40. Julian #2
Mara nods once. “It will take time. I need everyone in this room to understand that. Criminal investigations are not immediate, and the institution will try to protect itself where it can. We will push. The authorities will have to collect and review the evidence from original sources, which they’re doing now.
More victims may need to be identified or contacted.
Some may not want to come forward publicly.
There may be delays, and there will likely be attempts by counsel on the other side to minimize, discredit, or shift blame. ”
Eli flinches at that last part. I move before I can think, my hand sliding from his neck to his shoulder, grip firmer now. “They won’t touch him,” I say.
My voice comes out rough enough that several people look at me.
Mara holds my gaze, unshaken. “I understand your concern.”
“No,” I say, and I hear the edge in it. I know it’s too sharp for a lawyer giving us necessary information. I know that, but I can’t soften it. “You understand legally. I’m saying they don’t get to put him on trial for what she did.”
Eli’s head turns slightly toward me. “Jules.”
I hear the warning in his voice, gentle but real. He’s trying to pull me back before I bare my teeth at the woman helping him. I know that too. I breathe in slowly.
Mara doesn’t look offended. If anything, respect flickers over her face. “Julian, part of my job is making sure that does not happen without consequence. I cannot promise no one will attempt it, but I can promise Eli will not be left exposed or unsupported if they do.”
The answer is good. It’s not enough, because no answer would be enough. But it’s good.
I nod once, my jaw tight. “Okay.”
Eli reaches up and covers my hand where it rests on his shoulder. That quiets me better than anything else could have.
Mara turns her attention back to him. “Justice will be served, Eli. I don’t say that lightly, and I’m not promising it will be easy or fast. But with what we now have, and with what investigators are already finding, Celeste and the others involved are in serious trouble. Prison is a very real outcome for her.”
Eli closes his eyes.
Then Mila, who has had enough of legal justice and adult trauma, grabs Eli’s shirt again and lets out a small grunt of effort as she tries to climb him. Eli’s eyes open, and he looks down at her with an expression so raw it makes my chest hurt.
Prison. Evidence. Missing. Forged letter. Sorority conspirators. Grandparents who didn’t know she existed. All of that falls around this tiny person who has no idea she’s at the center of a storm that started before she could breathe.
“What about custody?” Eli asks, voice hoarse.
Mara’s posture eases by one degree, and I can tell this part is better. Not simple, but better. “On that front, we are moving in the right direction. The inspectors will be coming within the next week.”
Eli’s grip tightens again. “Inspectors.”
“Yes,” Mara says. “Home evaluation. They will need to see your current living arrangement and the renovated outbuilding. They’ll assess safety, stability, sleeping arrangements, basic provisions, support structure, and whether Mila’s needs are being met.
Given the preparations Killian made, Mrs. Alvarez’s involvement, your established caregiving, the medical records, and Celeste’s absence, criminal exposure, and the protection order against her, I do not anticipate major obstacles. ”
I feel Eli’s breath leave him.
Mara continues, “After that, barring any unforeseen complication, everything should be clear for sole custody to proceed.”
The room exhales with him.
Eli nods slowly, and for the first time since Mara started talking, I see him absorb something that doesn’t immediately hurt. “Okay,” he says. “That’s good.”
“It is,” Mara says. “You have done very well under impossible circumstances.”
He looks down immediately, uncomfortable with the praise, and I want to shake him a little.
Mara closes the file but doesn’t leave. That tells me there’s one more thing, and my whole body tenses all over again.
She notices. “There is one additional consideration.”
I hate that sentence already.
Eli looks up. “What?”
“Celeste’s parents,” Mara says. “They are shocked, from what I can tell, and they are angry with their daughter. They have not yet asked for anything formally regarding Mila, and to be clear, they currently have no established custodial rights. However, they now know they have a granddaughter. And while they, as grandparents, do not have automatic rights, they can petition the court for visitation if they can prove it’s in Mila’s best interests. ”
Eli goes still again, but this time it’s different. Less fear, more guarded calculation. I feel my own protectiveness rise so fast it almost chokes me.
Mara keeps her voice careful. “At some point, you may want to consider speaking with them.”
“No,” I say immediately.
It comes out before I can stop it.
Eli turns toward me fully, brows pulling together. “Jules.”
I know I overstepped. I know it the second his tone shifts; not angry, not exactly, but warning me that this is his decision before I turn into a wall with tattoos and trauma. Still, the thought of Celeste’s parents near Mila makes my whole body go rigid.
Mara’s gaze moves to me, then back to Eli.
“It is entirely up to you,” she says firmly.
“I am not recommending you agree to contact before you’re ready, and I am not suggesting they have any right to make demands.
But they may want a relationship with their granddaughter.
If they are safe, stable, and uninvolved in Celeste’s conduct, that may be something you choose to explore later. ”
“Later,” I repeat, unable to keep the bite out of it. “After they’re vetted six ways to Sunday, maybe.”
Killian’s mouth twitches, which is not helpful.
Eli’s hand tightens over mine. “Jules.”
I look down at him and force myself to breathe.
He isn’t upset exactly. He knows why I reacted; I can see that in his face.
But he also needs space to have his own reaction without me filling the room first, and the realization hits hard enough to cool some of the panic.
I don’t want to become another person whose fear makes choices for him.
I swallow. “Sorry.”
Eli holds my gaze for a second longer, then nods once before looking back at Mara. “I don’t know.”
“That is a perfectly acceptable answer,” Mara says.
“My parents don’t get near her,” Eli says. “Celeste’s parents are different, I guess. Maybe. I don’t know. If they didn’t know, if she lied to them too…” He stops, jaw working. “Fuck. I hate that I feel bad for them.”
Of course he does. That’s Eli. He can be furious, wounded, betrayed, and still find some corner of himself that recognizes another person’s grief. It’s one of the things I love about him and one of the things that makes me want to put him behind glass where the world can’t keep taking advantage.
Mara nods. “They have also been deceived. That does not mean you owe them access to Mila. It only means the situation is more complicated than Celeste’s original letter suggested.”
Eli laughs once, empty and tired. “Everything is more complicated than Celeste’s letter suggested because apparently every word in it was bullshit.”
“Most of it, yes,” Mara says, with such bluntness that Ryan makes a startled sound that might have been a laugh if the topic weren’t so awful.
Eli looks at me then, and I feel myself brace for what he’s going to ask even before he says it.
“What do you think?” he asks.
I want to say no again. I want to say absolutely fucking not, tell them to send a letter through their lawyer and stay away from the baby until every court in the country forgets their address.
I want to say they don’t deserve to breathe the same air as Mila until we know everything about them, because Celeste came from somewhere and people do not become what she became in a vacuum.
But Eli isn’t asking for my panic. He’s asking for me. So, I give him the truth with as much discipline as I can scrape together.