My back stiffened as anger started to roll through me now, too.
Nobody called her a bitch.
Not even my friend.
***
Theo
The pounding on the door after Hoax had arrived surprised me, but not the others.
I felt my heart start to pound in my chest as Liner stood up and began walking toward the door with what amounted to dread in his every step.
When the door opened, Liner didn’t bother with pleasantries.
Mostly because the man at the door said, “Where is she?” within moments of Liner opening it.
Then the big man’s eyes narrowed into dangerous looking slits that had me standing up and tensing beside my now sleeping child.
I wouldn’t be able to protect her from that enraged man, but I would be able to stop him long enough for Liner to…
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t care about that bitch. I care about a kid that I might have.”
The words coming out of that man’s mouth were downright scary.
“You need to get yourself under fucking control,” Liner demanded harshly, causing me to glance down at Linnie to make sure the loud command hadn’t woken her.
It hadn’t.
She’d gotten up very early this morning. Yesterday, she had spent half her morning at school, and there was no telling what time Tyson had woken her up in the first place. But then she’d come over here and played with Liner and Monster for who knows how long. And had gone to bed late last evening.
Needless to say, today, she was very tired.
Then, Rome seemed to wilt before our eyes. “Liner, you of all people know how hard this is for me.”
Liner nodded his head and stepped aside, but before he could say a word, Rome’s eyes caught on mine and stiffened.
“Is she…is she mine?” Rome asked, looking broken and beaten.
I smiled sadly as I ran my hand down the length of Linnie’s cheek, causing her eyes to blink open momentarily, but just as suddenly they closed, and she turned. “No. No, she’s not yours. But I’m willing to do a DNA test for you if you don’t believe me.”
He looked at the color of my baby’s skin, at her hair, and then at her face, obviously looking incredulous.
“Tara found a man that resembled you. I’m not sure who, I’m not sure where, but one day I woke up and…nothing. I couldn’t remember the last thirty-six hours. It was only after begging her to tell me what happened for days that she told me that she artificially inseminated me—and that was over eight weeks later,” I whispered. “She asked me to sleep with you, but I refused. She knew I wouldn’t do that, so she had a backup plan. God, she’d even given me medication to help me ovulate! I didn’t even know!” I shook my head sadly. “But…I made sure. I…at the funeral. I was able to take a piece of Matias’ hair. I’m so sorry. I…I didn’t know what else to do. I had to know,” I whispered brokenly.
“You were at the funeral?” he asked in surprise.
I nodded once, feeling my throat thicken. “I got a pass for the day and went. I couldn’t miss that.”
Rome looked down at his feet as Liner finished closing the door and turned to lean his back against the cool wood. His arms went across his chest, and he was tense as if waiting to intervene if he was needed.
One glance at me and he knew that I wanted to handle it. The situation. Rome.
It was the least I could do.
“What did you find?” he asked, sounding sick to his stomach.
“It took me a while. I had to find time. I was watched day and night, and the only person that truly believed that I wasn’t crazy was a woman that was only there once every two weeks. I gave her the hair, paired with mine and Linnie’s. The DNA wasn’t a match on Linnie’s to your son’s. There was no match at all,” I explained.
He blew out a breath.
Walking over to a sleeping Linnie, I pulled her hair back into my hands and ran my hands through it. A few strands of hair came out as I did, and I walked over to not Rome, but Rome’s wife, Izzy. I circled Linnie’s hair into my hand and then handed it to her.
“I’m not Tara,” I said softly. “I may look like her…but I don’t act like her. I don’t think like her. I don’t even breathe like her.”
Izzy, who hadn’t looked at me but with anything but disdain since she’d walked in the door, looked startled when I handed the hair to her instead of her husband.
“I…”
“Don’t,” I said softly, walking over to Linnie and picking her up in my arms. She was too small. So freakin’ small. “You don’t have to say anything. I know what Tara did. I know what Tara made me do. I don’t begrudge you your anger. But, saying that, don’t ever take it out on my little girl. She’s just as innocent as your baby boy was in all of this.”