“Sure,” he said. “Just like that. I’m getting a beer. You want one?”
Cooper really was a breed all his own. Few men would so readily forgive, and though he’d flashed a hint of temper that had surprised her, in the end, the good guy won out. Haleigh once again lamented her poor taste in men. Whatever girl ended up with Cooper Ridgeway was going to be a very lucky woman.
“I’d better not,” she said, loading up her go-to refusal line. “I’m not a fan of alcohol.” Which couldn’t be more true. Being addicted to the stuff didn’t mean she liked it. Quite the opposite, in fact. “And I’ve bothered you long enough anyway.”
“You don’t have to go,” Cooper said. “I was just being a dick about the two-minute thing.”
Haleigh shook her head. “You couldn’t be a dick if you tried, Cooper. Trust me. I’m an expert on the breed.”
“So what’s that about anyway?” he asked as he loomed above her, practically blocking the light from the lamp behind him.
She still couldn’t believe he was so . . . big. His shoulders seemed to go on forever, and that had definitely been a solid six-pack that had greeted her at the door. She’d never been one to melt at the sight of a hot body, but then she’d rarely encountered a body like Cooper’s. Odd to think that she’d occasionally slept one wall away from him during their high school days, but back then he hadn’t looked anything like the man standing before her now.
“I don’t know,” she said. And she really didn’t. David had been the first in a long line of guys who’d fallen squarely into the bad boyfriend category. “If I dig deep enough, I’m sure it has to do with like attracting like.”
Cooper strolled into an adjoining room that Haleigh assumed to be the kitchen, giving her a prime shot of his killer ass. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked over his shoulder before returning with a sweating longneck and a bottle of water that he passed her way. “If you’re going back to that crappy person thing, I’m calling bullshit.”
“Do you know why I became a doctor?” she asked him.
“Nope,” he said, taking a draw off his beer. The action drew attention to his full lips pressed against the mouth of the bottle.
She wondered what they’d feel like pressed to her.
Sensation prickled up her neck at the images flashing through her mind. Vivid, detailed images that sent heat pulsing to her core.
What the hell was wrong with her today? She’d just apologized for using the man thirteen years ago, and here she was, treating him like a side of beef in her mind.
“I am so messed up,” she said.
“You became a doctor because you’re messed up?”
“Um . . .” she hedged. “No. I just . . . My mind wandered for a minute.” Haleigh cleared her throat to buy time. “I became a doctor because my mother had high expectations and I was determined to meet them. Med school was my version of go big or go home. I liked the prestige of the occupation and thought for once I could make my mother happy.”
Cooper studied her with a tilt of his head as if searching for some deeper motivation at the back of her skull. She hated to tell him, but there was nothing deep about it. Simply put, Haleigh was a shallow people-pleaser. And a sucky one at that.
“I don’t believe it,” he said.
“I’m not surprised, but facts are facts. The act of becoming a doctor was nothing more than me chasing the shiniest brass ring I could find.”
The confession, something she’d long feared but never spoken aloud, scraped another layer off her fragile ego, making Haleigh feel as if her skin had been flipped inside out, leaving her exposed and raw.
Though uncomfortable, the experience was also oddly liberating.
“No way,” Cooper said, dropping into the chair he’d been standing next to. “I watched you deliver that baby last night. Nothing that happened in that room was about some brass ring.”
Haleigh took a seat on the black leather couch.
“Just because I had selfish motivations for becoming a doctor doesn’t mean I’m not good at my job. I bring babies into the world, making sure they and their mothers come through the ordeal healthy and happy. The point is that what I do doesn’t change who I am.”
“Wrong,” he argued. “If you were a crappy person, healthy and happy patients wouldn’t be a priority.”
“Believe what you want.” She spun the top off the water bottle. “I think I know me better than you do.”
“Could you make more money doing your job someplace else?” he asked.