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Back Born Out of Wedlock
Chapters (52)
  1. Born Out of Wedlock
  2. Dedication
  3. Table of Contents
  4. Prologue
  5. Chapter One
  6. Chapter Two
  7. Chapter Three
  8. Chapter Four
  9. Chapter Five
  10. Chapter Six
  11. Chapter Seven
  12. Chapter Eight
  13. Chapter Nine
  14. Chapter Ten
  15. Chapter Eleven
  16. Chapter Twelve
  17. Chapter Thirteen
  18. Chapter Fourteen
  19. Chapter Fifteen
  20. Chapter Sixteen
  21. Chapter Seventeen
  22. Chapter Eighteen
  23. Chapter Nineteen
  24. Chapter Twenty
  25. Chapter Twenty-One
  26. Chapter Twenty-Two
  27. Chapter Twenty-Three
  28. Chapter Twenty-Four
  29. Chapter Twenty-Five
  30. Chapter Twenty-Six
  31. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  32. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  33. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  34. Chapter Thirty
  35. Chapter Thirty-One
  36. Chapter Thirty-Two
  37. Chapter Thirty-Three
  38. Chapter Thirty-Four
  39. Chapter Thirty-Five
  40. Chapter Thirty-Six
  41. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  42. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  43. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  44. Chapter Forty
  45. Chapter Forty-One
  46. Chapter Forty-Two
  47. Chapter Forty-Three
  48. Chapter Forty-Four
  49. Chapter Forty-Five
  50. Chapter Forty-Six
  51. Acknowledgements
  52. Other Titles by Author

“When I was young...when I was a child, I loved my father. I mean, that’s what you’re supposed to do, right? Love your parents? But all that brought me was pain and rejection, nasty words, and nastier looks, and an overwhelming feeling of being so worthless that more than once I wished I was the one who had died at birth instead of my brother. Why was I even alive? After all, if your father doesn’t love you, how could anyone else? So, I didn’t even try. It was easier that way, and to make sure I never got hurt again, I built this fortress, this cocoon, and I wouldn’t let anyone in. Not Evelyn, not Fran, not even my grandfather.

“I sometimes question whether he actually loved me, or did he just see in me something my father didn’t possess, so he took me under his wing to hone me until I fit the mold he needed, a mold he knew my father would never fit into. I can’t tell you how many nights I’ve lain awake trying to remember if he ever said he loved me. He said I was a good girl, and I was smart. He said I was sharp, and...and I was pretty, but...but love? Love was a word I can’t remember him ever uttering. Yeah, from his actions you would think that he did love me, but then again, who knows? Maybe he just saw me as a means to an end,” Addison said with a shrug. “Anyway, I lived in my self-made cocoon, safe from harm and safe from words I would never have believed if they had been spoken...and then you came along, and everything changed.

“You forced me to emerge from that fortress of mine. No...” Addison said, shaking her head. “You made me want to. You made me want to trust and to believe, and to spread my wings and escape that safe place I had built for myself. The only difference between butterflies and me is that they are born from cocoons, and I was...” Addison stopped and chuckled under her breath. “I was...born out of wedlock.”

Joanna raised her eyebrows and grinned. “I’m fairly certain that’s not the correct connotation for that particular saying.”

“Well, maybe it should be. If I can be sitting here today with my wife and my children, looking forward to a future filled with love and family, why can’t something else change, too? If there’s one thing I’ve learned is that seeing the good in something is so much better than seeing the bad.”

“Yeah?”