Page 66 of Her Passionate Hero

“The adults each had a bedroom, all the children and the baby slept in the living room. The first time I snuck out of the apartment, I was probably four. Hell, Alia, I didn’t even know my real age.”

“Oh, Baby. What happened?”

She had no give for herself, but when he needed some solace, she was right there. Amazing.

“I left because I saw them take out the trash, and I remembered that there had been food on Ricki’s plate. I wanted what was in that trash bag. I went outside to find it and eventually, found the dumpsters for the apartment building. They were overflowing, so I was going through the plastic bags surrounding the dumpsters when Mamie found me. I tried to hide from her. It took her twenty minutes to coax me out from behind the bins. To this day she says it was a miracle that she was taking out the trash at midnight.”

“It wasn’t safe for her, was it? Why was she?” Aliana asked.

“Her cat was sick, so she said she had to get rid of the cat litter or be killed by the stench,” he said with a slight grin. “Spooky was a great cat. He lived for eight years after I moved in.”

“How did you get to move in?”

Hunter thought about that awful night.

“For the next six months, on different nights, I would sneak over to Mamie’s apartment. Things at my apartment got worse because the other family moved out. I didn’t realize what was going on, but I guess my parents couldn’t afford it on their own. All I know is there was a lot of screaming, yelling, and hitting. One night, Dad knocked Mom down and instead of her staying down, she crawled to the bedroom and came out with a gun. I snuck out the door just before I heard the gun go off. When I was at Mamie’s place, I heard sirens and more shots.”

“What happened when the police came and questioned you?”

“They never did.”

“How is that even possible?”

“Mamie explained it to me years later. She used to work with the county. My mom and dad died on Friday, she called a social worker friend the following Monday. She arranged for me to become her foster child. The social worker went back and found my birth certificate.”

“So, you’re her foster child?”

“Oh, hell no. Never underestimate Rosa Diaz. I was adopted before I was in first grade. That woman works miracles.”

Aliana’s fingers sifted through the hair on the side of his head.

“Why do you think you’re dirty?”

“I was eating out of the trash,” he bit out. “That night I went to the dumpster? That wasn’t the first time, I ate out of the trash can in the house all the damn time. I wore the same clothes weeks at a time. I stunk and didn’t even know it until I started going over to Mamie’s house.”

“I understand that as a child you felt ashamed and might not have been ready to tell me, but you don’t feel like that now, do you?”

He grasped her hand and brought her palm to his lips. “No. No, I don’t.”

“Good,” she said with a fierce smile.

“So, why do you still have some of your same tapes from childhood playing in your head? Why can’t I tell you you’re beautiful? Why can’t I tell you you’re my special piece of heaven?”

She tried to pull her hand away, but he wouldn’t let her.

“Hunter, let me go.”

“No. Answer me.”

“That was never who you were, those were just sad circumstances. And I’ve thrown a lot of those tapes away. I have.”

Her look implored him to believe her, but he didn’t. If she had, she wouldn’t have such a high wall built around her heart.

“So, it’s okay that I call you mi Cielito?” he asked.

She cringed. “You’re asking me to believe lies about myself. I have a mirror. I know me. I know the real me. You don’t Hunter. I know me. I’m no one’s piece of heaven. Especially yours. I would just drag you down. You don’t need that. You don’t.”

“Okay, Cariña, calm down. Let’s go back to the moment where you were playing with my hair, I really liked that.”