Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 108531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 543(@200wpm)___ 434(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108531 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 543(@200wpm)___ 434(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
He nodded, absolutely no judgment on his face. “That had to be hard on your mother, and it likely made her feel some shame.”
“My mother’s never felt an ounce of shame.” Her mother was the most prideful woman she’d ever met.
“Honey, you can’t believe that.” He winced. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“It’s okay. It’s nice to hear an endearment. Most of the time if someone isn’t calling me by my name, it’s not affectionate. And yes, I can believe it. She thinks she’s better than everyone else.”
“Or she puts on a show because she knows there are people who look down on her because she’s poor. There are people who strike first if they think they’re going to take a hit. Even if no one was ever going to hit them in the first place. I suspect your mother’s like that. And my mother is a shining example of why.”
She would have to think about that. Was her mother’s identity so tied up with her class that she couldn’t see past it? Quaid’s mother certainly didn’t seem to be able to. “So why aren’t you? Like your mom, I mean.”
His lips curved slightly, but it was a bittersweet expression. “I was not a debutante, and I was not raised by a debutante.”
“You didn’t live with your mom?”
“Of course I did, but she didn’t exactly raise us,” Quaid corrected. “She was an affectionate mother who enjoyed having us around the dinner table and showing us off to friends, but Paul and I were raised by nannies and my father, when he was around. Mom was more interested in us when we got older, but by then I was my father’s shadow. In some ways Paul became her playmate. And growing up rich in a place like Papillon is different than in the city. It wasn’t like there were fifty kids with my parents’ kind of money to socialize with, so I played and hung out with kids of all kinds. My father used the money he made from working for the wealthy to fund his pro bono work. He was very comfortable around all kinds of people. He used to tell me that the law, when properly applied, was the great equalizer. The law in its purest form should see neither race nor sex nor economic disparity.”
She wished that was true. “Your father was a dreamer.”
He shrugged. “He was an idealist. But he always put that ‘should’ in there because he also believed we can’t fix problems if we don’t acknowledge they exist.”
“Your father was a good man.” She owed a lot to Wilson Havery. Many people in the town had, and it appeared Quaid was carrying on that tradition.
“He was. He was also a little rough around the edges, so he thought my mom could teach him how to be more comfortable in society, how all of us could. My grandmother on my dad’s side wasn’t prepared for any of it. She came from a family of eleven, straight off the islands. She was a Drummond.”
“Oh, wow. I didn’t realize that.” The Drummonds were one of the poorest families in the area. They worked as shrimpers and fished, and the newest generation sometimes got into trouble running drugs. “I guess I thought all of the Haverys came from money.”
“Like I said, it can be different in a small town. My grandfather married her after she got pregnant. At least I don’t think my father was two months premature. He weighed nine pounds,” Quaid said with a chuckle. “He saw my grandmother struggle and didn’t want that for his kids. So he married a woman who did, in fact, make sure Paul and I could easily move through even the wealthiest circles, and my father taught me not to think that made me better than anyone else. Just luckier.”
She was fairly certain Quaid didn’t realize she had a connection to his dad. “Your father is the reason I wanted to be a lawyer.”
He sat up a little straighter. “Really?”
“Yeah. My cousin got in trouble when I was in junior high, and it looked like she was going to jail for a long time. Cassie was my favorite cousin. She was our babysitter when I was a kid, and I couldn’t stand the thought of her being in jail. I heard them talking about how bad public defenders were, so I marched into your dad’s office. I had saved up five dollars and fifty-two cents.”
Quaid gasped. “You were that girl? I remember this. I couldn’t remember who he ended up defending, but I remember him telling my mother it was some of the best money he ever made. She couldn’t understand because it was next to nothing, but he said money was relative. What meant nothing to him meant the world to the young lady who’d hired him, and he would honor that by doing his best.”