Free Crushed by Amity Hope Page B

trying to embarrass your mother and me?”
    She had tiptoed to the door. She was leaning against it . Her knees felt like t hey were about to give out on her.
    Her mother hadn’t been crazy. Despite how humiliated she felt because of what Landon
     was saying about her, she was livid over what he’d implied about her mother. She had been quiet, withdrawn. She’d never been a very social person.
     But she wasn’t crazy.
    She couldn ’t hear Reece’s response to his father’s accusations . Whatever he said, he said it quietly. Or possibly, her out of control heartbeat had the blood sloshing so loudly in her ears that she simply couldn’t hear what he said.
    “I will not keep my voice down! This is my house! Not yours! That means that I make the rules,” Landon boomed. “Do you know what her father is telling everyone
     at the mill ? That his daughter is screwing the boss’ son! ”
    She had been mortified. Under other circumstances it would be laughable that Paul claimed her as his daughter. H e’d never done that before. But if it gave him what he thought were bragg ing rights among his co-workers? Y e s, she could see that happening.
    She was sick with the thought of Paul’s gossip but to be honest, n ot at all surprised. She and Reece had been together half a year by that point but they ’d barely done more than kissed. Cleo wasn’t in the best place, emotionally. Reece w as always cautious of that. That was why he had, many t imes, spent the night. He knew she had nightmares after her mom’s death and when things got bad, when she hadn’t s lept for days, he’d stay with her. B ecause those nights, the nightmares stayed away.
    One night , apparently they hadn’t pushed her door shut tight . I t had swung open while they were sleeping. For some reason, Pau l had come home that night. He’d turned on the light as he stumbled down the hallway in a drunken stupor. He realized Reece was in her bed before she could get up to shut the door.
    “Don’t let Luci see you,” he ordered. It was the single most paternal comment he’d
     ever made.
    She had expected him to throw a fit but he ’d simply pulled her door shut. Tight thi s time so Luci wouldn’t catch them. She figured since she wasn’t his kid, he simply didn’t care. Or maybe he was, in some perverse way, pleased w ith her .
    Reece was, after all, the boss’ son.
    “If it weren’t for that damn contract, I’d fire his ass. I’ve been looking for ways around it. With this recession, I think I might have found a loophole. ”
    Her heart lurched at that. If Paul lost his job, she didn’ t know where that would leave her and Luci. He’d been hired when they had first moved to town , right after Luci was born. She had a hunch that his reputation would keep him from getting a new job too easily.
     For all of his drunkenness, she had to grudgingly admit that he had miraculously managed to keep a steady job at the mill . A mill owned by Landon Hildenbrandt , who employed a good chunk of the town.
    She started to panic that Landon would come down stairs and physically remove her from h is home. The humiliation of the conv ersation was already too much . She cou ldn’t deal with anything more. She g athered her things and crept up the staircase.
    “As if this situation isn’t disgraceful enough I have to hear rumors of that bastard
     bragging it up every day. It makes me look bad. It makes this family look bad. I know my workers are laughing their asses . M y son is slumming with the likes of the town drunk’s daughter. We want you to end
     it with her. Now,” Landon commanded.
    “Not happening,” Reece quietly told his father. “I love her. So you better get used
     to the idea of us together.”
    This was news to Cleo as she edged her way up the stairs. Landon let out a colorful, hurtful, degrading string of expletives at Reece’s
     proclamation .
    Cleo let her self out of the front door.
    She didn’t know how long she’d been sitting in