Page 18 of Single Dad’s Fake Bride (Billionaire Baby Daddies #7)

SADIE

T he discharge papers crinkled in my hand as I walked through the sliding doors of the hospital's detox center.

Mom shuffled beside me looking pale and brittle, her overnight bag clutched against her chest. The air felt sharp after the sterile warmth of the hospital, and she pulled her cardigan tighter around her shoulders.

"I hate that smell," she muttered, not looking back at the building. "Disinfectant and bleach."

I guided her toward my car, checking my phone out of habit. Sixty-seven days. The number had been haunting me since I'd texted Harrison two days ago asking for more time. Two days I'd spent circling the same impossible decision while Mom went through the motions of detox.

"The doctor said you need to follow up with your primary care physician within forty-eight hours," I said, opening the passenger door for her.

"The doctor said a lot of things." Mom settled into the seat with a grimace. "Most of them useless."

I climbed behind the wheel and started the engine. The radio came on automatically, some cheerful morning show that felt obscene given the circumstances. I switched it off.

"I brought you coffee," I said, gesturing to the thermos in the cup holder. "The pumpkin kind you used to make."

"Too hot in here." Mom adjusted the air conditioning vents, directing them toward her face. "And that junk was never any good. I only made it because it was cheap."

The comment stung but I tried to stay patient.

Getting clean wasn't exactly her idea. She had to be miserable.

I pulled out of the parking lot, focusing on the traffic instead of her words.

This was what recovery looked like, apparently, criticism and ingratitude wrapped in withdrawal symptoms and decades of resentment.

We drove with tension between us for ten minutes. Mom picked at the frayed edge of her sleeve and stared out the window at the passing storefronts. I tried to think of something to say that wouldn't set her off, but every topic felt dangerous.

"How long do I have to do this?" she asked finally.

"Do what?"

"The meetings. The check-ins. The whole performance."

I gripped the steering wheel tighter. "It's not a performance, Mom. It's recovery."

"Recovery." She said the word like it tasted bitter. "Forty-three years old and I'm back to square one. Again."

"You're fifty-three."

She turned to look at me for the first time since we'd left the hospital. "What?"

"You're fifty-three years old. Not forty-three…"

The confusion that flickered across her face made my stomach drop. I'd seen that look before, during the worst of her drinking, when entire days would disappear from her memory.

"Right," she said after a moment. "Fifty-three."

I parked outside our apartment building and helped her up the stairs. Her hands shook as she fumbled with her keys, so I took them and opened the door myself.

Stale air and the lingering scent of yesterday's coffee greeted us as we walked in. I opened the windows while Mom sank into her armchair, still clutching her overnight bag.

"I need to put some things away," I said, heading toward the kitchen.

That's when I saw the bottle of vodka, tucked behind the flour canister where she thought I wouldn't look. Premium brand—unopened, seal intact. She'd hidden it there before going to the hospital, maybe as a backup plan for when she got home.

I pulled the bottle out and stood there holding it, feeling its familiar weight. For a moment, I considered saying something. Confronting her. Asking how many other bottles were hidden around the apartment.

Instead, I unscrewed the cap and walked to the sink.

The vodka gurgled down the drain, thirty dollars' worth of liquid courage disappearing into the city water system. I didn't stop until the bottle was empty.

"What are you doing?" Mom appeared in the kitchen doorway, her face flushed with anger.

"Cleaning."

"That's mine." Her voice cracked on the word. "You have no right."

I set the empty bottle on the counter and turned to face her. "I have every right. This is my apartment too."

"I paid for that." She moved toward the sink as if she could somehow salvage what was already gone. "Do you have any idea what that cost?"

"Do you have any idea what your hospital stay cost?" The words came out more like a shout. "Five days in detox. The ambulance ride. The blood work. The?—"

"I didn't ask you to call the ambulance." She waved her hand, dismissing my lecture.

"You were unconscious on the bathroom floor."

Mom slammed the cupboard door so hard the dishes rattled. "I'm not a child, Sadie. I don't need you monitoring my every move, throwing away my belongings, treating me like some kind of prisoner."

My hands started to shake, but I kept my voice level. "I'm trying to help you stay alive."

"Maybe I don't want your help."

The words suffocated the air in the small kitchen. Mom's chest rose and fell rapidly, her face red with indignation and withdrawal symptoms. I could see the teenager she must've been once, defiant and afraid, before alcohol became the answer to every difficult emotion.

"Well, you're getting it anyway," I said quietly.

She stared at me for a long moment, then turned and stalked back to the living room. I heard the television click on, volume too loud, some daytime talk show filling the apartment with artificial chatter.

I stayed in the kitchen, gripping the edge of the counter until my knuckles went white. The walls felt too close, the air too thin. How long could I keep doing this? How long before the constant vigilance and worry broke me completely?

My phone buzzed, and while I didn't pick it up, I had a gut feeling I knew it was him. Harrison had offered me some insane gesture, probably meant to help him more than me, but it was a way out.

The marriage proposal that wasn't really a proposal. It was a promise of stability and security in exchange for five years of my life.

I'd asked for more time to think about it, and he'd agreed without pressure or conditions. But time wasn't making the decision easier. If anything, it was making everything more complicated.

I took Mom to her first AA meeting held in the basement of St. Mary's Catholic Church, a windowless room with fluorescent lighting and the persistent smells of coffee and old carpet.

Folding chairs were arranged in a circle.

A banner on the wall with the Serenity Prayer in faded blue letters hung on for dear life.

Mom had resisted coming. She'd argued that she wasn't ready, that she didn't want to sit around listening to other people's problems, that the whole thing was a waste of time. But the doctor had been clear—outpatient treatment required meeting attendance. No exceptions.

We took seats in the back row. Mom sat with her arms crossed, shoulders rigid, making it clear she was here under duress. I folded my hands in my lap and tried to look supportive rather than desperate.

The meeting leader was a woman named Carol, maybe sixty years old, with kind eyes and hands that never stopped moving. She opened with the usual readings, then asked if anyone was celebrating a milestone.

A man in the front row raised his hand. "Ninety days today."

The room erupted in applause. Mom flinched at the sound but didn't comment.

"Would you like to share anything about your journey so far?" Carol asked.

The man nodded, clearing his throat. "I keep thinking about my daughter. She's the one who found me that last time. Unconscious in the garage, car still running." His voice cracked. "She was twelve. Twelve years old, and she had to make the decision to call 911 on her own father."

I felt Mom shift beside me, her posture softening slightly.

"She won't talk to me now," he continued. "Won't return my calls. But her mother says she's doing better in therapy. That's all I can ask for right now. That she's okay, even if I'm not part of her life anymore."

More people shared. A woman talked about her fifth time in detox, how she'd convinced herself each relapse was the last one. Another man described losing his job, his house, his relationship with his adult children.

"My grandson turned three last month," a woman named Beth said. "I missed his birthday party because my daughter doesn't trust me around him. She's afraid I'll show up drunk, or that I'll relapse and disappoint him later. She's probably right to be afraid."

Mom's arms uncrossed sometime during Beth's story. She sat forward slightly, actually listening instead of just enduring.

"I used to blame them," Beth continued. "My kids. I thought they were being cruel, punishing me for mistakes I was trying to fix. But the truth is, I broke their trust so many times that they don't believe me anymore. Even when I'm sober. Even when I'm trying."

After the meeting ended, Mom was quiet as we walked to the car. The evening air was cooler now, streetlights beginning to flicker on along the residential blocks.

"That man," she said finally. "The one whose daughter found him."

"What about him?"

"His daughter is going to remember that for the rest of her life." Mom's voice was barely above a whisper. "Finding him that way. Having to make that call."

I unlocked the car but didn't get in immediately. "Yes. She probably will."

"I did that to you?" She looked at me across the roof of the car. "Not the same way, but… how many times did you have to take care of me when you were too young to understand what was happening?"

The question felt like a dagger to the chest. I thought about ten-year-old me putting Mom to bed when she passed out on the couch. Thirteen-year-old me learning to forge her signature on school forms. Sixteen-year-old me getting my first job so we could keep the electricity on.

"It doesn't matter now," I said.

"It does matter." Mom got into the passenger seat, her hands trembling as she fastened her seatbelt. "I want to get better, Sadie. I really do. But I don't think I can do it alone this time."

Mom's admission brought tears to my eyes and I blinked them back. I started the engine but didn't put it in drive yet.

"What are you asking me?"

"I'm asking for help. Real help. Not just dumping out bottles and driving me to meetings, but… support. Time. Someone who believes I can actually do this."

My throat felt tight. "Mom."

"I know I don't deserve it. I know I've asked before and failed before.

But I'm scared." Her voice broke on the last word.

"I'm scared that if I don't get clean now, I'm going to die.

And I'm scared that even if I do get clean, it might be too late to fix things between us.

And I want grandbabies…" I heard the emotion in her tone, tears welling up before she could choke them back. Things she'd never exhibited before.

I stared at the dashboard, processing her words. She was asking for everything I didn't have. Time I couldn't spare. Energy I was already running out of. Faith I'd lost somewhere along the way.

But she was also asking for the one thing I'd always wanted to give her. A real chance.

"I have a plan," I said carefully. "And I met someone. Someone who might be able to help us both."

Mom turned to look at me. "What kind of someone?"

"It's complicated. I'll explain more once I know for certain." I pulled away from the curb, heading back toward our apartment. "But if it works out, you wouldn't have to worry about money or insurance or finding a place to live during treatment."

"Sadie, what are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about someone who made me an offer. A good offer. One that could change both of our lives."

Mom was quiet for the rest of the drive home. When we got back to the apartment, she went straight to her bedroom, exhausted from the day's emotional weight. I heard her moving around, getting ready for bed, but she didn't come back out to say goodnight.

I sat at the kitchen table with my phone in my hands, staring at Harrison's contact information. Sixty-seven days until his deadline. Sixty-seven days to decide whether I was brave enough to marry a man I barely knew for reasons that had nothing to do with love.

My fingers hovered over the keyboard. I thought about the man at the meeting whose daughter wouldn't speak to him. About Beth, who couldn't see her grandson. About all the ways addiction poisoned relationships, even when recovery was possible.

Then I thought about Harrison. The way he looked at his daughter. The quiet strength in his voice when he'd made his offer. The promise of stability for both me and Mom.

I typed the message quickly, before I could second-guess myself.

Sadie 9:14 PM: If you're serious—and you can help my mother—I'll do it.

My thumb hovered over the send button. Everything in my life felt off-balance. The apartment was too full of my mother's broken promises and my own exhaustion. The fridge was half empty. My chest felt hollow.

I didn't want to be rescued. I'd never wanted to be anyone's charity case or convenient solution.

But I was out of options.

I sent it.