Stacked Up: Worth the Fight Series (6 page)

“Let me tell you a little story,” Iggy said.

“Not the time.”

“Shut up and listen. Gonna drop some knowledge on you, brother.”

Travis rolled his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest.

“Once upon a time, there was a kid who grew up in foster care. Let’s call the kid Marco. Hard life.”

Travis knew all about hard lives—he didn’t want to hear about someone else’s. He knew better than anyone what it meant to have a shitty family and no money.

“The kid was hungry, angry, and desperate to get himself a home,” Iggy went on. “So one day he hustles himself some money and gets some fake papers and at the ripe ol’ age of seventeen enlists in the Army. Made some good friends, learned what it is to have family. Learned that sometimes family is not blood. In fact, the family you pick for yourself can be better than blood. And the kid ends up meeting his brother, Dante, in the hot-as-fuck sands of Iraq. All Dante does for three years is talk about his girl and his son at home. Dante couldn’t wait to see her. That was his only dream. Dante talked about it so much that Marco began to believe that maybe being alone sucked ass. Maybe he needed to get the fuck out of the Army and go find himself a family. A girl. A son. Three years in the trenches with Dante, planning barbeques with an imaginary family and Dante’s real family. Then one day—boom! A fucking IED out of no-fucking-where! Dante dies and leaves an orphan and a widow. Marco leaves his fucking leg in the fuckin’ desert and along with it the possibility of ever having children.”

Travis had a lump in his throat. The truth was that Iggy was the most positive person he knew. The thought of all that darkness in Iggy’s life was astounding. “Damn, man. I didn’t know.”

“Yeah, I don’t tell a lot of people. But it’s cool,” Iggy said in a blasé tone. “What I’m trying to tell you, brother, is that you are a lucky son of a bitch. You don’t have to marry the girl, and there’s no need to have a family today. But don’t discard something that may lead to something big because you think you don’t want kids. I bet my leg—the real one—that you’ve never even thought about it. Really thought about it.”

“But you have.”

“Every fucking day,” Iggy said. He squeezed Travis’s shoulder before heading back into the waiting room.

The door to the waiting room opened and Iggy walked in. He said hello to everyone and then sat next to Penny. “Who’s this?”

“Sarabelle, my daughter.”

He wrapped one of the child’s curls around his finger. “Cute.”

“Hey, Iggy, do you happen to have a phone I can borrow?” Penny asked.

Iggy laughed. “Do I have a phone?” He rolled his eyes in amusement. “Got two.” He reached into his pocket and pulled one out.

“Does it have Internet access? I need to check my email. Is that okay?”

“You don’t have a phone?”

“I do.” She pulled her flip phone out of her pocket. “One of those prepaid ones, and I can’t check my email on it.”

Iggy took the phone out of her hands and looked at it as if it was some sort of ancient artifact. “Seriously?” He shook his head and scoffed. “Here you go.” He handed her his sleek phone.

She went into the Web browser—it wasn’t difficult to use his phone, since it was similar to the one she’d had before leaving Oklahoma—and searched her email. She had a ton of messages, mostly from her old friends. Ignoring them all, she scrolled until she found what she was looking for. It was something she did almost every day from the public library. She scrolled through her Google Alerts; for the last year, all the alerts had been mostly about her missing, and there was nothing new. Relieved, she exited her emails and then did a search on Travis. Her heart pumped fast against her chest when she saw all the photos of herself with Travis, which were mostly from local papers and sites. The articles said mostly that Travis, the star of
Fight Night,
was smitten with a local bartender at Ruby’s; sources said her name was Penny.

With trembling hands she read it again. “You okay?” Iggy asked. She exited the screen and handed him the phone without a word. How long before her stepfather found her?

“Hey, are you okay?”

She looked down at Sarabelle in her arms and squeezed her harder.

“Penny?”

“Um…yeah, fine.” She stood, her eyes unfocused and her thoughts jumbled. She didn’t want to go back to her apartment. What if her stepfather was there? She knew she was overreacting. It was too soon; the stories had just appeared in the last hour. And really, what could her stepfather do? He couldn’t physically make her do anything. She sighed. She knew what he’d do—he’d use his money to back her into a corner and force her hand.

“Okay, I think it’s time you tell us what’s going on. You’re kind of scaring us with that look,” Violet said, taking Belle from Penny’s arms.

She looked around and saw Travis standing close by, his arms crossed over his chest. “I should talk to him alone first.”

“Go. We’ll watch her,” Violet offered.

Penny led Travis to the other side of the room. This was it. Time to come clean.

“My stepdaddy’s Kip Owens.”

“Who?”

She reached into his pocket, took out his phone, and pulled up the Web browser. “Here.” She hit play on a video.

A familiar-looking man stood on a large stage. When Travis saw the large cross, he realized it was a church. “Oh, the preacher guy?”

“Yes.”

He continued to give her a blank stare until it hit him. “Oh, fuck! Your stepdad’s Kip Owens, the rich preacher from television?”

“Exactly.”

“And you have a baby. And you aren’t married.”

“Yes.”

“Wow. No wonder you always seemed out of place.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just that you didn’t look like you should have a shitty phone, a small apartment, and no car. You’re mannered, classy, well spoken.”

“Yes. Stuck-up bitch.”

Hearing her repeat the words he’d flung at her just an hour ago made him flinch.

He took her hands. She tried to pull them back, but he held them tighter. “Before you say one more word, I need to apologize. You know my mom was a drug addict who did nothing but put me and JL down. She was horrible, and everything I’ve done most of my life has been to prove her wrong.”

“But she passed away, Travis. You don’t have to—”

“I know all of that. But it’s something no one knows. Something I don’t talk about. To anyone. But you deserve to know where that hurtful comment came from. It came from a bad place. She used to tell me how I wasn’t worth anything. How I would never amount to anything. When I heard you say that, it just brought back old wounds.”

“I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I would never do that. I was trying to explain about Kip and the reason I couldn’t be photographed. He wouldn’t think you’re good enough because he doesn’t think anyone is. Well, anyone who’s different from him. Your career, your tattoos, the cursing, the drinking…I’m not trying to judge you. I like you the way you are. I’m just telling you why he wouldn’t like you. He doesn’t like me either since I got pregnant. But I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

“I know that now, and I’m sorry—I just jumped to conclusions. What I said…it was wrong. I don’t think those things about you. But most of all, I’m sorry I said those things in front of people. Our private moments. I feel…” He shook his head and looked up as if trying to gather composure. “I—I don’t know what to say except I am so sorry. God,
sorry
seems like an inadequate word. I feel like exactly the kind of person I said I’d never be.”

“It doesn’t matter, Travis. None of it. You and I are too different. You are at a different point in your life. One I might even envy. I have a child and responsibilities. You have a burgeoning career that you need to take care of. An image—the single playboy—that you need to uphold. And you need to get out and have fun. I do understand all of that, Travis. I really do. I don’t begrudge you that.”

She sat down on the nearest bench. “I grew up very wealthy. I had everything I needed. Nothing I really wanted, though. My dad died when I was seven, and my mother married Kip almost immediately. On television they had to portray the perfect family. When I was sixteen my mother died of breast cancer. Kip had legally adopted me by then, so he was stuck with me when Mom died. And then I got pregnant. A pregnant eighteen-year-old kid was not good for the preacher’s image. Plus, he’s not just a preacher—he’s the guy you see on syndicated television talking about living a pure life free of immorality and saying that God only loves those who save themselves for marriage.”

“I get it. He’s famous. A couple of thousand people listen to him. But that’s not going to—”

“Six million, Travis. Six million people tune in every single week to watch his sermons. Sermons about living a pure life dedicated to God’s mission. Six million believe that his word is law.”

“Damn,” Travis said. “Okay, well, so who’s the father?”

“His name’s Lawrence. He works with Kip.”

“A preacher too?”

“More like a jerk. He’s in his late thirties. I shouldn’t have slept with him, but I did—I was stupid. And it turned out he was married. I didn’t know at the time, I swear. Please believe that I didn’t know he had a family.”

“Calm down. I’m not judging you. I know you well enough to know you’d never do that.”

“I thought he loved me. I really did. I was so stupid. Anyway, he gave me five thousand dollars to keep quiet. He told me that I had seduced him and that had been the reason he’d succumbed to temptation. And if I said anything, I’d ruin his marriage.”

“Motherfucker!” Travis cursed, his fists clenching at his side.

“I might be young, but I’m not stupid. I knew it wasn’t my fault. I also quickly realized this was not a man I wanted in my life or in my child’s life. So I took the money and got him out of my life. I know it looks terrible that I took the money. But I took it for Sarabelle. He was going to be a terrible father anyway, and I preferred having him out of the picture completely. I never thought that the money was going to be my lifeline. But after Lawrence was out of the picture, Kip sent me away to Fresh Start, a home for pregnant girls.”

“Those actually exist?”

She laughed, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Yeah, they exist. It wasn’t so bad, actually. Most of the girls were a lot younger than I was; some were victims of sex crimes. I knew I didn’t want to give the baby up for adoption, but Kip didn’t really give me much of a choice. And neither did the attorneys from the television station that produces the show—I’d been appearing on the show when I was a minor, and when I turned eighteen my stepfather talked me into signing a contract to continue appearing on the show. But the attorneys said that my actions infringed on the morality clause in my contract. So they packed up my things and moved me, and I was supposed to just accept that, I suppose.”

“How’d you end up here?”

“I couldn’t accept that. I never did. I never even once thought of giving up the baby. And once I had her and the doctor put her in my arms, my fate was sealed. She’s part of me. A limb, an extension of me. So a couple of days after I had the baby, I left.”

“And you think they’ll finally find you?”

She let out a big breath. “You don’t get it. They aren’t looking for me. I did them a favor by leaving. I think, for appearances’ sake, Kip made a public effort to find me for a few months; he probably played the grieving father, but really, he couldn’t care less. Now, however, I’m likely to be all over the news. I can’t just go back into hiding, and they can’t pretend I don’t exist. I mean, how would that look for the perfect preacher if his daughter is not only alive but has a baby and is partying it up with an MMA reality television star in Florida? They can’t ignore it, Travis, and they will come to look for me. It may all be for appearances, but they’ll want me back.”

“So tell them to fuck off and stay here.”

“Obviously. But I didn’t want to have to deal with it. Who knows what Kip will do? You think you have a lot of media attention now? You have no idea. He’ll come into town with a media circus. He’s persistent, Travis. And what if that television station sues me for breach of the morality clause? I’m barely surviving financially, and if I have to deal with the cost of defending or losing a lawsuit, I won’t survive that. I just won’t. I don’t want Belle raised the way I was raised. I know you grew up poor and that your life was bad and that you probably think because we had money life was good. It wasn’t. Not at all. We had strict rules. I didn’t watch television. I didn’t know what was going on outside of my small town. I wasn’t allowed to think for myself. Everything that wasn’t prescribed by them was wrong. And I really don’t want to be known as the preacher’s slutty daughter, because that is exactly what they will say about me. Once the press hears, that’s all they will say.

“I’ve been surrounded by media my entire life and they will want to use me as an example of how my family is a bunch of hypocrites. Which they may be, but I don’t want to be the example of it, you know? I want Belle to grow up as far away from that as possible. I want her to know she is loved and wanted.”

“Is he that big an asshole?”

“Yes,” she admitted. “But he’s also a big believer. He’s not a complete hypocrite. He truly believes I am going to hell because I got pregnant, and that my bastard daughter will too. He wants me to repent for my sins. If he had to come ‘save me,’ he’d have to set an example with me. I’d spend the rest of my life apologizing and repenting for my sins.”

He ran his fingers through his hair.

“Look, I know this isn’t what you wanted,” Penny concluded. “I get it. That’s why I didn’t want to say anything sooner. I don’t blame you for wanting nothing to do with me.”

“I’m sorry for the things I said, Penny,” he apologized again. “And I’m sorry I outed you.” He paced the small room. “I think it’s going to be fine. It’s just the local paper and a few websites. No big deal.”

“I hope you’re right, Travis.”

He nodded, not really knowing what to say.

“Anyway, I have to get Belle home. Will you please keep me posted on your sister?”

He nodded again.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she repeated. Sadly, but understanding that there was nothing more either of them could do, she walked back to the waiting room and asked one of Travis’s friends for a lift to her apartment, not wanting to take the bus with Belle in the middle of the night.

Penny slept terribly.

Before leaving the hospital, she’d told the group the entire story. There was no point in hiding it anymore. And if—or when—the story unfolded in the media, they needed to know. They had been kind to her, and Tony and Francesca had driven her home, but after she’d locked the door behind her and put Belle down, she’d paced around her small apartment trying to think.

When she’d gone to bed at last, she’d had nightmares of her old life—a life she really didn’t want to think about. She woke up and lay in bed staring at the ceiling.

Even if things were difficult now, she still preferred it over what she’d had in Oklahoma. During the last year her faith in God hadn’t wavered, but it had been far too long since she’d closed her eyes and prayed. She’d had moments of sadness and anger, but everything that had happened had been the result of decisions she’d made. And they had ultimately led to Belle and that wasn’t something she could be angry about, no matter how hard things got. She closed her eyes and prayed for strength. And at last she fell into a dreamless sleep.

By the time she got out of bed the next morning, she felt a little better. No matter what happened, she didn’t have to go back home. When she left Oklahoma, she’d been naive and scared, and it had felt like the end of the world. But she’d grown a lot this last year, and now she felt as if she was strong enough to handle whatever was thrown at her. A year ago she had been too wrapped up in the problem to see the big picture. Now she could take a step back and see things a bit more clearly. And even the worst-case scenario wasn’t the end of the world. She’d learned how to scrape by with almost nothing. So long as she had Belle, nothing else really mattered.

Travis lifted his head from the uncomfortable chair in the waiting room at the hospital. He put his feet down on the floor and reached for his hat, which had fallen at some point. Stretching his arms, he felt all his muscles aching from having slept so uncomfortably as he awaited news of his sister.

He had spent most of the night pacing the halls of St. Joseph’s Hospital, about to lose his mind. Enzo had come out of the labor and delivery room earlier in the evening to explain that JL had had some complications after her water broke and that if she didn’t go into labor soon, she’d have to have a C-section. The look of panic and fear that marred Enzo’s face made Travis go from
Babies are a pain in the ass
to
Oh my God, this is some serious shit, and my sister’s life could be at risk.
Enzo had been coming out to update them every few hours, but at some point, Travis realized, he must’ve fallen asleep. Violet and Cain were sitting nearby, also asleep, but everyone else had gone home for the night.

To top it off, he felt uneasy about the turn of events with Penny the previous night: from sex to hurt to anger to betrayal and confusion, and finally to a major case of shame for the horrible things he’d said to her. He understood now why Penny hadn’t told him about her daughter. She’d trusted him completely with her body, but not with her secrets or her daughter. It made sense—after all, he’d said so much shit about not wanting kids. But he also felt like he’d been lied to.

The truth was, he probably wouldn’t have pursued her had he known that she had a kid. But he had strong feelings for her now, like it or not, which made him feel as if the decision to continue on with her had been already made for him, and that angered him a little. Still, he couldn’t just click off his emotions. And the fact that he felt that way about her after sleeping with her just once unnerved him.

When they’d first kissed, he realized now, what had really gotten to him wasn’t even the kiss. It had been the way she’d cried in his arms. Penny wasn’t the type of woman who opened up to anyone. She was strong and feisty in a subdued way, a way you didn’t see coming. Even that first night he’d suspected that the way she’d crumbled in his arms was something no one else had probably ever seen. And the fact she’d laid all that on him just made him want to hold her, keep all harm away, protect her in the most basic of ways.

Someone needed him.

Even for a brief moment, she had needed him. And that made him feel special and wanted, something he’d never felt before with anyone. The truth was, he hadn’t been feeling much of anything lately. He’d been walking around numb. Going through the motions. Training, then training some more. He didn’t even eat enjoyable food—he had protein shakes for dinner. But she made him feel special and important. Mostly because
she
was special.

The fact that he liked her was undeniable. He just wanted to be around her—like all the fucking time. Even sitting at the bar watching her serve customers and occasionally chatting with him made him feel good. She had an easy way about her, even though she kept to herself. She smiled, was eager to help everyone, and was grateful and kind to everyone she met. She was a calming presence that soothed his soul. He hadn’t even realized how torn his soul had been until she walked into his life. All the evil words his mother had spewed seemed to go silent when Penny was around. He felt worthy. And she’d done that.