Ethan stood in the foyer, watching Isabella being dragged into a squad car, screaming obscenities. He looked at the lawyer. He looked at the empty house.
He realized, with a crushing weight, that he had no wife. He had no mistress. He had no house. And he had no son.
His phone rang.
He picked it up numbly.
“Hello, Ethan,” I said from the hospital room. My voice was crisp and clear.
“Clara…” he whispered.
“I believe you mentioned something about ‘stability’ being required for custody?” I asked. “How stable is your living situation right now?”
Part 5: The Locks Change
Ethan arrived at the hospital twenty minutes later. He looked like a man who had run through a hurricane. His hair was wild, his shirt was untucked, and he was sweating profusely.
He burst into my room.
“Clara! Baby!” he gasped, rushing toward the bed. “Can you believe her? That psycho! She tricked us! Thank God you were smart enough to buy the house. You saved us, Clara! You saved the legacy!”
He reached for the bassinet where Leo was sleeping.
“I can’t believe I almost let that woman near our son,” he babbled, his hand reaching for the blanket.
Smack.
I slapped his hand away. It wasn’t a gentle tap. It was a sharp, stinging slap.
“Do not touch my son,” I said.
Ethan recoiled, rubbing his hand. “Clara, come on. I was tricked! I was a victim too! We can fix this. We can go home. We can raise the twins together at the Manor. Just like we planned.”
“We?” I asked. “There is no ‘we’, Ethan. You filed for divorce. You abandoned me while I was giving birth. You tried to separate siblings because one was a girl.”
“I was stressed!” he pleaded. “I wasn’t thinking straight! Isabella manipulated me!”
“You’re a grown man,” I said coldly. “You made a choice. You chose the shiny lie over the real work. And now the lie is in jail.”
“But I’m his father!”
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