Chapter 5: The Call I Didn't Owe Him
He called four more times before midnight.
I didn't answer any of them.
The fifth call came at 7:14 the next morning while I was making toast and Maisie was explaining to Cora why clouds were shaped like animals.
I looked at the screen, looked at my daughters, and let it ring out.
At 7:31 he sent a message: *Lena please.
I know you don't owe me anything.
I just need ten minutes.*
I read it while the toast was cooling.
Cora caught me looking at the phone.
She didn't ask.
She turned back to the window and pointed out a cloud that looked like a rabbit.
At 9:15, after Diane had taken all four children to a nearby park, I sat down at the kitchen table and called him back.
He answered before the first ring finished.
"Lena."
"You have ten minutes," I said.
"Talk."
A long breath.
"The baby isn't mine."
I said nothing.
"The doctor ran a preliminary assessment based on the dates.
She said she couldn't confirm paternity without a test, but that the timeline made it — she said it was unlikely." His voice was flat in a way I hadn't heard before.
Not the controlled flatness he used in arguments.
Something emptier.
"Brielle admitted there was someone else.
A man named Callum.
She said it was finished.
She said she was certain."
"But she wasn't certain."
"No.
She wasn't." A pause.
"She's agreed to a test.
We'll have results in a few days."
"All right."
"Lena—"
"Preston."
"I know what I said to you yesterday.
In that room.
I know what I said about the girls."
I waited.
"I was—" He stopped.
Started again.
"I don't have an excuse for that."
"No," I said.
"You don't."
The line was quiet for a moment.
"I want to see Cora and Maisie," he said.
"I know I don't have the right to ask that right now.
I know that.
But I'm asking anyway."
"You'll need to go through the proper channels.
The custody arrangement is in the decree."
"I know what the decree says.
I'm not asking about the decree.
I'm asking you."
"And I'm telling you to follow the decree." I kept my voice even.
"That's what it's there for."
Another silence.
"Are you ever going to let me explain?" he said.
"You just explained.
The baby may not be yours.
Brielle lied about the dates.
You're devastated." I paused.
"I heard you, Preston.
But none of that changes what you said to me in that conference room.
None of it changes the last two years.
The explanation doesn't reach back far enough to fix what needs fixing."
"I made a mistake."
"You made a series of choices," I said.
"Every single one of them was a choice.
You chose Brielle over your marriage.
You chose to tell me to take the girls.
You chose to call her before you'd even left the building." I stopped.
"A mistake is one wrong turn.
What you did was a direction."
He didn't answer that.
"The girls are well," I said.
"They slept.
They ate breakfast.
Maisie is currently identifying clouds.
You can call them on Saturday at ten, as the decree specifies.
I will make sure they're available."
"Lena—"
"That's the ten minutes, Preston."
I ended the call.
My hands were steady.
I noticed that specifically — I looked at them and they were completely steady, resting flat on the table, and I felt nothing that resembled the grief I had expected to feel during this conversation.
What I felt instead was something quieter.
Something that had been a long time coming.
I got up and finished the toast.
Diane came back with the children at half past ten.
Maisie ran in ahead of the others and announced that she had found a stick shaped exactly like the letter Y and that she was keeping it forever.
"Forever is a long time," I said.
"I know," she said seriously.
"That's why I picked a good one."
I laughed.
It surprised me — a real laugh, the kind that comes from somewhere you forgot you had.
Cora came in last, quietly, and set her backpack by the door.
She looked at me the way she had been looking at me since yesterday.
Reading me.
"Are you okay?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
She studied my face for another second.
"You look different," she said.
"Different how?"
She thought about it.
"Like you put something down."
I looked at my seven-year-old daughter and felt something move through my chest that I didn't have a word for.
"Yeah," I said.
"I think I did."
She nodded, apparently satisfied, and went to find her book.
My phone buzzed on the counter.
Not Preston this time.
A number I didn't recognize.
A local area code — local to the city we had just left.
I answered.
"Is this Lena Hartwell?" A woman's voice.
Professional.
Careful.
"It is."
"My name is Grace Alderton.
I'm a family law attorney.
I was given your number by Eleanor Hale." A brief pause.
May you like
"I think you should know what Brielle Foster has been telling people about the divorce settlement.
And I think you should know it before Preston does."
