Fated An Alpha Male Romance - K. Alex Walker Page 0,84
of your room and he charged after me. I’d never fought harder in my life. Eventually, we ended up in the kitchen and…well. As you know.”
I walked over to her. “Didn’t you ever explain any of this to the district attorney?”
“That story is what got me my thirty-five year plea deal. They claimed that it was my word against the dead man’s and then began to call my past into question. They claimed that John threatened to end the affair and so I killed him in a jealous rage. His wife had even said on the stand that she’d known about the affair and he’d agreed to leave me. If we’d taken it to trial, I was facing life without parole.”
I began shaking my head and pacing the room. Everything that I’d believed and had held onto for the past couple of decades was untrue. My mother hadn’t made the choice to no longer be a part of my life. It was because she’d chosen me, as well as herself, that she’d landed in jail. She’d been trying to protect me, not get rid of me.
“Mom, I have to apologize to you,” I said, standing directly in front of her. “I can’t tell you how angry I was for so long because I’d assumed that you never thought the entire thing through. That instead of killing him, all you’d had to do was walk away from him. I was angry for so long.”
“And you had every right to be,” she explained. “You were six. You weren’t nearly old enough to make sense of any of it and I didn’t want you to know. I didn’t want even the possibility that something like that could have happened to you in your head. Also, I knew that Dad would take good care of you. After your grandmother died, I went off the deep end and he tried so hard to pull me back but could never do so. I saw you going to live with him as a blessing in disguise because at that time, I was so all over the place that he was your only hope. And, Dr. Stewart, I can see that I wasn’t wrong. Honestly, it’s my greatest gesture as your mother — making a hard sacrifice just to give you a fighting chance.”
I initiated the hug this time, squeezing her and apologizing for all of the years I’d spent hating her, and for the fact that I’d never gone to visit her.
“So, you got out early for good behavior?” I asked, my lips pressed into her hair.
“I got some time shaved,” she replied. “The brunt of it was what was revealed during my parole hearing. John’s wife came forward in support of my parole. She talked about how he’d abused her and that she’d found horrifying pictures of their children in their attic during a move.”
I squeezed her even tighter and continued to apologize until she held me at arm’s length, tears in her eyes.
“Well, now that we’ve got that settled, I’ve got years to make up for,” she said. “First, we’ll have dinner and then you’ll tell me all about the special woman in your life.”
Another head-on collision crashed in my head. “Shit.”
“What’s wrong, Ethan?” she asked.
“I think I made another mistake.”
“What mistake is that?”
“The woman in my life,” I explained. “I didn’t fight for her. She wasn’t only thinking about how her family would treat her; she was also thinking about how they would treat me. And…I didn’t even try to fight for her. I was so focused on her independence that I didn’t realize that I could fight for her.”
She held my face between her hands. “Ethan, what are you talking about? What did you do?”
“Her name is Alexandra,” I answered. “She’s beautiful, she’s intelligent, and she’s amazing.”
“Ok. So, what’s the problem?”
“She’s getting married to someone else.”
I expected more questions to follow, but instead, she seemed to think for a minute.
“When’s the wedding?” she asked.
“Tomorrow.”
“Then, we’ve got packing to do.” She walked to the kitchen entrance. “Carl, how do you feel about taking an impromptu trip?”
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Ethan, honey, you just realized that you could fight for the woman who loves you. You have to go and do just that, and I want to be there to help you do it.”
“Go where?” Carl asked, a metal spoon covered in red sauce in his hand.
“To New Orleans,” my mother nonchalantly answered.