Knocked Up by the Bad Boy Read Online Free Page B

nights ago. Who I can’t get out of my goddamn head.
    “When am I going to get grandchildren?”
    “Did you just invite me over to give me shit about this again?” My angry voice echoes in the small apartment as she guides me to the kitchen.
    “Johnny, I don’t like hearing you curse.”
    Mange d’la marde.
    “Sorry.”
    “Come, you need to eat. You’re too skinny.”
    I’m always “too skinny” for her. She expects me to bloat like a beached whale, like my old man. He was a fat fuck.
    She flaps her hands, motioning me toward the bowl of spaghetti alla Bolognese . Ma serves me at least a pound of pasta. The steam rises from it in spirals, the spices from the meat failing to distract me from my two ex-wives.
    It’s really the only thing I’ve ever failed at in life. I have all the money and pussy I could possibly fucking want. The only thing I don’t have—a family—I failed at. Twice.
    I’m not going for a third. I just won’t.
    Besides, living a bachelor’s life isn’t bad at all. Tony did it, before he knocked up that girl.
    I pick up the fork and wind the pasta around and around.
    Then I think about how Tony talks about his baby girl all the time with a look in his eyes that I don’t understand, and my chest tightens.
    I shove the feeling away.
    Who needs a wife?
    “So how’s work going?”
    “Pretty good.”
    Work is always a tricky topic to navigate around my mother. She knows exactly who I am, but I wouldn’t tell her, for example, that I’m planning the biggest heist in history. Millions of dollars in cash. That’s what fucking drives me. Nearly every restaurant, casino, and racetrack in this city gives me a piece of their action in exchange for protection from other gangs. If this heist goes as planned, all of us will be fucking rich. We won’t need that shit anymore.
    She looks up at me from her plate of Bolognese , her eyes evasive. “I just find it hard to believe that you can’t find another wife.”
    My fork clatters on the plate as I throw my head back and close my eyes.
    Keep it together. Don’t fucking yell at her, or she’ll cry and you’ll be stuck here even longer.
    “Ma, marriage isn’t for me.”
    “I thought I would die of shame when you got divorced the first time. It’s a sin, Johnny. Marriage is a sacred vow—”
    “Oh will you fucking please stop with this shit!” The chair crashes to the floor as I stand up abruptly. “Every fucking time I come over, it’s the same thing! I’m not getting married again. I’m not having kids. Get the fuck over it. I am.”
    I’m stewing with the rage of being reminded of this failure over and over again, but then she bundles the tablecloth in her hands, and her face screws up.
    Shit.
    “How can you talk like that to your mother?”
    Seeing her tears would be a bigger punch to my gut if she hadn’t done it a thousand times already. I shove my hands deep inside my pockets, filled with a rush of self-loathing.
    She’s right. You don’t disrespect your mother.
    “I’m sorry, Ma.”
    “You’re all I have left. Your father left us.”
    Oh, fuck him.
    A fresh stab of anger hits me right in the chest as she looks at a family portrait hanging on the wall. I want to smash it, or at least cut him from the fucking photograph so I don’t have to see his rotten face staring back at me.
    “He’s been dead a long time, Ma. You should meet someone else.”
    “I can’t. I loved your father.”
    I didn’t.
    I don’t dare say that out loud.
    “I’m so proud of you, Johnny. I just want you to be happy, and I don’t think you are.”
    I am fucking happy. Aren’t I?
    What the fuck is happiness? Is it whistling to yourself as you walk down the street without a care in the world? Is it being able to fuck gorgeous women, night after night? I search inside myself, but I only feel vague annoyance and that stirring need for more stimulation.
    Bending over, I pick up the chair from the floor, avoiding my mother’s gaze. “I gotta