Page 8 of Mistaken Identity
Dad and I combined didn’t make that.
As a journeyman plumber, I made good money.
But good money didn’t matter when you had millions of dollars in medical bills to pay and a five-thousand-dollar rent check to caregivers for your asshole of a mother.
“I…”
“Plus,” Creole continued as if I hadn’t been digesting her previous words still. “Laney will never find someone that she loves like she loves you. Unless you count me, and I can’t give her the family that she wants.”
I couldn’t either.
“I can’t either,” I echoed my own thoughts.
“You may not, no,” she agreed. “But if she winds up pregnant, they’ll automatically assume it was you. She winds up pregnant when she’s with me, they’ll be wondering what kind of filth infected their bloodline and go digging.”
I rolled my eyes.
Laney’s parents were the problem here.
They were controlling, rich, and entitled.
They couldn’t stand anyone that they deemed “beneath” them.
They hated me with a passion and hated Creole even more.
Creole didn’t beat around the bush anymore. She hadn’t in seven years when she’d started acting like a completely different person.
She didn’t act like she was who she wasn’t, and I kind of liked that about her.
Other than her hotness, that might be the only thing that I liked about her.
Her ability to stand up for herself and others was everything, especially when it came to Laney’s parents, Luciano and Paula Combs, it was legendary.
Not even Laney and I could do it.
Not that I was a pushover or anything.
To be truthful, if I knew that it wouldn’t hurt Laney, I’d fuck the motherfuckers up.
However, I couldn’t stand to watch Laney get hurt, so I let her handle her parents how she saw fit.
“Mama,” a little boy came barreling out of the bedroom where Creole had previously been waiting. “Can you tie this?”
My heart panged at the little boy’s bald head.
Leukemia.
He’d been suffering from it for a little over six months.
The prognosis was good, but he was still being tortured with chemo and radiation.
Poor guy.
“Yeah, baby.” Creole bent down, and Damon, her son, pressed his tiny little hand against her shoulder.
Creole didn’t flinch like she did with everyone else.
Then again, when you had a kid at seventeen like Creole did, it was doubtful that you would be able to get away with not touching your own kid.
