An Heir At Any Price: The Billionaire's Obsession - Contemporary Romance Read Online Free Page B

“date,” I wanted to take a
cab home, badly. I really didn’t want Aiden’s twenty foot limousine
to drop me off in front of my crappy little apartment. My
neighborhood wasn’t terrible, but it was definitely working class,
and my apartment complex was definitely of the low rent variety. He
insisted, however and it was getting more evident that this man
hated the word, “No.”
     
    I gave the driver directions and I
said a little prayer that Mom was inside and not out for her
nightly cigarette when we got there. She was staying with me for a
few days while the plumbing was being worked on at hers. When we
pulled up the complex was quiet. No sign of Mom or anyone else.
Aiden wanted to walk me to the door and I drew the line
there.
     
    “I’m fine, really,” I told him. “I do
this all the time.” He relented on that one but stood at the door
of the car and watched until I got to the bottom of the stairs that
led up to my apartment. I waved at him and he waved back. As I
slipped in my front door, he was still watching.
     
    “Holly? Is that you?” I heard my
mother’s voice as soon as I walked in but I couldn’t see her. The
apartment was completely dark. I reached over and flipped on the
light. She was lying on the couch and when the light came on she
threw her skinny arm across her eyes and said, “That’s too
bright!”
     
    “You shouldn’t be sitting here in the
dark, Mom. What are you doing?”
     
    “I’m just resting, I’m
really tired today for some reason.” Maybe
because you stayed up all night last night with your friend,
Vodka, I thought, but I didn’t want to
fight with her tonight, so I didn’t say it aloud. I didn’t even
know it for a fact. I was asleep before she was, but she could have
just been watching TV.
     
    “Well go ahead and rest,” I told her.
“You can go home tomorrow, right?”
     
    “Holly,” she said in that tone she
used when I knew she was going to ask me for something that I
couldn’t afford.
     
    “What, Mom?”
     
    “I know I told you that I needed to
stay here for a couple of days so my neighbor can work on the
plumbing…”
     
    “But?” I asked. I had already figured
her story was baloney, they usually always all are. Plus, she still
lives next door to, “Grandpa,” who was really up in years now. I
had a hard time picturing him taking apart pipes. I just hadn’t had
the energy to discover what the truth was this time.
     
    “But…my electricity’s been off for…a
while and my water too.”
     
    I dropped down in the chair across
from her and asked, “How did that happen, Mom? I paid those
bills.”
     
    “Well, you gave me the checks and I
planned on paying them…but I must have forgotten. You know how bad
my memory has gotten….”
     
    “What did you do with the checks,
Mom?” It was one of those questions I didn’t really want to know
the answer too.
     
    “I must have misplaced them,” she
said. I shook my head. I wasn’t sure if her alcohol soaked brain
really didn’t work anymore, or if she thought I was stupid. I knew
she was lying to me though. She wouldn’t look me in the
eye.
     
    “Oh good then, I’ll just cancel those
checks and I’ll go down and write new checks to the electric and
water company when I get off work tomorrow.”
     
    “Oh, you mean call the bank?” Now she
was nervous. I’d had enough of this game and her pathetic attempt
to hide the fact she was once again stealing my hard-earned money.
My father left her a house, I paid all the rest of her bills except
for a couple hundred dollars in food stamps she got from welfare
every month and I give her a small allowance. Yet, she still steals
from me every chance she gets. I usually go directly in to pay her
utility bills because there was no way I was going to trust her
with cash, but I hadn’t had time to get down there this month. I
thought it would be okay as long as I didn’t give her
cash…obviously I was wrong.
     
    “How did you manage to