Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 64617 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64617 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
For a second his eyes glazed over, but he simply blinked it away.
“Answer me! Where is the woman who should be taking care of her baby? The mother who is missing all Journey’s milestones? Do you both even know what she looks like anymore?” The palms of my hands connected with his chest, giving him a shove.
He didn’t falter.
“Did you know she can pull herself up on furniture and has taken a few steps along it? Do you know how many teeth she has now? Or here’s a good one… What’s her favorite song to be sang to her?”
His chest heaved the further I pushed every button of the truth I’ve been dying to say to him for so long.
“That’s what I thought! You have no idea! You call yourselves parents? Watching from afar on a nanny cam isn’t parenting, it’s neglect. Maybe YOU should be arrested!”
Without missing a beat, he got right up in my face again, snarling in a menacing tone, “You’re fired! Now get the fuck out!”
“What? No!” I shuddered, fervently shaking my head. “You can’t do that! You can’t fire me!”
“I. Just. Did.”
“No! You can’t do this! Journey needs me! And Jackson and I were just turning a corner—”
“Well then, turn your ass around and get the fuck out of my house!”
Before I knew what was happening, he yanked me away from the door, manhandling me. He grabbed my purse off the entry table, opened the door, and tossed it out on the lawn. The contents went everywhere, including my cash and phone.
The tears pooled in my eyes. Threatening to surface when he shoved me out the door next.
My voice.
My heart.
My very being was falling apart.
But I still managed to say, “Please don’t do this … at least … let me say goodbye to them,” I expressed with a shaking breath. “I love them like they were my own.”
He took one last look at me with callous, beady eyes, scoffing, “Well they’re not. You don’t belong in their lives or this house.”
The door slammed in my face with no compassion or regard for how I felt. Leaving me with nothing.
No answers.
Especially, about his wife.
Chapter 25
<>Aiden<>
Now
__________
I stood there.
My chest heaving.
My heart hammering.
Losing my fucking mind.
I was the beast.
She didn’t deserve any of the bullshit I just spewed or how I treated her. She was the only reason our home was becoming united again after so long.
“Goddamn, it, Bailey,” I whispered to myself, battling like hell not to open the door and allow Camila everything she craved.
Including me.
I felt it.
Our intense connection.
From the second she stepped foot into this house for her interview with Skyler, I was drawn to her…
A woman who wasn’t my wife.
I couldn’t do that to Bailey, to our marriage, to the love we shared.
I wouldn’t.
It was one of the reasons I hadn’t met Camila. On top of the several other circumstances I existed outside of this house. The walls were closing in on me, and I found it hard to catch my breath. Feeling her everywhere…
And I wasn’t just talking about the woman who would forever own my soul. The love of my life.
Beauty.
It didn’t stop me from watching Camila on video every chance I got. Seeing her bond with Journey, her struggle with Jackson, her attention to Jagger, all of it since day one. Her devotion to my kids, to this house, to their lives held me captive every day. The least I could do to show my appreciation was to buy her favorite things she casually mentioned to Journey.
I may not have physically been here for my children, but I made sure they were safe, fed, and had a roof over their heads. It was all I could manage to do. I was stuck in the past, unable to move forward or think about the future. My life had been ripped away, but my kids were always on my mind.
No matter what, they were there.
I had become a shitty fucking father, I knew this. I let down my family in unforgiveable ways for circumstances beyond my control. Abandoning my kids and home to pour everything that was left of my existence into the hospital. The one place I didn’t feel her or see her. I became the man I always promised myself I’d never be. I couldn’t even look at myself in the mirror without seeing all the shitty foster dads staring back at me.
I was one of them.
Once I heard Camila start walking down the steps and away from our home, my chest tightened to the point of pain.
Squeezing…
Choking…
Suffocating what was left of me.
I took a step, about to open the door and allow life to run the course it was set to follow. Damning me to Hell for disrespecting my wife but giving my children what they absolutely needed.
Her.
I turned the knob just as Journey’s loud wails began resonating down the hall. Another problem I wasn’t ready to face quite yet. My feet still moved on their own one right after the other, pushing my body toward her nursery.