I rushed in front of her and found a man and woman perched on Rachel’s couch. The woman was slim, her black hair making her pale skin seem even whiter, with brown eyes that matched Rachel’s.
“We haven’t met,” the woman stood, ignoring Rachel’s question as she beamed at me. “I’m Christy. Rachel and Taylor’s mother. This is my fiancé, Jared.”
“Fiancé?” Rachel coughed out a laugh as Christy extended her hand to me.
I eyed it for a long minute before I took it.
“Yes, fiancé. My daughter is a little judgmental,” she whispered to me, holding on to my hand when I tried to slip it away. “I guess we’re crashing a party today.”
My gaze drifted to Taylor, standing by the kitchen with her arms tightly crossed around her torso as if she were shielding herself. I could spot her tremble from across the room.
I’d known her mother was a piece of work, but the way she shot the breeze with me despite the obvious discomfort of both her daughters made me see red.
“No, you’re not. Take your fiancé and go. I told you not to come back.”
“I came to pick up Taylor. Jared and I got an apartment in Fort Lee, and I thought she could stay with us and check out the local high school.”
“Why would she want to do that?” Rachel asked her mother, her tone low as she took slow, deep breaths.
“I was thinking it was time she moved in with me. Get away from dirty Brooklyn,” Christy scoffed, sweeping her gaze around the living room.
“I’m her guardian. You signed over all your rights, remember?” Rachel said through gritted teeth. I stepped close to her, grabbing her arm when I noticed it shake.
Christy waved a dismissive hand.
“I figured it was more convenient that way. In case I wasn’t around for some random form or permission slip. Why are you fighting me? You finally have a life.” She nodded toward me. “Taylor, pack a bag, honey.”
“No!” Rachel bellowed, loud enough for Taylor to flinch, but her mother barely made eye contact. “Taylor ismykid now, legally. I can take you to court. And what the hell do you want with her after all this time?”
“I’m ready for a family,” Christy said, squaring her bony shoulders. “Jared and I discussed it.”
“I’m definitely ready for kids,” Jared said, still sitting on the couch as he lifted a tattooed hand to scratch his head. “So, it’s good that Chris already has one.”
His clueless laugh made my vision blur, enough rage surging in me for my hand to ball into a fist at my side. This was what Rachel had been forced to deal with her entire life, and thinking of all she’d had to endure with such a cruel and selfish parent turned my fucking stomach.
Yet, somehow, she’d grown up to be the most beautiful person I’d ever known.
This would be the last day she or her sister would ever deal with this again. Picking up both these two lowlifes by the neck and tossing them onto the sidewalk wasn’t the conduct my contract had told me I had to uphold, but I didn’t give a shit.
“My buddy says Fort Lee has a good girls’ softball team,” Jared said, nodding at the photo of Taylor with her team on the wall. “With legs like that, it would be a waste to stop playing.”
Blood roared in my veins as his eyes raked over Taylor.
“You shouldn’t be looking at a teenage girl’s legs,” I growled, eating up the steps between the door and couch in two strides to get in the fucker’s face. “Or looking at her, period.”
“I’m just saying. Chill out, man,” Jared said, holding up his hands.
“So, you want her as a prop?” Rachel said, her voice still shaking. “Like when you took her for ice cream when she was little because you were screwing the owner of the shop. No. Fucking. Way,” she said, her jaw so tight I caught it ticking. “I don’t want you or your loserfiancéanywhere near my sister.”
Christy rolled her eyes, unaffected and bored when she met Rachel’s gaze. “You know they always side with the real parent in things like this. What lawyer would you use? Aunt Lucy’s?” She snickered. “He’s two steps away from an ambulance chaser, and not big steps.”
Rachel stepped in front of her when Christy shifted toward Taylor.
“And what happens when he moves on and you have no use for having a daughter around? You’ll just drop her back off?”
“She’s fourteen.” Her mother shrugged. “She can fend for herself.”
“Thirteen!” Rachel yelled back. “And she’s still a kid.”
