For The Love of Easton : A Single Parent Romance and Sequel to For The Love of English Read online

  Copyright © 2021 by AM Hargrove

  AM Hargrove LLC—Up All Night Romance (UAN Publishing)

  For The Love of Easton

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used factiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in form or any manner whatsoever by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or a book review. Scanning, uploading and distribution of the book via the Internet or via any other means without permission is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support for the author’s rights is appreciated. For information address to A.M. Hargrove LLC, UAN Publishing—[email protected]

  All rights reserved.

  Cover art by Najla Qamber

  Editing by RJ Locksley

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Epilogue

  Other Books

  About The Author

  Acknowledgements

  For My Grandnuggets

  The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire.

  Ferdinand Foch

  Prologue

  English

  My hands quivered uncontrollably when the knock on the door came. I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans before I opened it. My boyfriend, Stuart, sauntered in like he owned the place. We were in our second year of college and it was late March. Sometime throughout this year, he’d changed. The sweet, kind boy I’d fallen in love with in high school had replaced me with alcohol as his best friend. As if that weren’t bad enough, along with the heavy drinking came a vicious temper. My belly rollercoastered as I thought about the times he had shoved me around recently. What would his reaction be when I told him the news?

  “Hey, S-Stu. How was your day?” The stammer in my voice matched the quiver in my hands.

  “Better now,” he said, tipping the ever-present bottle of Jack into his mouth. For the life of me, I couldn’t understand how he could tolerate the stuff. “So, what was so fucking important that I had to interrupt my partying to come over here?”

  From the looks and sounds of things, he hadn’t interrupted anything. He’d detoured here on the way to a fraternity party. Besides the drinking, that was another huge part of our problem. Hell, if I were honest, we were riddled with issues, but after he heard what I had to tell him, all of them would be minor in comparison.

  “Maybe you should sit.”

  “Fine.” He dropped to the sofa my parents had given me when I’d moved into this apartment. One year of dorm life had been more than enough for me. I looked him over and for the first time wondered how I’d ever fallen in love with this man. His clothing was unkempt, his hair dirty, and he didn’t appeal to me at all. But I had to do this.

  “Well, what is it? I don’t want to hang around here all night.” He took another slug out of his bottle.

  Might as well get to the point and get it over with. “Right. So, I, uh, I’m pregnant.”

  He stared at me a moment, then asked with a hard edge, “Is it mine?”

  My heart pinched. He was the only man I’d ever been with, only now I questioned my judgment. I’d lost my virginity to him when we’d been seniors in high school and decided to attend the same university. We’d vowed our love for each other then. What had happened to the kind boy I’d grown up with? Fury crept into my veins and I exploded, putting any fear of him behind me.

  “Of course it’s yours, you idiot.” I glared at him. “How can you even ask that? You know damn well I haven’t been with anyone else.” Then something made me ask, “Have you?”

  He smirked, then shrugged. That was my answer. He wasn’t the idiot, I was. Rage’s fierce claws sank further into me and I flew at him, hands balled into fists. “You asshole.”

  As I made to strike him, he grabbed my arm in an iron grip and said, “Don’t even think about it.” He was on his feet faster than I’d thought possible and shoved me to the floor.

  When I landed on my butt, it pissed me off even more. I pushed myself up and went at him again, only I wasn’t expecting him to retaliate with his fists. My head snapped back as he connected with my jaw. Stuart wasn’t scrawny anymore. He had put on weight after we entered college, about twenty-five pounds’ worth of it, and most of it was muscle. Stars spun, but he didn’t stop with that single punch. He hit me again and again until I cowered on the floor, curling into a ball.

  Lucky for me, that was when my roommate walked in with her boyfriend.

  “What the fuck!” Stacey shouted as she ran to me, knelt down, and cradled my bruised head, while her boyfriend threw Stuart out of the apartment. They argued briefly, but I was too dazed to comprehend what was said.

  “We’re going to the hospital,” she said.

  “No, just give me a minute.” My breath wheezed as I slowly moved.

  “Let me call the police.” Stacey ran her hand over my jaw and I winced. “You could have a broken jaw and maybe some ribs.”

  I touched my cheek, which stung with pain. As I thought about this pathetic situation, I broke into sobs.

  “Hey, everything’s going to be all right. You don’t ever have to see him again.”

  “Yes, I do. You don’t get it. I’m pregnant with his baby.”

  Stunned eyes greeted me. “Fuck it all, English. I’m sorry. Given that, you really ought to go to the hospital to let them check you out.”

  Eventually, they both persuaded me and we went to the ER. Once there, the medical personnel asked what happened and, of course, I told the truth. I opted not to press charges though. Fortunately, even
though it felt like I’d been flattened by a truck, I’d only sustained bruises and, as far as the doctor could tell, the baby was fine. It was early on in the pregnancy, only about eight weeks, so he said everything should be okay, but suggested I see an obstetrician soon.

  When we got back to the apartment, the crying wouldn’t stop.

  “English, you should call your parents,” Stacey said.

  “Oh, God. Daddy hates Stuart. He always said he was worthless.”

  “True, but your parents adore you and will be here for you. You need them now more than ever.”

  She was right. My parents had always been there for me, no matter what. I dragged my aching body into my room and gingerly crawled on the bed. My dad answered after the first ring.

  “Hey, munchkin, what’s up?”

  At the sound of his upbeat voice, the dam broke again. “Oh, Daddy,” I sobbed into the phone, “I messed up.”

  He went straight into serious mode. “English, what is it? What happened?”

  “I need you and Mom. Can you come?”

  “You bet. Are you home? Are you safe?”

  “Yeah.” I sniffed.

  “Is Stacey there with you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. Stay put and we’re on the way.”

  “Daddy?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I love you.”

  “Love you too, munch. See you in an hour.”

  It was the longest hour, but when they walked into the apartment, I’d never been so happy to see them in my life. While I sobbed in my dad’s arms, Stacey and her boyfriend slipped out, leaving us alone. Mom brought me a mug of tea as Dad continued to hug me. After the worst of the storm passed, I told them the whole ugly story. Dad’s eyes were filled with kindness, but also pain, and Mom was her usual empathetic self. Neither of them judged me, and they were behind me a hundred percent.

  Daddy spoke first. “English, I—”

  “Daddy, I know you hate Stu, and you’re right.”

  “That’s not what I was going to say.” He picked up my hand and held it. “What I wanted to tell you was having a baby at your age is difficult, but if you come home after this semester, your mother and I will help, as I’m sure Banana and Geepa will too.” Banana and Geepa were my grandparents. I could never say ‘Grandma Anna’ so I’d turned it into ‘Banana,’ and ‘Grandpa’ had been too much too, so they shortened it to ‘Geepa,’ a variation of ‘G-pa.’

  The floor was my best friend as I asked, “Banana and Geepa won’t hate me?”

  “Hate you? Why would they hate you?”

  I shrugged. “You know.”

  “What? Because you had sex?”

  “Yeah.” This was so embarrassing. I wished I could crawl under the sofa and hide.

  “Remember my own story with you? I had you when I was in college and they helped me raise you at first. They’ll be thrilled to have another baby around. That’s not to say the baby won’t be your primary responsibility. We’ll be your helpers, not the main caretakers. That is if you want to keep it.” His blue-green eyes that were so much like my own froze me in place.

  A hand splayed over my chest. “Keep it? I could never… yes, I’m going to keep it. I made it, so it’s mine.”

  A soft smile turned up the corners of his mouth. He had a way of comforting me with those small grins of his. “Fine. And what about Stuart?” He rubbed a finger over the bruise that had already formed on my jaw.

  “Do I have to give him a say in the matter?”

  “I’ll check with my attorney, just to be safe.”

  I reached for my mom’s hand. “Mom, you haven’t said anything.”

  “Your father has pretty much covered everything that’s on my mind. One thing though, and take heed of this. Your life will never be the same. You’ll not be a single, carefree young woman anymore.”

  My head dropped. “I know. I’ll have to give up my dream of being a graphic artist.”

  Mom asked, “Why would you think that? A baby won’t stop you from getting your degree. That’s where your support team comes in.”

  Dad grabbed my shoulders and said, “English, don’t forget you were only four months old when you came to live with me, so I understand what it is to be a single parent. It wasn’t until you were six that Mom came into our lives.”

  How had I forgotten that? Mom had been my first-grade teacher, which was how she and Dad had met. They’d ended up getting married, and that was the best thing ever.

  “Yeah, I remember. Then you two can be my teachers.”

  “I think your father will be the better one,” Mom said. “He has all the experience in being a single parent.”

  “I believe you should finish out this semester, and then transfer to a local college at home to complete your degree,” Dad suggested. “But I wish you’d consider pressing charges against him. He deserves it, munch, after what he did to you. And you don’t want this happening to someone else, do you?”

  My gut clenched at the thought of someone else going through this. “No, I don’t want that. But if I press charges, then it will be in the court records that he’s the father of this baby. That’s something I absolutely cannot have.”

  “That’s an excellent point. Normally I would push for you to press charges, but I don’t want that man to have any hold on your child, our grandchild, so in this case, I agree.”

  Mom nodded. “I agree too. English, everything happens for a reason and one day you’ll understand why this did. But promise me something?”

  “What, Mom?”

  “Please don’t give this baby a Star Wars name.”

  Finally, something brought a grin to my troubled face. I’d insisted all my siblings have Star Wars names or nicknames. Hence, my brother—Beckley Bridges, named after my father—was called BB2. I had twin siblings named Finn and Rey, but AM—for Anna Monroe—was lucky enough to have escaped that nomenclature.

  “Hmm. Pretty sure I’m past that.”

  Mom held her hands in a prayer pose, looked up at the ceiling and said, “Thank you, Lord.”

  Chapter One

  English—Eight Months Later

  Thanksgiving Day. Of course that was the day my baby decided to make her grand appearance. And yes, I was having a girl. I’d been nervous about how she would make her entrance into the world. My brothers and sisters had told me she would be just like me—bossy. That was unfair. I only bossed them around because I was older than BB2, the next Bridges child, by eight years and the others even more.

  The contractions began before we put the turkey in.

  Dad asked, “Should we continue?”

  “Well, yeah, everyone has to eat, even if I can’t. Besides, Banana and Geepa will be here.” Banana and Geepa were my grandparents on my dad’s side. I’d never known my mom’s parents because they’d both died when Mom was young.

  “She’s right, Beck,” Mom said.

  They prepped the turkey and Mom told me to shower and make sure I had everything ready. “You never know if you’ll go slow or fast.”

  I took her advice and it was a good thing, because two hours later I was huffing and puffing in the back seat on the way to the hospital. Mom and Dad took me, but Dad would be kicked out for the actual birth. At first he protested.

  “I’ve seen your mother give birth before.”

  “True, but not your daughter. That’s beyond creepy, Dad.”

  Mom agreed. “She’s right, Beck.”

  “You two are the creepy ones. I wasn’t looking at it like that.”

  I waved a hand. “Doesn’t matter. I think it’s creepy. End of story. Besides, it’s my baby, not yours.”

  “I’ll remember that when you need something.”

  I spun around to see him grinning.

  “Gotcha!”

  I punched his arm with my middle knuckle stuck out a bit.

  “Ouch!”

  “That’s what you get for being mean.” Then I stuck my tongue out at him.

&nbs
p; Rey skipped in the room then. “What’s going on?”

  This conversation wasn’t for her eight-year-old ears. “Nothing much.”

  “Then why are you pouting?”

  “I’m not.”

  I chuckled to myself at the memory of that conversation as I showered. Another contraction hit and I decided when I finished, I’d start timing them. I wasn’t concerned, only curious.

  My bag was packed with all the things Mom and the doctor had recommended. I dressed and went back downstairs. The kids were in high gear and it made me anxious over how it would be with a new baby here.

  “Why the long face?” Dad asked.

  “All this commotion. How will the baby even sleep?”

  His booming laughter practically vibrated the dishes that Mom had set on the counter. “Hey, Sheridan, English is worried about the baby sleeping through all the noise.”

  Mom joined in on the fun.

  “I don’t see what’s so comical.”

  “That’s because you were once part of all this commotion when Anna Monroe, Rey, and Finn were born.” Dad flung out his arm, indicating the wild bunch of kids.

  I hadn’t thought about it much, but kids never do.

  “They managed to sleep just fine. It’s why we bought another sound machine. Remember?” Mom asked.