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“Great. I also bought him a nice glove, and he seems to like it, though he did mention that your, um, girlfriend bought him a used one.”
“Fiancée,” I emphasize. “Yes. She did. He loves it.” I feel a surge of pride that Callie beat Elizabeth to the punch with something Scout has been using day and night since he got it. I hope that he doesn’t toss it aside now that he has a shiny new one.
“Well, now he has a spare.” She raises an eyebrow, which is a sign she has something else to say. Ammunition she’s holding in reserve. “He also told me something interesting.”
I feel the blood drain from my face as I try not to react. Here it comes. The little nugget of pain she’s been honing all day. I know she’s trying to get me to second-guess some aspect of myself, and I refuse to play her game.
“Kids say some interesting things. Anyhow, I should get him into his bed.” I lean in and start to unbuckle Scout, who doesn’t budge. When he sleeps, he really sleeps, and it doesn’t matter where he is. I envy that.
When I lift Scout out of the car, he snuggles into me like a koala, resting his cheek on my shoulder. I feel a pang of sadness for Elizabeth, who’s missed out on three years of this. But it doesn’t make me feel any kinder toward her now that she’s trying to take him away from me. It’s hard to read the look on her face. For a second, I think she’s looking at how Scout is curled against me and rethinking her ridiculous ask for full custody.
“Don’t you want to know what he said?” Her lips curl into an intentionally placid smile. I don’t know how she managed to hoodwink the mediator into thinking she’s wholesome, but I can only hope the mediator sees right through her.
She can’t wait to tell me whatever this thing is, which means it can’t be good. And I refuse to play her games.
“It’s late, Lizzie. I should get him to bed.”
A tiny flare of her nostrils tells me how much she hates the nickname, so I’ll continue to use it.
As I close the car door and turn to carry Scout inside, Elizabeth calls after me. “He said Callie’s only been around for a month. She’s your friend, not your fiancée.”
My eyes squint closed. Of course she wants to do this now when she knows I won’t raise my voice and wake my sleeping son. I turn and say quietly, “Yes, because that’s what we told him initially. I didn’t want to confuse him until I knew things with Callie were serious. And they are. I love her.”
I wish my throat didn’t go dry at the end of the last sentence, but telling Elizabeth something I haven’t yet said to Callie feels like a gut punch, and I’m the only one to blame for holding out on her with my real feelings.
Elizabeth nods slowly. “Sure, well…I suppose kids sometimes get it wrong.”
Relief floods my nerves, and I measure the distance between here and the front door of my house, calculating a dozen or so strides before I’m inside and safe from further interrogation.
“Yes, they do.” My clipped response should end the conversation, but my ex-wife can’t stand it when someone else has the last word.
“I’ll have my lawyer really dig in, now that there’s suspicion of it all being a ruse, make sure your relationship holds up to scrutiny. Perjury is a felony, after all. Not a good look for a devoted father.”
Her smile is all teeth like a shark.
Leveling her with a stony stare, I do my best not to react. She loves playing this game, trying to push my buttons. I stand, filled with regret for each minute I let her get to know me well enough to understand just how to hit a nerve.
“It’s been a pleasure, Lizzie. As always.” I turn my back and walk into the house to put my son to bed. He doesn’t budge as I carry him down the hall and pull his shoes and socks off his feet. When I put him down, he sways like a drunken sailor, but I manage to change him into pajamas and get his teeth brushed. He won’t remember any of it in the morning, but I tuck him in and read him a page from the book on his nightstand for good measure. Then I watch his chest rise and fall in that rhythmic way that indicates a deeper sleep than I’ll ever have, especially now that Elizabeth has dropped her latest bombshell.
I’m stalling, wanting to spend more time with him because I have a new fear that our life as I know it is fleeting. But I know I can’t just sit in Scout’s room and stare at him all night, so I go down the hall and perch on the end of my bed.
Everything feels different now. My room and my bed sit cold and empty because I know what it feels like to have Callie here. Not just in my room, but in my life. In both of our lives. I want to call her, ask her to come back, but I’m too worried about what I’ve done—to my custody case, to her, to myself—to let her in right now.
This is my problem, and I need to solve it alone.
And it’s too late to call my lawyer and warn him about the shitstorm headed his way once Elizabeth’s lawyer starts digging in and questioning my relationship with Callie. So I have no choice but to sit here, too wound up to sleep, too tired to do anything else, and wait for morning.
Maybe things will look better by the light of day. I doubt it, but it’s possible.
CHAPTER 27
Luke
The next morning, I don’t feel any better. My coffee tastes like cardboard, and my eyes feel like I slept with them open. Because I didn’t sleep. And my lawyer, who just showed up on my porch unannounced, isn’t helping things.
“This is bad,” John says, wringing his hands. I might find his dire warning and the hangdog look on his face somewhat amusing if he wasn’t talking about my case.
I haven’t even had a chance to call him yet to warn him about the conversation with Elizabeth. I was waiting until a decent hour. Apparently, he already knows. Or there’s some other problem that warrants him showing up here.
