by Marie James
“Mike,” I whisper. “Please tell me you didn’t say anything to him?”
“To Alex or his dad?”
I squeeze my eyes closed. “Either of them.”
“I haven’t. It’s not my place to reach out to persons not listed as contacts in a student’s file. That would be unethical.”
“I’ll come up there tomorrow to add him to the no-contact list.”
It doesn’t go unnoticed that neither one of us hasn’t mentioned the man’s name.
“I’ll need you to bring legal documents that say he isn’t allowed information, Tinley.”
“I don’t have anything like that.” He fucking knows it, too. “Are you going to tell him anything?”
“If a child’s parent contacts me wanting information and there’s nothing in his file saying he can’t have it, I’m legally obligated to provide the information.”
“Are you enjoying this?”
“Not in the slightest, Tinley, but I do know what this type of information can do to a young man. It may be best to sit down and have a conversation with Alex while you can still control the situation.”
There is no controlling this situation, and I grind my teeth at just one more person trying to tell me what do to and what’s best for my son. I don’t fault Mike for looking out for one of his students, but parenting suggestions have been flying at me as a single mother for years. I’ve had it up to my eyebrows, and I’m tired of unsolicited advice.
“I can arrange for a youth counselor to be present to ease the blow.”
What goes unsaid is that Alex should’ve never been denied access to his father.
“That won’t be necessary. Will you allow him to ride the bus home? I don’t get off until five.”
“Of course, Tinley. Please remember that I’m always here if—”
“Thank you, Mr. Branford,” I hiss into the phone, cutting him off before I disconnect.
My lies, the things I’ve told my son to protect him, are coming back to bite me in the ass. There’s no way this isn’t going to destroy him. When he came home from daycare at four, wanting to know why others at school had daddies and he didn’t, I told him his daddy died. He didn’t understand death, but he accepted that his father would never be around. When he was older, asking for more details after my own dad died, I lied again, telling the most precious person in my life that Ignacio was a bad person who died while doing terrible things. I could blame the bitterness I was feeling at the time for losing my father, but honestly, I’d hoped all those years that Ignacio went back to the life he was so good at before I left. I needed him to be a bad person because it made it easier for me to keep Alex away from him and safe. No one in their right mind could fault a parent from keeping their child away from a drug-dealing criminal, right?
I still don’t know what Ignacio has done with his life. Mike said Alex would benefit from a positive male role model, but the man has always had more faith in people than they deserve.
What I do know is that Ignacio showed up at my door looking better than I remember him ever being, and the expensive truck parked at the street didn’t make me think he was hurting for money like we have been since Dad died.
People don’t make it out of this neighborhood legally, so there’s still a chance that Ignacio is the bad person I’ve let myself imagine he was all these years. Only now he’s right in the middle of our lives holding a grenade that’s going to ruin everything.
I haven’t regretted the lies I told Alex very often, but when I get home and yell at him for his behavior at school, it kills me to hear him mutter something about being exactly like his father.
I stand at his bedroom door, head pressed against the worn wood, trying to build the courage to turn the knob and tell him the truth, but I just can’t. I need more time. I need the help I so quickly dismissed when Mike offered it earlier. I just need.
I need understanding, someone to tell me I made the right choice all those years ago. Someone who can convince me that the lies I told were the only option even though I know they weren’t.
Regardless of the fact that Ignacio hurt me, he deserved to know. My mother has told me as much for years even though she has respected my wishes and gone along with the lies I’ve told my son. My dad had the same mindset as me. If a man could hurt me as much as he did, then what kind of damage could he do to a small child? I was convinced that I did the right thing until a handful of days ago when the ghost from my past showed up demanding answers.
I’ve been balancing my entire life on unsteady ground, and all it’s going to take is one confession to make everything implode around me.
Last week Alex told me he hated me for grounding him. He may actually mean it by the time Ignacio is done infiltrating our lives.
Chapter 7
Ignacio
Although I gave the testing facility permission to text the results, it seems like too big a piece of news to share via two short sentences and a secure link.
Even still, I spend the next couple of minutes entering my information to create my one-time use account to get the news I already know in my heart.
Wren: I’m here if you need someone to talk to.
The text rolls from the top of my screen, and of course that fucker would know before I do. He’s probably been back in St. Louis tracking every dime I spend and using a tracking device to make sure I’m not camped outside of her house or Alex’s school like a psycho. Well, not really a psycho, I guess. Both Deacon and his right-hand man Flynn pulled that shit, and it ended happily for both of them, but they don’t have a hidden damn-near teenager to contend with either.
Me: Thanks, man. I appreciate that.
The text is just another way to avoid the inevitable for a few seconds longer, and I scoff in irritation when Wren chooses now to remain silent. He can probably tell from his mega machine that I haven’t clicked the direct link to download my test results.
With one final deep breath, I click the link, the results telling me exactly what I already know. Alejandro Cooper Holland is my son. My heart pounds, and it’s as if the confirmation changes everything. Although I’ve known the truth for days, the confirmation makes everything real. I don’t know what Tinley did to get Alex’s DNA to the testing sight, but there isn’t a doubt in my mind she didn’t tell him the truth and take him up there in person. I guess I should count myself lucky she didn’t turn in her own spit swab so the results would come back in her favor. It was clear from our brief interaction that she doesn’t want me in his life in any form or fashion.
I need to go to her, but I’m warring with a million-and-one emotions right now, and no good will come of confronting her when my head is this messed up. I have no way to calm down, no way to release all the pent-up anger and hostility I feel, all the pain from missing so much, but time machines aren’t a thing. We’re just going to have to navigate this situation as best as we can manage. Not knowing what the future holds for my son makes me antsy and nervous. I’ve never had to worry about anyone but myself for most of my life. How is it possible that one piece of news made all of that change in an instant?
I am cognizant enough to know that just showing up and demanding to officially meet my son would be an unhealthy blow to him, and the last thing I want to do is hurt him more.
I fire off a text to her, wondering if she’ll even answer.
Me: The results are in. We need to talk.
Five minutes go by before she messages back.
Tinley: I know. They sent them to me as well.
Me: What did you tell him?
Tinley: I haven’t told him anything.
Me: Why does he think I’m not in his life.
Those three little dots appear and disappear several times with long breaks in between before her next message, the one that knocks the wind from my lungs comes through.
Tinley: I told him you died.
Jesus Christ. Is this woman for real? Does she hate me so much that she’d tell such a horrific lie to our
child?
Tinley: I told him you were a criminal gangbanger and died in a drug deal gone wrong.
I blink down at my phone. I want to laugh, praying that she’s joking, but deep down I know she isn’t.
Tinley: Are you?
Me: Dead? I’m very much fucking alive.
Tinley: Are you a gangbanger, a drug dealer?
I narrow my eyes at the damn phone, pissed beyond reason.
I shove my phone back in my pocket. She doesn’t deserve a damn answer to such a ridiculous question. It doesn’t matter what kind of life I’ve led since that day I hurt her, but it’s clear what she thinks of me. Alex is my son, and I’m going to be in his life whether she likes it or not.
I don’t have long to stew in my anger, and that’s a good thing because I’m seconds away from calling Wren and insisting he find me a family law attorney, demanding the best so I can win full custody of my son, when the sound of soft knuckles hit the front door.
Pissed, I pull open the door ready to spit venom at whoever has the fucking nerve to bother me right now, but the timid woman on the stoop is wearing a nametag from the realtor’s office I called yesterday, reminding me that I have an appointment with her right now.
“Mr. Torres?” she asks, her eyes darting behind me as if she needs to assess the danger of being here alone.
“Yes,” I manage with an almost calm voice as I hold my hand out to shake hers.
“Amy Degrassi, I’m from Sky Realty.”
“Nice to meet you,” I say before stepping aside. “Please come in.”
She falters in the doorway, and it’s clear she’s uncomfortable.
“There’s no need for you to be uneasy. I just got some life-altering news. It has nothing to do with you.”
Her teeth worry her bottom lip, but she must decide I’m no threat because she steps inside.
“May we leave the door open?”
“Of course,” I answer, hating that any woman would be afraid to be alone with me.
The realization makes me push down the irritation I feel over my current situation, and I plant a smile on my face.
“I haven’t had the chance to clear anything out, but I’m looking to sell as-is. A fixer-upper for a property management company or something,” I tell her as we walk deeper into the house. “I know it needs a lot of work, but full disclosure, I don’t plan to fix a single thing.”
“That will prevent many families from being able to purchase.”
“I know.”
Honestly, I’d rather just let the property sit until it was condemned but throwing away money on property taxes isn’t reasonable.
“There are three bedrooms, one bathroom. The garage is filled with trash. The carpet is utterly disgusting. As you can see,” I point to the living room walls, “There are holes everywhere.”
She cringes as she looks around the room, and I know it’s clear to her that the man who lived here was an angry bastard.
She follows me to the master bedroom, which even calling that is a joke. It’s just as small as the other two on the property.
“One bathroom is a hard sell,” she mutters as she stands in the hallway looking into the room that was designated as mine as a kid.
She didn’t want to fully walk into the master, but something catches her eyes in my old room. Muscles along my spine tense as she looks down at the closet door.
“Locks on the inside of the closet?”
I grunt in response, not needing to explain the messed-up things I had to do to stay safe before I was old enough to walk out the front door without triggering my grandfather’s need to call me in as a missing child.
I wish I could say I forgot about this room, but that would be impossible. The memories are alive and well, but I haven’t stepped foot in here since I returned, choosing rather to crash on the sofa.
“What are you expecting to get for the property?” Amy asks as she walks back toward the living room without so much as poking her head into the third bedroom.
“Enough to cover the back taxes from the last couple of years,” I explain.
I haven’t dug much around my grandfather’s shit, but the late notices and foreclosure warnings are hard to miss seeing as they have arrived daily since I returned to town.
“Are there any liens on the property?”
“Not that I know of.”
“I’ll have to dig in deeper.” She looks around the room one last time before meeting my eyes. “Have you considered just letting a foreclosure go through?”
I pull my eyes from her, looking around the room and trying to see more than just my fucked-up childhood after my parents died. It’s nearly impossible to remember any good times, and I certainly had none in this home, but my mother did. She was raised with love and devotion, parents who doted on her until she made the wrong choice in a man that would rip her from all of our lives.
“If you could start the process, that would be great. I don’t know much about what’s required, so I’m depending on you to walk me through this process.”
I’ve only ever signed paperwork for a residence once, and since that was a condo in a brand-new construction site, there weren’t many hoops to jump through. I’m completely out of my league here.
As I walk Amy to the open front door, I can’t help but wonder if I’m just going to have to suck up my issues with this house and stay here for a while. That means fixing several things just to make it inhabitable because I won’t walk away from my son, no matter how bad my back hurts in the morning from the busted springs on that shitty sofa.
“I’ll be in touch,” she says, but there’s not an ounce of enthusiasm in her voice.
She won’t make much of a commission on this property even if we do get to the point of selling. It’ll take a miracle to find someone to purchase because there are many houses in this neighborhood—several on this very block—that have just been left to rot.
With that appointment out of the way, I grab a shower and clean clothes. Walking into my grandfather’s old room always makes my skin crawl as if an invisible layer of grime coats my body just by crossing the threshold.
The next part of my day will include a visit to the woman I never thought I’d see again.
Chapter 8
Tinley
“This is child abuse,” Alex mutters as he repositions himself, scooting further along the baseboard in the kitchen.
I scoff at his complaint, pointing to a spot he missed like a drill sergeant.
“Child services has more important things to worry about than a boy who can’t stay out of trouble being forced to help clean his home. But feel free to give them a call.”
He grumbles something under his breath, and I know I should chastise him for the few disrespectful words I manage to understand, but I’m picking my battles today.
He didn’t put up much of an argument when I woke him up at the same time he would normally get up for school, but the disdain started the second he saw the cleaning supplies on the kitchen table.
“Neither of us should be spending our off days doing this,” he continues to complain.
“You don’t have an off day. Suspension is supposed to be punishment, so get back to work, Cinderella.” I hand him back the bottle of cleaner now that it’s refilled. “Plus, you know Nanny is safer in a very clean home. Her immune system is nonexistent.”
I hate to use Mom’s illness as a weapon and guilt trip on my child, but nothing else seems to work around here lately.
“Speaking of—” He looks over his shoulder. “Where is she this morning?”
“Napping,” I answer because the truth—that she was too weak and tired to get out of bed this morning—would cause him pain. “So, keep your complaints to a minimum so she can rest.”
He rolls his eyes, a trait he picked up from me at a very early age, but he turns back to the baseboards, sprays them with more cleaner and keeps scrubbing.
Alex doesn’t look up from his work when there’s a knock on th
e front door, but the sound ratchets up my nerves like bad news is waiting on the other side. We have people in and out of the house most days of the week. Mom’s nurse and the minister from church both come and go regularly, but they never knock. If Mom is here alone, they don’t want her to have to overexert herself by using energy to wheel herself across the room to open the door.
That knock means my life is going to change. I know who it is before I even look through the peephole. I’m already a blubbering mess before I tug open the door because when my hand hits the doorknob, I can sense Alex standing up from his work in the kitchen.
“Please don’t,” I whisper the second I pull open the door. Tears pool on my lashes, and Ignacio focuses on them as his throat works on a swallow. “It’s not a good time.”
“Not a good time?” he hisses. “Really?”
“Please,” I beg again, even though I know the effort is wasted.
His face is somehow angry and handsome all at the same time. His dark brown eyes narrow, showcasing lashes most women would kill for.
“When?” he snaps. “When is a good time to talk about my child?”
“What?” That question comes from behind me, and the tears that were threatening roll in steady rivulets down my face.
Ignacio snaps his head in the direction of the question, making me realize that it was never his intention to show up here and wreak havoc on his son’s life.
“He’s here?” he hisses. “He’s supposed to be at school.”
“Suspended,” I manage on a sob.
“Mom?” Alex steps up beside me, and it isn’t lost on me that he’s already trembling and keeping a distance between the two of us. “You’re that man from my school.”
Ignacio’s throat works on another swallow, but he doesn’t say a word. He’s as unsure how to have this conversation as I am, but he isn’t the one who’s going to have to confess to a lifetime of sins.
“What did he say?” Alex prods. “What was he saying? What child?”
I look over at my precious boy who is nearly as tall as I am already, watching as the color drains from his face. Years of lies and betrayal, the realization that his mother has been deceiving him for years makes his lower lip tremble. When his eyes begin to shine, I know I’ve lost him. Whatever control I’ve managed to hold on to and convince myself I still have over this young man snaps in an instant.
