My entire body started to shake at her words.

“You think I wouldn’t recognize it? It’s the same type of truck the groundskeepers use at the Riscoff estate, and the same as what Roosevelt Riscoff used to drive when he came to see me.”

My head jerked back against the seat, hitting it hard enough it bounced. “What?” I gasped out the word. “You—”

Renee Rango’s gaze narrowed on me. “Don’t you dare judge me. You don’t know anything. But I do. I know exactly what’s going to happen if you keep trying to reach for something that’s so high above you. You think that boy will ever give you the life you want? No way. He’ll hide you away just like his father hid me until he pays you off to stay quiet about it ever happening.”

“Oh my God,” I whispered.

She nodded. “Yes, I’ve been where you are. I was stupid then. Naive. Trusting. I thought he loved me, and that eventually he’d find a way to tell his father that he wanted to be with me, no matter my background.” She laughed, and bitterness dripped from the sound. “Well, that didn’t happen. You don’t have the bloodlines they want either.”

Everything she said compounded on what Lincoln had said last night, and the greasy feeling plaguing me since then grew.

“He paid you off?”

Her lips twisted into an ugly smile. “Because I thought I was so smart. I got him to take me to Vegas. We had a quickie wedding he didn’t even remember because he was hammered. I didn’t bother to show him the marriage license until I had a positive pregnancy test in hand. I thought I had him by the balls then.”

I blinked twice, unable to believe what I was hearing. A pregnancy test? Did that mean Ricky was . . . I couldn’t even finish the thought before Renee kept going.

“And you know what he didn’t do? He didn’t take me home to Daddy to tell him he was going to be a grandpa. No, he hired some shyster of an attorney to divorce me, paid me off, and threatened to take my baby from me and make it so he was raised by people so far away that I’d never find him again. If you think for one second they wouldn’t do the same to you—or worse—then you’re dumber than I thought you were.”

Oh my God. I knew Lincoln’s father wasn’t a great man, but that seemed awfully cruel. “I don’t know what to say . . .” I stared down at my hands curled into my lap, squeezing them tight to stop the shaking.

“All you need to do is march your ass back into that house and tell my son you’re going to marry him.”

I jerked my head up to look at her. “What?”

Her lips pinched together. “You heard me. You’re going to marry my son.”

“But I don’t love him. You know I don’t. You can’t possibly want me to marry him.”