Caleb
Ispend most of the morning on a Zoom call with Reilly, going over everything he pulled together so far, and the picture gets uglier every time he adds a new piece to it.
By the time the call is over, I feel like I've been staring at a crime scene for three hours.
They're still working on pulling information on his previous cases, but we have substantiated proof that he alone made every complaint about Olivia.
After stopping by the library to print all of Reilly's findings and stuff them into a folder, I head back home.
I've got to get this information to her so she can provide it to her lawyer.
Alone, it may not be enough to stop the judge from granting more rights to Derek, especially with CPS showing up at her house, but it's a good start.
We still have a few weeks to go, too, and I know if we keep digging, there will be more.
I turn onto our street to see Olivia's SUV parked in her driveway with the hatch open.
She's leaning into the back pulling grocery bags toward her as Ethan runs toward the house with a gallon of milk clutched against his chest, taking the porch steps sideways.
She says something to him that I can't hear and the screen door bangs shut behind him.
We've barely spoken, though after she requested that I pick up the paint supplies when I was done sealing the fence, I know we're at least on speaking terms, which is good. I imagine living next door to someone who hates me would be a tad discouraging, and just when I was settling in, too.
The news I'm about to share with her probably won't come as any huge shock, but having the proof of it should be somewhat comforting.
The lawyer she's working with could probably present a case to the judge that Derek is harassing her, at the very least, if not defaming and slandering her.
I really want to help her fight this, though it won't alleviate the guilt I feel, but it's a start.
So, taking my folder, I slide out of the truck and shut the door.
Before I'm even on her property, she looks up, watching me strut across the property line, and her arms tighten on the bag.
It's a quick glance, but it comes with a fleeting expression of nerves before a smile locks into place on her face.
"You need a hand?" I ask as I step up beside her. It appears she's going to try carrying every one of those bags at once. I've seen her actually do it before, but this load looks a bit large for that circus trick.
"I've got it."
"That bag is ripping."
She looks down at the bottom of the paper bag where condensation has soaked through and the whole thing is about to give way, then she sighs and shifts it to her other arm. "I'll make it."
"That bag won't make it." I take it from her before she can argue and grab two more bags from the hatch with my free hand. She steps back with a jug of juice and a carton of soda in hand and sighs again, dropping her shoulders.
"Thank you," she says, but it comes out polite and distant. It still bothers me that the warmth in her tone around me is gone now. We were really building something before my foolish mistake severed everything.
I follow her inside to the kitchen where Ethan's already abandoned the milk on the counter in favor of his game in the other room. Olivia sets her bags down and starts putting things away without looking at me, and I set my bags, and the folder, on the counter near the sink.
I feel out of place entirely, not knowing where anything goes, not even knowing if she wants me here.
She glances at me when I put the eggs in there, but I can't tell what that expression is.
She may well be the most impossible woman to read with those plastic smiles and cheerful expressions which I know are fake.
I'm standing there with two loaves of bread in my hands staring at her when she lifts an eyebrow at me. "You can put the bread in the bread saver," she says, nodding at the counter by the microwave.
"I know where it goes," I tell her softly, trying so hard to decide whether I should leave or finish helping. When her shoulders stiffen, I lean toward the former.
"Right. Of course you do." There's an edge to it, but it's tired more than hateful.
She turns back to the freezer and arranges the vegetables next to a stack of frozen waffles that I'm guessing are Ethan's.
"You know where everything goes in my house because you spent two months memorizing it. " God, that hurts. But she's not wrong.
"Olivia…"
"I'm not starting a fight." She closes the freezer and faces me. "I'm stating a fact."
She folds the empty bags and tucks them under the sink, then leans against the counter with her arms crossed.
The kitchen feels more cramped than it used to, or maybe it's that the last time I stood in here we were different people to each other, and now every foot of space between us carries the weight of what I did.
"Do you want coffee?" she asks. It sort of catches me off guard because I thought she was angry with me, but maybe this is her way of bridging the gap, being neighborly.
"If you're making some."
She turns to the coffee maker and fills the reservoir and measures the grounds and hits the button, and the machine starts gurgling.
Then she pulls two mugs from the cabinet and sets them on the counter.
The simple act of sharing coffee shouldn’t feel this tense, but I really messed things up.
I'm not sure if we'll ever get a familiar closeness back between us, but I'd like it. At least if I intend to stick around.
Walking over to where she's standing, making coffee, I set the folder on the counter and rest my hand on it.
She looks at it then up at me. "What's that?"
"Well, it's proof you can take to your lawyer. " My chest aches. I just want her to see I'm not a bad guy, that I really didn't mean to get sucked into Derek's scheme. "My guys put it together over the last two weeks."
Her eyes drop to the folder, but her expression stays blank now. Maybe I'm still crossing lines. I can't tell. Maybe she wants me to butt the hell out and not stay involved. I don’t work for her, after all. But how can I stand back knowing what that asshole plans to do and not help?
"Reilly organized everything chronologically," I tell her as I fold the folder open. "The first page is a summary. The calls to Helen line up with the dates she gave me, and the CPS complaint matches a call Derek made from his cell two days before Mrs. Finch showed up at your door."
She pulls the folder closer to herself and picks up the first page while I pour the coffee into both mugs and set hers beside her.
She takes it without looking up, wrapping her hand around it out of habit.
I watch her face go through several expressions, then the crease between her eyebrows deepens and her lips purse.
She flips to the second page and reads that one more slowly, tracing the highlighted numbers with her fingertip.
I can see how she's trying to rationalize why her ex would do all of this.
Some of the things I'm sure she never knew about, or if she did, she hadn't told me about it yet.
I was gut-sick learning just how far that bastard would go to discredit who she is as a mom and a person.
"He called the school?" she asks, looking up at me in shock. "What did he tell them?"
"Mick's still running that down, but based on the pattern, it's probably the same thing he told everyone else.
That you're medicated and unstable." I frown and run a hand over my face, then sip the coffee to disguise how upset I really am. I don’t want her to see my temper and get afraid of me, but my God, I could really hurt that man right now.
"I can't believe they would take this seriously. I’m a good mom." She sets the page down carefully and points at the banking information. "What about the wire transfers?"
"Derek set up a shell company four months ago.
The only transactions on it are the payments for my house deposit and rent.
Torres's guy says it was created specifically to hide those payments from the custody financials.
" This is the part I'm afraid of her learning, that he paid for everything, including my living arrangements.
It threatens to spark the same animosity between us that we just moved past.
"Four months." She flips over the wire transfer page and reads more of the incriminating details.
"He's been planning this since before you moved in?
" I'd like to tell her he's probably been plotting this since the instant that judge gave her full custody, but I bite my tongue.
I can see how hard her positive exterior is straining.
She's going to crack at some point and when she does, I'm afraid it'll hurt her so badly.
"The first call to the school was five months ago."
She drops the paper and picks up the mug, staring out the window over the backyard.
I swear I see tears brimming in her eyes which she fights back, but there's nothing I can do.
I'd honestly pull her into my arms and hold her if she wanted me to, but that part of this is broken now.
She's not clinging to me for comfort the way she did that day Derek confronted her at soccer practice.
So I stand stoically, listening to the noise of Ethan's video games giving her space to process this information.
"So I can take this to my lawyer?" she asks, turning to look up at me.
"That's exactly what Reilly is researching for. Everything in that folder is documented cleanly enough to submit as evidence, and we're still pulling more."
"We…" she says, narrowing her eyes. "You keep saying we."
"My guys from the Corps. Reilly, Dawson, Mick, Torres. They're all helping me build my security firm—which wasn't a lie— and I have them all working on this."
"Why would they do that? They don't know me." Setting the coffee down, she turns to lean on the cupboard, facing outward. The heels of her hands plant on the counter, and she looks confused. "I didn't hire you all…"
"I fucked up, Liv. And I want to make it right. They work for me, so…"
She picks up the phone records again and runs her finger down the list of highlighted calls.
"That's very kind of you, but it's not necessary.
Thank you for giving this to me, though.
" Her shoulders are drooping now, and the fake happy face is gone.
"I'd like you to leave now. I need time to think about this. "
"I'm not giving up, Olivia. I'm going to make this right, even if you want nothing to do with me at all anymore." I turn to go, and I'm surprised she doesn't stop me, though I don’t know why. Wishful thinking, maybe.
When I get back to my house, I sit at my kitchen counter and pull up my email. I've got to keep digging. I know Derek has to have some sort of record of other horrible life choices we can exploit. I just haven't found them yet.