Chapter 3
I didn’t sleep.
Lily did.
She slept curled against me in Hannah’s guest room, one tiny hand wrapped around my shirt.
Every few minutes, I touched her back just to feel her breathing.
Hannah sat beside me until nearly dawn.
She didn’t ask why I was shaking.
She didn’t tell me to calm down.
She just stayed.
At five in the morning, she finally spoke.
“You need a lawyer.”
“I know.”
“A good one.”
“I know.”
“And you need to stop answering Ryan.”
I looked at my phone.
Thirty-two missed calls.
Seventeen messages.
At first, Ryan had sounded angry.
Bring Lily home.
Then threatening.
My attorney will be requesting sanctions if you interfere with my custody.
Then apologetic.
Emily, this got out of control. Please let me explain.
Then desperate.
My mom pushed everything too far.
I stared at that last message.
Hannah read it over my shoulder.
“He’s already blaming his mother.”
“He always does.”
“Then why did you marry him?”
The question could have hurt.
It didn’t.
Because I had been asking myself the same thing all night.
“He wasn’t always like this.”
“Maybe.”
Hannah tucked her legs beneath her.
“Or maybe he just didn’t need to show you this side before.”
At seven, I called the family attorney Hannah’s coworker had recommended.
Her name was Dana Brooks.
She agreed to meet me at nine.
By nine fifteen, I was sitting in a conference room while Dana read the divorce petition.
She was in her forties, sharp-eyed, calm, and completely unimpressed by Ryan’s accusations.
That calmed me more than sympathy would have.
She turned a page.
“They’re alleging untreated depression, erratic behavior, verbal aggression, alcohol misuse, and neglect.”
I stared at her.
“Alcohol misuse?”
“They attached photographs.”
She slid copies toward me.
One showed me asleep on our couch with an empty wine bottle on the coffee table.
I remembered the night.
I had come home from a company dinner.
The bottle was Ryan’s.
He had finished it while watching basketball.
I had fallen asleep waiting for him.
Another photograph showed Lily crying while I stood in the kitchen.
Another showed medicine bottles beside my purse.
“That’s antibiotics.”
Dana nodded.
“I know.”
“How?”
“The label is visible.”
She looked almost amused.
“Whoever prepared this evidence isn’t as clever as they think.”
She turned another page.
“There’s also an email from you to Ryan saying, ‘Sometimes I wish I could leave all of you and never come back.’”
My stomach dropped.
“I never wrote that.”
“Good.”
She slid the page across the table.
“Because the email formatting looks wrong.”
I leaned closer.
It showed my name.
My email address.
A date six weeks earlier.
But I had never sent it.
Dana tapped the paper.
“We’ll subpoena the account records if necessary.”
I swallowed.
“What happens now?”
“We respond immediately. We request temporary custody based on last night’s incident. We preserve the police report. We get Lily evaluated by a pediatrician today.”
“She isn’t hurt.”
“I believe you.”
Dana’s voice softened.
“But she spent potentially more than an hour outside during a storm. We document everything.”
I nodded.
“Claire said some of the evidence was fake.”
“Who is Claire?”
“My husband’s girlfriend.”
Dana stared at me.
Then slowly removed her glasses.
“Your husband’s girlfriend is helping you?”
“Maybe.”
“Interesting marriage.”
Despite everything, I laughed.
It lasted one second.
Then I cried.
Dana waited.
When I stopped, she said, “Call Claire.”
I did.
Claire answered immediately.
“I can meet.”
“Where?”
She suggested a coffee shop downtown.
Dana shook her head.
“Ask her to come here.”
Claire agreed.
Forty minutes later, she entered the conference room carrying a laptop and a large envelope.
She looked like she had been crying too.
She sat across from me.
“I don’t expect you to forgive me.”
“I don’t.”
She nodded.
“Fair.”
She opened her laptop.
“Ryan told me you two had been separated emotionally for almost a year. He said you refused to move out because you wanted the house.”
“Did he tell you he still slept with me?”
“No.”
“Did he tell you we went to San Antonio together last month?”
Claire’s face crumpled.
“No.”
I looked away.
There was no satisfaction in hurting her.
Ryan had made fools out of both of us.
She opened a folder on her computer.
“I work in marketing. Ryan asked me to help organize files for his lawyer.”
Dana leaned forward.
“What kind of files?”
“Photos. Messages. Screenshots.”
Claire clicked.
“I noticed something weird.”
A screenshot appeared.
It was supposedly a text conversation between Ryan and me.
In it, I threatened to take Lily away forever.
Claire zoomed in.
“The font spacing changes here.”
Dana nodded.
Claire clicked another screenshot.
“And the timestamp overlaps the message bubble.”
My stomach turned.
“Who made these?”
“I don’t know.”
“Ryan?”
“He sent them to me.”
“Where did he get them?”
Claire hesitated.
“Patricia.”
Of course.
Claire opened an email.
Ryan had written:
Mom found more stuff on Emily’s old tablet. Put these with the custody evidence.
Dana’s expression hardened.
“Forward that email to me.”
Claire did.
Then she pulled out her phone.
“There’s more.”
She showed us messages between her and Ryan.
One was dated two weeks earlier.
My mother will take Lily Monday afternoon while Emily is away. We’ll have her settled before Emily gets back.
I stared at it.
Monday.
Yesterday.
That meant if I hadn’t returned early, Patricia would already have taken Lily.
My hands went cold.
Another message:
Once temporary custody is granted, Emily won’t be able to do anything.
Claire whispered, “He told me you knew Lily was staying with Patricia.”
“I didn’t.”
“I know that now.”
Dana photographed everything.
Then Claire said something that made the room silent.
“Patricia doesn’t want Ryan to keep Lily.”
I frowned.
“What?”
Claire looked at me.
“She wants Lily.”
My skin prickled.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“She doesn’t even like her.”
Claire shook her head.
“That’s what I thought too.”
She reached into the envelope and pulled out a brochure.
A private preschool.
Three hours away.
The one Ryan had mentioned.
Then she pulled out another document.
It was an enrollment application.
Guardian One: Patricia Carter.
Guardian Two: blank.
Mother: Emily Carter.
Father: Ryan Carter.
Both parent sections had a handwritten notation beside them.
Limited access pending court decision.
My heart slammed.
“She enrolled my daughter?”
“Apparently.”
Dana took the papers.
“When?”
Claire pointed.
Two months ago.
Before the divorce had even been filed.
Before my business trip.
Before any supposed emergency.
This had been planned.
Not for days.
For months.
I stood so quickly my chair scraped backward.
“I’m getting Lily.”
Dana raised a hand.
“She’s with your sister?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Keep her there.”
“But Patricia knows where Hannah lives.”
My stomach dropped as soon as I said it.
Because of course she did.
Ryan had been to Hannah’s apartment dozens of times.
I grabbed my phone.
Hannah didn’t answer.
I called again.
Nothing.
Again.
Voicemail.
My breathing changed.
Dana was already standing.
“Call building security.”
I called.
No answer.
Then my phone rang.
Hannah.
I answered instantly.
“Are you okay?”
“Emily.”
Her voice was strange.
Too quiet.
“What?”
“Don’t panic.”
I was already panicking.
“What happened?”
“Patricia is downstairs.”
My knees nearly gave out.
“What?”
“She’s in the lobby with Ryan.”
Claire covered her mouth.
Dana grabbed her own phone.
“Call police now.”
I spoke into mine.
“Hannah, lock the door.”
“It’s locked.”
“Where’s Lily?”
“With me.”
I could hear pounding through the phone.
Then Ryan’s voice.
“Hannah! Open the door!”
Another slam.
Patricia shouted something I couldn’t understand.
Lily started crying in the background.
I pressed the phone against my ear.
“Hannah, take her to your bedroom.”
“I am.”
A crash sounded.
I screamed.
“What was that?”
“They kicked something.”
Ryan shouted through the door.
“Emily kidnapped my daughter!”
Dana leaned close to my phone.
“Hannah, this is Emily’s attorney. Do not open that door. Police are being called.”
Then Patricia’s voice came through.
Clear.
Cold.
“Give us Lily and this can end quietly.”
My entire body went still.
Not Ryan.
Not “give her father his daughter.”
Give us Lily.
I suddenly understood what Claire had meant.
Whatever this was, Patricia wasn’t helping her son get custody.
May you like
She wanted my child for herself.
And she had been planning it long before I knew there was a war.
