Marcus (Heartbreakers & Troublemakers Book 5) Read online

  Marcus

  Hope Hitchens

  Copyright © 2018 by Hope Hitchens

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events & incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, incidents or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Author’s Note

  Thank you so much for checking out the latest (as I type!) novel in my new romance series Heartbreakers & Troublemakers. As with all my books, this story was a labor of love for me. I’ve poured my heart and soul into polishing it to perfection. I hope you have as much fun reading it as I had writing it!

  - Hope xx

  Contents

  1. Adina

  2. Marcus

  3. Adina

  4. Marcus

  5. Adina

  6. Marcus

  7. Adina

  8. Marcus

  9. Adina

  10. Marcus

  11. Marcus

  12. Adina

  13. Marcus

  14. Adina

  15. Adina

  16. Marcus

  17. Marcus

  18. Adina

  19. Marcus

  20. Marcus

  21. Adina

  22. Marcus

  23. Adina

  Epilogue

  Newsletter

  Introducing… Asher

  About the Author

  1

  Adina

  “What do you think J-dog, does red lipstick make Mommy look desperate?” I asked.

  I could see Jaden’s reflection in the mirror as I painted on a second coat of lipstick. He was watching me with a contented little smirk on his face, and one of his little hands was holding his foot. He was on his back on the bed behind me. He had started on his belly but had managed to roll himself over and was watching me.

  “I know it’s sort of a lot for therapy, but your daddy comes to these with me. We’re trying to get him back. He likes you,” I said, blotting my lipstick on a tissue, “I just have to try a little harder.” I ran my fingers through my hair, fluffing the front for volume.

  My hair had grown quite a bit during the pregnancy, and I hadn’t cut it since. I had also stopped straightening it. It had recovered—mostly—from the years of abuse with hairdryers and straightening irons. I left it down.

  We were expecting Jessica, Jaden’s babysitter any minute now. I hated leaving him alone but at least if I had to, it was with her. He was four months old now, and she had come into my life when I thought I was going to lose my mind.

  Nobody tells you how hard those first few months are. It’s like being pregnant still, but your baby is outside your body. Four months was when the fun started. They started smiling, real social smiles, not just because of gas, and expressing feelings more than just hunger and tiredness.

  It was like he was an actual person now. Having Jessie around saved me from full-blown hysteria. It was also just nice to talk to someone who could talk back. I didn’t like to think that I went into full post-partum depression after Jaden was born, but I was a new mom, alone and going through a breakup. It was pretty shitty.

  I also needed her so I could go back to work. The rent was due every month whether or not I was breastfeeding and trying to care for an infant alone. I didn’t have work every single day, so I still had full days with him, but I imagined one of the jobs that I would take in my life would be being a stay-at-home mom. I still hoped that that would be something I would do. The thing about being a stay-at-home mom was that nobody paid you for the labor.

  “So, what do you think?” I asked Jaden, turning around and facing him. He smiled and gurgled a little. “Thank you,” I said, “I did wear this dress before I got pregnant with you and it fits again. Thank you for noticing.”

  The doorbell rang then, stopping me before I gave myself another compliment through my son.

  “Guess who’s here, J-dog,” I said, lifting him off the bed and walking out of the bedroom. I opened the door, and Jessica was there, greeting us with a warm smile.

  “Hey, Adina,” she said, “and hello J-dog,” she said to Jaden, tickling his belly. He smiled as I handed him off to her. She was actually the one who had come up with the nickname.

  “Hi, Jessie. I can’t tell you how long I am going to be gone today, but there’s a ton of food in the fridge which you can eat if you get hungry. Jaden’s milk is in there too… is there anything else?” I asked.

  “Don’t worry about it, Adina, I’ve got this. Don’t hurry back on account of me,” she said smiling. Jessica made me think of some of the girls that I went to high school with; those beautiful, sad girls who the boys really wanted but were too afraid to talk to.

  We could actually have been in high school at the same time since she was only three years younger than I was. She was a little alternative; a piercing in her nose, and some tattoos but she wasn’t a teenager, and she had been pleasant and professional during the interview. She was a college student, and I didn’t get her sometimes when I needed her because she had classes, but I liked that she had something going on. I could admire her balancing work and school.

  She was good with Jaden, and she seemed to really like kids. I needed the extra pair of hands. You just did. It was a fact, no matter how much you wanted to think you could do it all. You didn’t get paid, but it was a job, and you got to clock out maybe in the next eighteen to twenty-one years.

  Jaden was planned, but you can’t really plan pregnancy the way you can plan road trips or parties. There are a lot more anomalies when it comes to pregnancy. I got pregnant when I wanted to, but everything that happened around the pregnancy happened one hundred percent not according to plan.

  Jaden’s father and I had been trying to conceive, and only after we had broken up had I learned that we were successful. We were planning a family, but as we were, it sort of all fell apart. Fast forward a year and some change later and we were trying again. We were picking up the pieces.

  I left the two of them together and made my way to the parking garage to drive to therapy. You didn’t need a car in New York City, but they were great when you were new in town and homeless. I had never been homeless, but I had driven to the city several years before, and it saved me dealing with the allegedly horrifying New York metro train system.

  I liked driving in the city. People drove like maniacs, and pedestrians crossed the street like ants, but I liked not being at the mercy of the MTA or the bus system. Therapy was in Midtown, about half an hour from where I lived in Morningside Heights, but Jared had just about the same amount of distance to travel. Five o’clock every Thursday evening. This was going to be our third session.

  He had let me pick our therapist. I wanted a woman, and I wanted someone who had seen somebody I knew. Helena and Drew had been married since they were teenagers and Helena had told me that Dr. Vanessa Menendez was the real deal.

  I smiled at her from across her desk. She sat silently, busying herself with something as we waited. It was about fifteen minutes past five. He had never been late before, so we couldn’t say this was common with him.

  It was my idea, I’ll admit it. I wanted this, but he had agreed to it. We had just had a baby together, all I needed was him back in my life to make the family we had conceived of together a reality. We h
ad already tried getting back together, but we had probably done it wrong.

  Once Jaden was born, we had become involved again, of course, because of the baby, and that had been the problem. I had hoped that that was enough, but that was just wishful thinking on my part. It didn’t work that way. A toxic relationship wasn’t made better by a child.

  I’d suggested seeing someone to help us patch things up, and he’d said yes. He’d told me I could pick the doctor and he’d pay for the sessions. I guess him missing a session was wasting his own money, not mine, but that didn’t necessarily make it better.

  I saw Dr. Menendez glance at the clock.

  “He said he was going to be here; it must be traffic or something,” I said. She looked up and smiled slightly like she was sympathetic. God, how many people had she heard with that same hope and insistence tell her the same thing sitting where I was then?

  “Can you just start with me if he doesn’t show up soon?” I asked.

  “Talking to just one of you sort of defeats the purpose of couples’ therapy, doesn’t it?” she said.

  “Will you? I mean, do you do that?”

  “If the situation calls for it, but one of your issues with Jared is open communication. I think it would be a little counterintuitive to talk to you without him.”

  I sighed. By the time it was five thirty-five, I asked awkwardly whether Dr. Menendez would be willing to reschedule us. I drove home, giving myself time to think and sort of cool down a little before I called Jared. I wanted to call him, but not to yell at him, just to talk calmly about what he had done and how it made me feel.

  The first call went unanswered. On the second, I heard some rustling and the sound of other people talking before he finally said hello to me.

  “Jared?”

  “Oh, Addie. Hi, how are you?” he asked. I tried to quell the anger I felt rising inside me.

  “Where are you, Jared?”

  “What? Why?”

  “Thursday the usual time? Yeah, that sounds good. I’ll be there. Do you want me to pick you up so we can go together?” I said, paraphrasing what he had said to me about that day. He was silent for a while. That was okay; he’d get it.

  “Oh… oh shit. Was that today?”

  “It was. Where the hell were you, I was sitting there like an idiot telling her you would be showing up?”

  “I- I couldn’t make it today. Sorry.”

  “If that was the case, you should have called me in advance so I could cancel. Spare me and Dr. Menendez the wasted time.”

  “I know, I’m sorry. I couldn’t be there today.”

  “Why? Where are you?”

  “Listen, this isn’t a good time. I’ll call you later.”

  It felt like heat traveling from my head down my spine and settling in my stomach when I felt it.

  “Are you with her?” I asked.

  “What? No!” he said. Too emphatic; he was lying.

  “Jared, don’t lie to me. If you ever loved me during the five years we were together please, do not lie to me.”

  “That’s not fair, Adina,” he said sighing. It was not fair, but I was having a hard time seeing why he thought he was the victim in this situation. Jessica didn’t babysit Jaden for free. Every time I left him alone on account of Jared were minutes I’d never have with him again.

  It wasn’t fair that I wanted him to be honest with me about why he wasn’t at therapy? It wasn’t fair that he had cheated on me in the first place and that was why we were even in this situation. It wasn’t fair that he didn’t think these appointments were important enough for him to schedule whatever the hell it was he was doing with her around them. It wasn’t fucking fair that I seemed to be the only one who gave a fuck about fixing our relationship.

  I tried to take a few deep breaths because I was tired. Thinking about fighting with Jared made me tired. I just wanted to go home and squeeze my baby. So he had missed the appointment because he was with her. So he was still with her. I couldn’t do anything about that. I paid Jessie by the hour; I had to get back home.

  “I know you’re the one who pays for the appointments, but I have to hire a sitter whenever we have these,” I said, trying to keep my voice level.

  “I know, I said I was sorry,” he insisted. Not sorry enough to show up on time for one lousy appointment with our shrink?

  “Sorry doesn’t fix our relationship, Jared. I need to know whether you’re serious about this.”

  “I am, I just missed one fucking appointment, Addie. Give me a break, okay. I can’t talk right now. I need to go.”

  “Dr. Menendez said she’d be willing to reschedule our appointment for the weekend.”

  “But that’s when I get Jaden,” he said.

  “Don’t bother waiting for me to drop him off this weekend. I won’t be.”

  I hung up and turned my phone off. I wanted to scream. Scream and then break something, preferably Jared’s neck.

  He had made a promise. He had made a promise to come to couples’ therapy with me so we could try again, and he flaked without so much as a phone call because he was with her? I gripped the wheel and tried to take a few calming breaths. Dr. Menendez had told me my jealousy was something I had to let go of. Inhale. Exhale.

  Yeah, I would as soon as Jared stopped giving me reasons to be jealous. Inhale. Exhale. I stopped and looked at my phone, regretting the last thing I’d said to him. I didn’t want to let my anger and jealousy make me the type of person who kept a man’s son from him.

  I turned it on and sent an apology text saying I’d be dropping Jaden off at the same time I usually did. We were Jaden’s parents first before we were… whatever the hell it was that we were.

  After therapy, depending on how it went, I thought maybe he’d want to get dinner together, or drinks, or something. Just spend a little time together. Hopefully, he’d want to. Hopefully, he’d want to spend a few hours with me, which could turn into a few more hours, then sooner or later we’d be moving back in together.

  It came together simply in my head, but the reality of our relationship was expensive therapy and halting conversation.

  I got out of the car and started inside to my apartment. At least I’d get an early night tonight. After putting Jaden down for the night and taking a hot bath, I’d try to talk to Jared again.

  2

  Marcus

  “We’re sorry, Mr. Kissel, but you aren’t what our company is looking for at this time.”

  “Mr. Kissel, we performed a routine background check, and we found some worrying information.”

  “While we are an equal opportunity employer, we cannot place you in a direct customer service position. You can understand why, can’t you?”

  It was like they wanted you to end up back in prison. You’d think a society so concerned about recidivism would make it easier for ex-cons to reintegrate. It was an industry, a system and you know what? If they took a couple of steps to make prison a little more comfortable, maybe I’d let them take me back.

  When you were incarcerated, nobody expected you to get a job. We worked, but it wasn’t like having a real job. You didn’t have to pass an interview to get on chow or laundry duty. You just had to be present for all head counts and try not to kill anyone.

  That was easy, sometimes. You think all you need to do is talk like you went to school and make sure you shaved that day, but nope. You have to disclose your felon status and then basically hope they don’t do a background check.

  Nine times out of ten they do the fucking background check. Nine times out of ten you are politely turned down. Then lucky you; you got to do it all again the next day.

  I went back home after the interview. Something I learned from prison: sensory deprivation. If you stayed your ass at home, you made it harder for yourself to get into trouble. It made it easier to do the right thing. The boring thing. The things no one could arrest you for doing.

  It was all in the name of staying straight, but it could bite you in the ass. Yo
u had to give just enough, so you weren’t tempted. I should have called my probation officer right after the interview, but why bother? They’d just tell me the same thing; that if I couldn’t get employment, I had to go back to school. That was like telling someone if they couldn’t walk that they should try running.

  My counselor had warned me that this would happen. I knew it would happen. I wasn’t dumb enough to think anyone would be jumping at the opportunity to have me at their company. She had insisted that I don’t get discouraged because first, you’re feeling down on yourself, then faster than you can stop yourself, you’re buying dope from an undercover cop and getting your ass thrown back in prison.

  The slope wasn’t that slippery. I wasn’t going to shoot heroin again. I knew about outlets, and feelings, and coping now; I had paid attention when she’d talked. I had things to do. It was true what they said; idle hands are the devil’s workshop. Jonny was getting out of the halfway house soon for home confinement. His probation officer; mean, skinny, divorced guy named Wilson had been to the apartment already. I’d know soon whether that knucklehead would be coming to stay with me or not.

  I trawled Craigslist for jobs before giving up and calling Jessie. She was where I wasn’t; at work. She babysat which I was one more rejection away from trying to do myself. I’d be hired at the fucking Roc Center before I got a job like that, though. I was a guy, for one, but even if that wasn’t a problem, my record would be.