
He wouldn’t make eye contact with me. I reached up to touch his left shoulder, one of the only spots I knew didn’t hurt him, and he flinched.
“You’ve done enough. You don’t like it? You can leave, Detective Hamilton.”
Barely ever Dennis. Definitely not Denny, or any of the terms of endearment he’d called me so long ago. Detective Hamilton was a verbal shield he used to keep me out.
“Cooper, for fuck’s sake. I’m not leaving you.”
He turned his head toward me, but he still wouldn’t meet my gaze.
Imissedhis gaze, even though at one point it had made me jumpy, unsettled. His gaze had forced me take a deeper look at myself and my core beliefs about my sexuality. I’d come to crave it. Then, I’d somehow managed to blow it with Cooper Harris…and four and a half months ago, I witnessed a madman nearly end the life of the only man I’d ever…
I didn’t knowhowto classify what Cooper was to me now, other than to say he was my life’s work.
My life. Period.
He’d spent five weeks in the hospital and a week in the rehab unit before we came here. He’d made progress physically. Emotionally…
I had no idea how to quantify it.
“Then we have nothing else to talk about.”
The stubborn man moved around me without touching or looking at me, and he made his way to the bedroom of the cabin.
Why was he asking about the damn carnival? That was a subject that, no matter how much Cooper meant to me, I couldn’t discuss. The lives of people I cared about were intertwined with the story of this mystical carnival, and I couldn’t betray their trust. It pained me to keep anything from him, but I’d also vowed to protect Cooper Harris with my life, and him asking questions about that damned carnival would potentially bring hell to our doorstep. I couldn’t risk it. Not now.
Cooper spent the afternoons napping, and I mostly stayed close by in case he had a nightmare. They seemed to hit him hardest during these afternoon naps. He’d tried going without them, but the headaches and brain fog were way worse if he didn’t rest.
I spent the time I wasn’t caring for him researching his conditions and potential treatments, getting frustrated that I couldn’t do more for him, that he wouldn’tletme do more to help him. I read the musty old books in the cabin, mostly a bunch of classics—who knewThe Count of Montecristowas actually good?—and some ancient survival manuals. There was also a huge stack ofNational Geographics, so I was kind of an expert on ancient Sumerian languages and what really happened at Pompeii by now.
He’d wake in time for dinner, and we’d usually eat in silence. Afterward, he’d work on his computer until his eyes gave out and he’d lose his temper. Evenings were hairy. I hated those couple of hours because he often became unglued over the littlest things.
