Page 105 of The Back Forty
“My birth certificate?” he asks softly.
I nod. “Yeah. I wasn’t trying to snoop. It was right there in the same folder and—I didn’t mean to read it, but your last name…”
“Miller,” he says with a slow exhale. “Yeah.”
I swallow. “You don’t have to explain it. I just… I wanted to be honest with what I saw. And I guess I’m curious, and maybe a bit confused.”
His hands slide to my hips again, grounding both of us. He leans up and kisses me gently on the lips before pulling away on a sigh. “Thank you for telling me. I figured this would come up eventually. I wasn’t hiding it from you. But it’s not something that I was eager to share. It isn't something I talk about with anyone.”
He pauses and takes a breath like he’s bracing for impact. “My mom was Bethany Smith.”
Was.
That single word punches the air from my lungs because that means the woman who gave birth to Lawson is no longer alive. And that also means he has a different mother from the rest of the Marshall siblings. Judging by the first and last name on the birth certificate, I'm guessing Kent Marshall is not his father either.
“She was Anne Marshall's sister,” he continues quietly. “Who was actually my aunt, which makes me—yeah. Technically, Troy, Cash, Colt, and Regan’s first cousin. Not their brother.”
I blink, stunned. “Oh. Wow.”
He nods. “She was young when she met my birth father. He was older. Charismatic. Dangerous from what Kent has told me.”
His voice drops, thickens with the weight of it. “He was abusive. Controlling, I guess, and my mom was impressionable coming from a rougher family home life.”
I slide my arms around his neck, threading my fingers into the back of his hair. I press my forehead to his and close my eyes.
“I’m so sorry.”
He shakes his head. “My mom tried to leave him a few times, but he always dragged her back. After I was born, things got bad. Really bad Kent said.” Lawson rubs slow circles into the side of my thigh, grounding himself with the motion. “My mom was scared for her life. For mine. She went to her sister, and asked if her and Kent would take me temporarily. Just for a little while she figured things out because she needed to make sure our home life was safe.”
I stay quiet, letting him speak. Letting him unravel something he’s probably only ever carried in silence.
“I don’t remember any of it,” he continues. “At the time, Kent and Anne only had Troy. They were just kids themselves—high school sweethearts who got pregnant at seventeen, you know. Kent was barely scraping by, trying to get the egg farm running smoother since his dad handed it over to him. And little Troy was tagging along everywhere, five years old and wild as hell from what I hear.”
He huffs a soft laugh that’s laced with something more complicated. “The version Kent told me years later was that they weren’t sure they wanted more kids after Troy's unexpected pregnancy and birth. That first pregnancy had wrecked their relationship in a lot of ways. But when Anne’s sister showedup asking them to take me in, they didn’t hesitate. They just accepted me without any strings and open arms.”
My chest tightens. I can picture it now. Mrs. Marshall holding him, tiny and helpless, while her husband tried to keep their world afloat and his mom sought safety from her abusive husband.
He draws in a long breath. “Somewhere within that first year of me living with the Marshalls… it got worse. My mom was struggling and one day, she ended up taking her own life.”
My stomach twists. “Oh God, Lawson. I’m so sorry.”
He nods slowly. “Thanks. A part of me is… I don’t know. Grateful I don’t remember her. That I only ever knew Mrs. Marshall, my aunt, as my mom. But still… there’s this ache. This hollow place that never really goes away.”
“I can see why,” I whisper, brushing my thumb over the back of his neck.
He swallows and keeps going. “Kent and Anne adopted me not long after Bethany died. Right around the same time they got pregnant with Cash. Nobody in the family ever treated me differently. Troy always acted like I was just another one of his younger brothers. And Kent, he never once made me feel like anything but his son.”
He pauses and lets out a shaky exhale.
“But I always felt it. That invisible line. Like I had to prove I belonged. Like I owed them to carry the Marshall last name.”
I nod gently because Igetit now. I see him more clearly. The relentless drive. The long hours. The impossible standards he holds himself to. He does it because he thinks he doesn't deserve to be a part of this world that the Marshall's have built, but he's so far from wrong. The success of the family can be directlyattributed to all their commitment and Lawson's power in sales and marketing is what drives it home.
“That’s why I work so damn hard,” he says, confirming it. “Why I was always the one on the road, always pushing for bigger numbers, more aggressive sales plans, nonstop pitches. Even now, when we’ve already passed every milestone and built this thing into a billion-dollar business, I feel like I can’t stop though I know I need to slow down.”
“They’ve never made you feel like you owe them, though,” I say softly.
“No,” he agrees, rubbing his jaw. “But I feel that way. Or… part of me does. The little kid part. The one who felt unloved and unwanted. Like I wasn’t worthy of the Marshall name but just sort of got dropped into it. Like I deserved the same fate as my mother. That feeling came back hard when I accidentally got Mel pregnant and gave Beckham the Marshall name on his birth certificate. Like I was passing on something I really didn't earn. Doors will open for Beckham because of his last name in this town, and it's not the one that I was born with.”
