He nodded his agreement but the look on his face spoke to something else. “We definitely got to change that. I can’t have you stuck up in the house alone.”
“I’m not alone. I have Ami.”
“Be serious, Ling.”
My jaw dropped at the way he’d shortened my name. I didn’t expect him to come up with something likeStarbright, but Ling was a big no. “Absolutely not.”
“I told you I was going to find something else. Calling you Sterling is a mouthful.”
“It’s two syllables.”
He shrugged his shoulders and put his eyes back on his innocent daughter as he blatantly lied. “I’m lazy.”
“Since I know the type of discipline it takes to become a professional athlete I’m going to call bullshit on that.”
Aldrich’s head snapped up and the joyful surprise on his face made me wonder what had him so giddy. “Not Mary Poppins over here cussin! Say it ain’t so, Ling Ling.”
“Okay, that’s two syllables. Like my actual name and I’m an adult. I, of course, won’t use that language around Amisha—”
He chuckled and continued to rub her back. “Hell, she's gone hear it from me so you can go right ahead and relax on that.”
“Like I said. I wouldn’t ever cuss at your daughter—”
“Oh, we’d be packing your shit if you did. But cussin’ around her is different, Ling. You know that, right?”
I hesitated because we were not about to dive into the brutalities of my childhood. My mother was fond of cursing at whomever she saw fit. Be it me, my father or the staff at her home. They would take the abuse because she paid well and she would take their silence as complicity to continue her reign of terror. My mother was the most emotionally unregulated person that I’d ever seen but to let her tell it she was mother of the year.
Money might buy the things that can temporarily make you happy, but it doesn’t buy inner peace.
“Yes, I’m attempting to ease your mind about the level of professionali—”
Aldrich glanced back at Ami who had finally released her gas in multiple ways, before he looked up at me. “Bruh, come sit down cause you gone make my neck hurt looking up at you like that. I’m already rigid as fuck to make sure I don’t mess up with her. Come chill.” When he nodded to the spot directly next to him I wanted to ask if he was out of his entire mind thinking I was gonna be close enough to have his thigh touching mine. “Ling?”
“Right.”
I moved over to the footstool and left plenty of distance but tried to sit close enough that it wasn’t obvious I was shook. Because I absolutely was.
Aldrich smelled so good. Like most men, he had a myriad of scents but he must have taken years to know which would complement one another. His cologne was Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille. That was his around the house scent. When he went out he normally wore Oud Wood, which was another favorite. He had a flashy style based on the photos I’d seen of him, but I could tell he was specific with what he liked and took pride in his appearance.
We sat in silence as he rocked back and forth with Ami on his chest. The scene was idyllic and I wish I had my phone to snap a photo for him. He was looking at me and stealing glances at her as she started to drift. I couldn’t help but smile at the picture they made. Initially, Aldrich smiled back but suddenly the smile dropped off his face. When he stood up carefully with his arm bracing Ami’s back, I knew he was heading out.
“Thank you for giving me some parent training today. I’m going to reach out to my mom who should be here in a couple of weeks for a couple of weeks. You can get a lot of days off then, okay?” He placed Ami in my arms almost regretfully before taking a step back. “I’ve got to head out in about an hour but call me if y’all need anything while I’m gone.”
He turned and walked back out of her room, putting back up the pieces of his wall of emotions that this tiny baby had knocked down in only a few minutes.
At least that meant there was still hope.
ALDRICH
I HAD TO get out of the house.
And I hated myself for needing space. For running away. The thought of my fearing something made my gut churn. But the desire to shed the implications of my actions didn’t halt them. I was still putting one foot in front of the other and leaving. Fleeing was more like it.
I’d done what I could but having that girl’s parents ambush me at the hospital when it came time to pick up the baby was too much. The baby was too much, but I started to feel something when I held her. And even that shit scared me senseless. I knew my life would be easier if I gave in to them. Them being her egg donor’s parents. But since they’d already raised one girl that was too spoiled to hear the word no, I didn’t want them to ruin one that had my blood in her veins. And the thought of paying those people to take care of my child felt like I was paying them for what happened to me and rewarding their psychotic daughter posthumously.
There wasn’t a fucking chance in hell of that happening.
Their showing up at the hospital had me wondering if they’d been camping out or if someone had alerted them to my being there. I hadn’t given their daughter or what happened to her body a second thought after learning she was dead. Their thinking it was somehow my responsibility to pay for her fucking funeral was laughable to me. I’d already been weighing the idea of going for full custody of the baby simply because of how she’d gotten here. I hated to feel like the universe had done me a favorby getting rid of Ami’s egg donor for me, but I felt like I could breathe for the first time in months when Billy told me she was dead. She’d already gone into lawyer mode and asked me if I wanted to look into the accident but I wanted to wash my hands of everything that had to do with the chick Marley. Except of course, the baby she’d carried.
