Page 7 of Hired By My Rich Baby Daddy 3

My eyebrows pulled together.

“Damn, Noree.”

She pressed her lips together and looked away. “I know. I didn’t mean to get to fighting in your house, but Ginger… she really pissed me off to the point of no return. But that’s still no excuse. I-I’m sorry for… all of it.”

I ain’t say nothing, just eased her hand under the water and started cleaning it.

She winced hard, sucking air through her teeth, and her fingers tried to curl up in mine.

“I know.” I loosened my hold a little. “Just let me get this blood off.”

I grabbed the peroxide and a few cotton balls from the medicine cabinet. I soaked one of them and carefully cleaned the blood from her fingers one at a time. She bit down on her lip to mask the pain.

Once her fingers were clean, I tossed the bloody cotton balls into the trash, grabbed the box of Band-Aids, and started wrapping each finger. When I finished with that hand, I reached for the other one.

“So why didn’t you tell me? For real,” I blurted out, no longer wanting to beat around the fucking bush.

“I tried to.”

“Nah.” I shook my head. “The second you saw me. Before you got hired or any of that shit. Why didn’t you tell me I had a baby?”

Her mouth opened, but nothing came out right away. She sighed and used the back of the hand I’d already wrapped to wipe her eyes.

“That wasn’t my intention, Ozy… I just didn’t know how to say it.”

“You could’ve just come right out and said it.”

She nodded, looking down at our hands.

“You’re right. I could have.” She sniffled. “And honestly, my reasoning for not telling you, when I look back on it… was stupid.”

“What was the reason?”

She winced when I started cleaning the other hand. Three nails gone off that side, all of them broken, blood now dried around her fingertips and all down her palm, some staining the sleeve of her jean jacket.

I glanced up when she didn’t answer.

“Noree.”

She swallowed hard. “If I’m being honest, I didn’t know if you’d try to take me to court.”

I stopped with her hand still lying in mine. “Why the fuck would I take you to court?”

Her eyes dropped again.

“I don’t know if I really wanna get into all of that right now⁠—”

“Nah,” I cut her off. “Now is the time for us to talk about all of this shit. Put it on the table.”

She nodded real slow.

“Well.” She took a breath. “I lost my job. Remember, we talked about that for a brief moment the day I was here for the interview. Uh… I had been looking for work for quite some time, and while I was looking, I had to dip into my savings.”

Her voice got quieter, and she bit down on her lip nervously before continuing.

“Unfortunately, that left me with an eviction notice on my door.”

I ain’t say nothing right away.