All for Maddie Read online

  I hadn’t realized we had been sitting outside on the sidewalk of the little coffee shop for over an hour. My phone rang with the ringtone that I definitely had to change.

  “Hello.”

  “Did you get lost,” Alex asked.

  I wanted to tell him that it was none of his business where I was. However, I didn’t. We were supposed to be this happy little couple in love. I didn’t want Regan to think otherwise, for whatever reason.

  “No, I actually ran into your sister. We’re having coffee.”

  “Oh,” he said, sounding surprised. “Well, I will have supper ready in about an hour. Don’t listen to a word she says.”

  “I was going to cook,” I whined.

  “You can cook tomorrow. Maddie was getting hungry.”

  “Alright, I’m leaving now. Did you want me to pick up some Alka-Seltzer while I am out?”

  “You tell my sister that I despise her. And make sure she tells you the whole story. She made me eat it.”

  I laughed. She didn’t tell me that part. I loved her. Why couldn’t she have fed him dynamite?

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  “I’m going to take it she didn’t have a nap?” I assumed as I put away groceries. Maddie was whining, wanting the bag of gummy bears that I tried to keep hidden. I gave her two and that pissed her off. She wanted a red one, a green one, a blue one, a yellow one, and a white one, which wasn’t even a choice.

  “No, Maddie, you can have some after you eat your supper,” Alex tried. That caused her to throw herself on the floor and scream. He tried to pick her up. She arched her back, slid out of his arms, and kicked him right in the shin.

  He picked her up and carried her out. I could tell that he was mad. It showed. I wasn’t sure whether or not to intervene. I would have just given them to her. I knew that wasn’t going to work with him. I stood still, listening as he reprimanded her and sat her on the bottom step. She got up. He sat her back down. She got up. He sat her back down. I stood in the door watching as she cried for her mommy, trying to come to me, only to be sat back on the step.

  “You can’t act like that, Madelyn. You can’t kick daddy, and you can’t throw a tantrum because you want gummy bears. You eat your supper and then you can have candy. You sit here and be a good girl for three minutes and you can get up?”

  Maddie screamed. “I want my mommy.” She got up. He sat her back down. I couldn’t take it. She wasn’t used to that. I didn’t like him making her cry and upsetting her like that.

  I walked out and picked her up. He took her right out of my arms and sat her back on the steps. “Don’t!” he demanded as Maddie screamed, reaching for me.

  “Alex, she’s not used to this. Let me take her.”

  “No, Whit. She is not going to act like this, and you’re not going to let her.”

  “You are not going to be mean to her,” I demanded, getting pissed.

  “Don’t move,” he said, pointing to Maddie as he stood to meet me. “I am not being mean to her. You and everyone she knows has let her get away with murder, whatever Maddie wants, Maddie gets. She’s going to get kicked out of preschool the first day. Walk back into the kitchen and let me handle her.”

  I wanted to knee him in the nuts. I wanted to pick my daughter up and calm her cries. He wouldn’t let me and it infuriated me to no end. I did the only thing I could and stomped back to the kitchen. I stayed at the door and observed.

  “Stop crying and daddy will let you get up,” he said, sitting beside of her. She tried to crawl on his lap and he stopped her. “No. You have to sit there and be a good girl for a couple more minutes.”

  Maddie stopped throwing her fit as soon as she realized that he wasn’t mommy and she wasn’t going to get her way.

  “That’s my girl. Are you going to kick daddy again?”

  “No,” she said in a whiny voice, wiping her tears with her little fingers.

  “Can you tell daddy that you’re sorry?”

  “I sorwy.”

  “Come here,” he said, taking her in his arms and loving her.

  That wasn’t the last of the time outs that night. Maddie threw a handful of lima beans across the room when she tried to tell her daddy she didn’t like them. She once again sat on the bottom step.

  “I not wike wima beans,” she wailed over and over. Alex sat beside her, made her sit every time she tried to get up, and started her three minutes once she calmed down. She even ate three of the lima beans.

  I started cleaning up after supper, wanting to bathe my daughter and spend the evening with her, letting her know that mommy wasn’t going to be mean to her. I knew I shouldn’t have thought that way. She was a brat, but it wasn’t her fault. It was everyone else’s fault. She was the only baby at the resort, everyone loved her and nobody could say no to Maddie.

  “Come on, sweetie, let’s go take a bath,” I coaxed.

  “You can go. I’ll finish cleaning up,” Alex offered. I responded with a dirty look, taking Maddie’s hand.

  I ran the tub full of bubbles and got in, sitting her in front of me.

  “I see my Papaw,” Maddie sadly said, as I washed her arms and legs.

  “Papaw’s coming to see you tomorrow,” I said, sounding excited.

  “How many sweep times?”

  “One. When you wake up, he’s going to come and see you.”

  “And Nana too?”

  “Yup, Nana is coming to see you too. They miss you.”

  “JESUS ALEX!” I screamed, turning toward the door, covering my breasts with my arm.

  “Sorry, I didn’t know you were taking a bath too.”

  “GET OUT!” I screamed when he stood there, staring. Oh my God, I couldn’t live here. I couldn’t live with that man. I was going to end up in a nut house.

  Chapter 8

  My dad couldn’t believe our house, well, Alex’s house. He was in love with the barbeque pit by the pool and informed Alex that he was in charge of making the steaks later, for Alex’s family.

  I was a nervous wreck, thinking about our families coming together. Alex thought it was necessary for whatever reason. Maddie clung to my dad for a while, and then right back to her daddy. I couldn’t wait for Regan to get there. I needed a drink. I wasn’t worried that they wouldn’t get along. It wasn’t that. His family truly was just like mine, other than they had a lot more money, and I was sure they didn’t work as hard as my dad did. I was more nervous about the sleeping arrangements that I was going to be expected to adhere to. And the fact that Alex thought it essential to touch me whenever other people were around.

  Connie, Dana, Regan, and myself took care of the side dishes while the men tended to the meat and the two girls outside. Well, actually Dana and Connie took care of the side dishes. Regan and I just drank some sort of contraption she threw together. It was delicious, pineapple juice, vodka, and Sprite. I’m not sure if it had a name, but it sure was tasty. It calmed my nerves. By the second one I could already feel it. I needed food.

  “Mommy, me did pee,” Maddie said coming into the kitchen with wet pants. She tended to have accidents when she was too busy to come in and go potty. She loved Trenton, which was her distraction to make it to the bathroom.

  “Come on, Nana will help you,” Dana offered taking her hand.

  Alex walked behind me and kissed me on the back of the neck. “How much longer on your stuff, Mom? Can we put the meat on?” he asked, walking away just like that. I eyed him cautiously as he took the plate of steaks from his mom and winked at me. Why he did that, I wasn’t sure. Nobody saw him.

  “I have never seen him like this, Whitley,” Connie admitted, staring after him.

  “That’s because Whitley here is the only one that could give him a baby,” Regan replied.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, turning to her.

  “She means, a beautiful baby. There is no way anyone else could have made such a beautiful little girl with him,” Connie chimed in. I wasn’t buying it. I saw the look they exchanged, the look fro
m Connie to Regan, telling her to shut up. There was a reason for the statement. I was sure of it.

  “Come on, let’s go outside with the guys,” Connie insisted.

  “We’ll be out as soon as we mix a drink,” Regan promised.

  “What did you mean by that, Regan,” I asked, as soon as Connie was out of earshot.

  “By what?”

  “Don’t play dumb with me. Why am I the only one that could give Alex a baby?”

  “I didn’t mean anything by it. Stop analyzing. I was just remarking on how cute your child is. That’s it.” She walked away and I followed with a fresh drink.

  My dad and Rob talked about fishing of all things.

  “Papaw, I feed a fish,” Maddie said. They just had to go and mention fish.

  “You can feed the fish tomorrow. Papaw is going to take you home with him for a couple of days.”

  “Dad, you can’t just come and take her. You have to discuss this with Alex and me first,” I assured him. No way. No way in hell was he taking her back to the resort and leaving me alone with Alex.

  “I did. Alex and I already talked about it. I knew you wouldn’t mind. Do you?”

  Well, hell.

  “No, but I could come home for a couple days. Alex could probably use a break to get some work done. He has hardly been at his office since we got here.”

  “No, I’m okay. My work is getting done. I have a very critical helper. She’s quick to tell me if she doesn’t like it. I removed an elephant the other day for a monkey. Maddie said the elephant was too big. She was afraid he was going to step on the lady bugs.”

  What the hell? That’s the look I gave Alex. Was he even serious? We’d kill each other. I needed another drink.

  We walked Alex’s family out around eight. Maddie was getting tired and extremely fussy. I bathed her while Alex showed my dad and Dana where they would sleep. He put them in a spare bedroom off from the dining room, not wanting them to take my room due to all of my belongings in a room separate from Alex’s. I was hoping that they turned in before we did. I might not have to go upstairs at all. I could just sneak to my room and they would never know.

  My dad insisted on reading to Maddie and when I went into check on them, he was sound asleep with her nestled in his arms sleeping too. Great, Dana was in the living room watching the news. It looked like I was going upstairs.

  I jumped in his shower with the multiple shower heads, hitting every inch of my body. I may need to shower there more often. It felt amazing.

  I was hoping that he was still downstairs when I emerged. Fat chance, he was in bed, shirtless! I was in long cotton pants and a long sleeve nightshirt. He laughed.

  “Do you always sleep like that?” he asked.

  “No, only when I have to share a bed with you. You should sleep on the floor. You’re the one that got us into this mess.”

  “It’s a king size bed. You won’t even touch me.”

  “I’m not worried about me touching you.”

  “I won’t touch you either.”

  “Put a shirt on.”

  “No, I’m not sleeping in a shirt. You can take yours off too, if you want.”

  “Don’t, Alex,” I warned.

  He laughed. “I’m kidding.”

  I sat on my side of the bed and took another drink of the mixed drink I brought with me. I needed to be comatose, passed out, incognito.

  “Haven’t you had enough of that?” Alex asked.

  “Go to sleep.”

  I took one more drink and laid down, far, far away from shirtless Alex. I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at his naked chest. It needed it to be dark.

  “Turn the light off,” I demanded.

  I rolled over facing the bathroom.

  “Whit?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “Remember that night at the party, you told me that your real mom lived in South Sioux City?”

  “You remember that?” I asked, rolling over to my back. It shocked the hell out of me that he remembered that. Why would he remember that?

  “Yes, do you see her?”

  “No. Never.”

  “You don’t talk to her?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t really know her. Why all the questions?”

  “Just curious, what do you mean you don’t really know her?”

  I took a deep breath. “My mother was Charlotte Westfall.”

  Alex sat up. “Charlie Westfall, the governor?”

  “Yes, and you’re not allowed to mention that to anyone. She wasn’t the governor when she had me. She never wanted me. I’ve always been with my dad, ever since the day I was born.”

  “What do you mean she didn’t want you?”

  “I can’t talk about this with you, Alex. My dad signed a privacy disclosure when she gave me up. He wasn’t even supposed to tell me.”

  “He took you from the hospital?”

  “I just told you that I couldn’t talk about it.”

  “I don’t care. I’m not going to tell anyone. I just can’t believe it. Charlotte Westfall is your mother?”

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  “What do you mean how? She got pregnant, didn’t want me, and handed me over to my dad once I was born.”

  “Wait, she’s married to Ronald Westfall. You’re only twenty-one they just celebrated their twenty-fourth wedding anniversary. I saw it on the news.”

  “Alex, let it go. It doesn’t matter.”

  “It does matter. She was married and had an affair with your dad? How did that happen?”

  “She was campaigning when she was younger and stayed at the resort for a week. They hooked up. I don’t know how it happened. I guess they must have had sex or something.”

  “But, why didn’t she just say that you belonged to her husband?”

  “He had a vasectomy at the age of twenty-one. He was determined to never have any offspring, I guess.”

  “Why didn’t she just abort you?”

  “Boy would that have ever made my life easier. My dad talked her out of it. He threatened to expose her if she did that. She went home to Los Angeles where she would be inconspicuous with the population, had me, and split. My dad flew to LA to get me.”

  “Wow, Whit. That’s crazy.”

  “Yeah, go to sleep.”

  “What about her husband. He had to know.”

  “I’m sure he did. It’s kind of hard to hide a pregnancy, believe me I know. I guess he forgave her.”

  Alex got quiet. Was he giving up? Nope.

  “Why didn’t you tell anyone what happened, Whit?”

  “Alex, it was a long time ago. Go to sleep.”

  “It wasn’t that long ago. And you are still very bitter about it.”

  I snorted. That was an understatement.

  “I was afraid. I was only seventeen. I didn’t want to disappoint my dad. I wasn’t even supposed to be at that party.”

  “I would have never touched you had I known that you were underage.”

  “Oh, well, that’s nice to know. I’m glad you chose to only rape non-minors,” I mocked.

  “It wasn’t like that, Whit. I just, I don’t even know what the hell that was. I swear to God, I never did it again. I was drunk.”

  “Oh, well, then you’re excused.”

  “I don’t want to be excused. I can’t change it, Whit. I wouldn’t change it now if I could. I wouldn’t have Maddie in my life had things not turned out the way they did. I’m just saying that I am sorry. I was a little out of it that night.”

  I sat up. I couldn’t believe how angry it still made me. “You knew exactly what you were doing. You knew you were going to take me to your room the moment you approached me. Didn’t you Alex?”

  Alex didn’t reply.

  “Didn’t you, Alex!” I yelled.

  “Yes, Whit, I did.”

  “Did you know I was a virgin? Did you know that you took my virginity by raping me
that night?”

  “No, I didn’t know that.”

  “How could you not, there was blood.”

  “I swear I didn’t see blood. You were a virgin?”

  “Yeah, I was. You took it and got me pregnant.”

  “I honestly don’t remember much about it, Whitley.”

  “You don’t remember much?” That was the wrong words. It pissed me off.

  “No.”

  “How about I tell you what I remember. I mean, it doesn’t seem quite fair that I’m left with all the memories while you are clueless. I remember being envious of your bathroom and the way that you lived. I remember being nervous when I walked out and you were sitting on your bed waiting for me. I chugged my drink and looked over to you. You were smiling a victory smile, because I had just took your bait in one swallow. I’ll never forget that grin, Alex. Sometimes you smile like that now. That is what I think of every time I see it.

  I remember feeling dizzy all of a sudden like I was going to pass out. You pushed me back on the bed and told me not to worry, that I wouldn’t remember any of this. You lied. I remember every fucking thing you did. You lifted my shirt and squeezed my nipple. I told you to stop. I told you I didn’t want to do this. You just kept telling me that I would enjoy it. You laughed and told me again that I wouldn’t remember it. You took off my clothes. All of them, while I laid there helpless and unable to get my muscles to move more than an inch or so. You spread my legs, exposing me on your bed, and ran your fingers up my pussy. Do you remember that, Alex? Do remember finger fucking me?”

  “Whit, stop,” Alex tried. I wasn’t stopping. He was going to remember every last detail.

  “I’m just trying to refresh your memory. You stood above me and removed your clothes. I couldn’t even cry. I was crying on the inside, I was screaming on the inside. Unfortunately, my tears or my scream didn’t work either. You stroked your turned on cock while you fingered me. I didn’t know what the hell was going on. I felt wet. I felt turned on. I felt humiliated because I was enjoying it, but I wasn’t. I wasn’t enjoying it at all and didn’t understand why my body was betraying me. That’s your justification. You got me off, so it must have been okay. It wasn’t okay, Alex.