AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I frowned. “I didn’t mean to. It kind of just happened.”
My mother gave me a disapproving look. “So, he’s been looking for Destiny’s family while also being undercover for the police in a sting operation?”
I nodded. “His words.”
“Sometimes, I have to remember how broken you were when I first met you. I believe I expect more from you, on an emotional intellect-level. You’re stunted, Posey. In some aspects of your life, you still only see black or white. You never peer deep enough to see the grey.”
“Are you saying I was wrong to be upset?” I tilted my head, anger bubbling to the surface. “He should have told me Destiny wasn’t his kid.”
“What I’m saying is,” my mother stated. Her clipped tone brokered no talking back to her. “He took a child into his house. Hunter did what any good human being would do while trying to find her family. Something you too were doing, am I right?”
I nodded. “But he lied about being Destiny’s father.”
“Not every day a man will take up for a baby when they’re not biologically related. Could it be he’d been telling the truth the whole time? You mentioned Hunter, at one point, tried to get Hope out of the lifestyle they had thrust her into. Could it be she knew she was pregnant and had formed a plan before Destiny was born?”
“To what? Give some man who doesn’t have any relation to her, her child?” I shook my head. “No way. Did you read the report of how the detectives found Destiny? The condition of the room? The fact no one can say with certainty how long it’d been since she’d last had her diaper changed or she’d eaten.”
My mom continued to rub my back while she rocked me, something she’d done the night of the accident and my first night in her home. Then countless times afterward “I forget, baby. The trauma you sustained while in the system blinds you to the good some people do out of the kindness of their heart. Hunter, from everything I’ve seen and listened to, is one of the good genuine people. His heart is gold and in the right place. He could have laughed you off his porch. Could have forced you to prove everything you were telling him, instead he welcomed you and Destiny into his home. Few would do that, Posey. Fewer in this world care whether or not a child has a safe home or a roof over their heads.”
“Am I just supposed to overlook the lies, though?” Stubborn was a good word for how I dug my heels in, not wanting to listen to the situation from a different perspective.
“No,” Darcy said. “Not at all. I don’t like when people try to cover up the truth or pretend they’re something when they’re not. What I am asking you to do is to put yourself in my shoes or Hunter’s shoes for a minute. In Destiny’s case or for me, with you, what would you have done?”
The quickest answer was not always the right answer. I’d have taken sixteen-year-old Posey into my home and never let her leave. The same for Destiny. Both needed a family, and both needed to be shown love. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t have manipulated the situation to fit my benefit.
“I’d like to say I would have done the same as you or Hunter,” I said.
“But...” She gave me a stern look.
“My yearning to help couldn’t be used to manipulate the situation. Like, I wouldn’t embellish an already horrible report about the family I’d been taken from after the incident. I also wouldn’t have claimed paternity for a child that wasn’t mine. It only complicates the situation, especially when someone finds out the truth. It leads to too many questions. Snap judgements. How can I help other children if I can’t stay impartial?” My sense of judgement it seemed overran every other part of my brain that screamed to protect the kids no matter the cost.
“What if you have to bend those stringent rules to get the result that will benefit the child you are trying to save?” She quirked a brow, challenging me. “I have been keeping up with your memos and interviews for the Miller family. You know what you need to do there, right?”
I nodded. “Remove all the children. Put them into foster homes and hope they all make it to their eighteenth birthdays.” The thought ripped at my heart. No matter how much any of us tried, Tiffany wouldn’t get her shit together and dad would end up killing her and the kids if we didn’t intervene. “Can’t even say if I want the thirty-week-old baby in the NICU to survive.” I swallowed around the knot of guiltiness at the notion of the baby not living. Reece had already been through withdrawals and had two brain bleeds. Of course, the doctor said some of those things were normal for twenty-four-week-old babies. Preemies were delicate. One wrong move and they could pass away. Seeing Reece at thirty weeks, still needing more help than most of the NICU babies, just hurt. I worried her life would be one gigantic loop of horrific suffering. She’d done nothing to deserve what she’d already been through, except for being conceived by two people who should have never had children to begin with.
Careful, some of your resentments for your own parents is showing.
“Those children never stood a chance,” Darcy mumbled. “That’s what you’re saying.”
“No,” I said. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Did you not deserve a chance? What about Destiny? Is she not worthy of Hunter’s or your love?”
Darcy was bombarding me with questions I didn’t have any answers to. Knowing the truth of Destiny’s current situation took me and Hunter out of the equation. We were nothing to her. Wherever her family was, they were the ones who should love her.I’ve been searching... There’s no one.I couldn’t believe Hope or Pedro had no family. Then I snorted to myself. Who was I kidding? Pedro preyed on Hope because she was alone. I put money on the fact Hope was a runaway and Pedro made her feel wanted.
“I didn’t ask to be lectured,” I said.
“You thought I came here to tell you what? You did the right thing?” she replied with a chuckle. “Instead, I challenged everything you know. Giving you lip service will only trap you in your current way of thinking.”
Again, she hit the nail on the head. “I wanted you here because I don’t know what to do.”
“Let’s try it this way. You didn’t you have food poisoning the night of the incident at the hospital, right?” How we jumped topics so quickly or why I’d felt trapped by my adoptive mother, I wasn’t sure. “You decided to lie to all of us to help Hunter.”
My head dropped forward as shame filled me. “Well, when you put it like that, yes, I decided to help someone who’d been in need. Waverly was the nurse who’d been hurt severely. He asked if I could stay with Destiny. I didn’t hesitate. I said sure. I was afraid if I told anyone what happened, both of us would get into trouble.”
Darcy’s brow furrowed. “For helping a single father out in a stressful situation?” She exhaled and patted her thighs while shaking her head. “You have got to be the thickest headed child I have ever met. You should have called me and told me. I would have helped you. I would have told you to stay there. It was where you needed to be.”
“It was all last minute. I didn’t think things through,” I muttered. “He’d been frantic when the call came in. So scared. I didn’t think I had the right to say no.”
