Chapter 4: The Second Document
"What else she filed," I repeated.
Richard reached into his jacket and produced a second envelope.
This one was sealed.
"I only received this by courier at seven this morning," he said.
"I drove here directly.
I didn't call ahead because I didn't know who else she might have access to."
I took it.
Broke the seal.
This document was longer.
Eight pages.
The heading read: *Petition for Dissolution of Informal Domestic Partnership and Division of Shared Assets — Estate of Ethan Calloway.*
I read that line three times.
"We're not married," I said.
"She's claiming common-law partnership.
Eighteen months of cohabitation.
Shared finances.
Shared parenting role." Richard's voice was flat.
"She's petitioning for a share of the estate.
The house.
A portion of the children's trust."
The children's trust.
Claire had built that trust.
She had spent four months with our attorney — a different attorney, one Vanessa had never met — structuring it so that Sophie and Caleb would be protected no matter what happened to me.
She had done it eight weeks before her diagnosis.
As if she had known.
"She's going after Claire's trust," I said.
"She's attempting to."
I set both documents on the garden table beside me.
My hands were steady.
I was aware of that in a distant way, the way you notice small things when larger ones are too large to hold.
Vanessa hadn't moved from her position at the edge of the terrace.
She was watching me with an expression I recognized now for what it was.
Not love.
Not even ambition.
It was the look of someone who had done the math and believed the numbers were in her favor.
"How long have you been planning this?" I asked her.
"Ethan—"
"Not a general answer.
A specific one.
How long."
She tilted her head slightly.
"You were never going to marry me.
Not really.
I could see it every time you looked at Sophie.
Every time you picked up that rabbit Caleb carries everywhere.
You were still married to a woman who d*ed two years ago." Her voice didn't waver.
"I was patient.
I built something real here.
The law agrees with me."
"You sl*pped a woman across the face today."
"In a moment of frustration.
That won't define—"
"In front of forty witnesses and a social services liaison you personally invited." I picked up the guardianship petition.
"This document lists Grace Miller as an unstable influence on the children.
It says she has shown erratic behavior and inappropriate emotional attachment."
Grace, who had slept outside my children's bedroom for six nights.
"She's a housekeeper," Vanessa said.
"Not a parent."
"No." I set the document down.
"She's the only adult in this house who behaved like one."
A long pause.
Then Vanessa's tone changed.
The smoothness went out of it, replaced by something harder underneath.
"You should think carefully about what you do next," she said.
"I have documentation.
Photographs.
Testimony from staff members who will confirm that your work travel left these children effectively unsupervised for weeks at a time.
I have a social worker standing fifteen feet away who observed this household today." She paused.
"And I have a very good attorney."
She glanced at Richard.
Richard looked at the ground.
"He withdrew from my representation twenty minutes ago," she said.
"But the petition is already filed.
The court date is already set.
And whatever you think of me, Ethan, a judge is going to look at two children whose father is absent for months at a time and ask who was actually raising them."
She wasn't wrong that a judge would ask that question.
She was wrong about the answer.
"Sophie," I said, loudly enough to carry through the glass.
The terrace door opened.
Sophie stood in the doorway, Grace's hand on her shoulder.
"Tell me again," I said to my daughter.
"What you told me on the video call."
Sophie looked at Vanessa.
Then at me.
"The rules are different when you're gone, Daddy."
"What rules?"
Sophie's voice was very quiet.
May you like
"She said if we told you anything, she would make sure we never saw Grace again."
The social worker's pen had stopped moving.
