Chapter 12
“Here is what is going to happen,” I said, sliding a document across the table.
“I take the house. We sell it. I keep seventy percent of the equity to cover what you drained from our accounts. You pay child support. I take primary custody. Leo moves to Ardencraft with me. You get him one weekend a month, and you fly out to see him. If you fight me on this, Ms. Vance will introduce evidence of your affair with my sister, which started long before I left. And I will drag your name through every social circle and corporate board you care about.”
David stared at the paper.
“He hates you,” he whispered, making one last attempt to hurt me. “Leo hates you. He told me he never wants to see you again.”
“He’s a five-year-old boy who parrots the men he wants to impress. He’ll unlearn it. Sign the paper, David.”
He fought, but the fight was hollow.
Once Rosalie moved out of his house a week after the mediation, citing a mental health crisis, David was left alone with a hostile child and a sinking career.
Two months later, he signed.
The day I went to pick up Leo, it was raining.
I pulled my rental SUV up to the house I had once poured my soul into. The ivy I had left behind was completely dead, brown vines clinging to the brick like skeletal fingers. The flower beds were choked with weeds.
David opened the door. He didn’t say a word. He handed me a duffel bag and walked away.
Inside, the house smelled of stale takeout and unwashed laundry.
Leo sat on the couch with an iPad glued to his face.
He was thinner. His clothes were slightly too small, and his hair was unkempt.
When he heard my footsteps, he looked up. For a second, pure instinctive relief flashed across his face.
“Mom.”
Then the programming kicked in.
His expression hardened into a scowl.
“I’m not going with you. Dad says you’re taking me away because you want to ruin our lives.”
I did not rush to him. I did not beg for his affection. I did not cry.
I simply walked over, turned off the iPad, and picked it up.
“Hey!” he yelled.
“Get your shoes on, Leo. We have a flight to catch.”
“I want Auntie Rosalie. I want Dad.”
He started to scream, his face reddening. He balled his hands into fists and lunged at me, aiming to hit my leg.
I caught both wrists.
My grip was firm and unyielding.
Then I knelt so we were eye level.