22. Declan #3
Harold Price looked up from his notes. "Is there room for compromise? Visitation? A shared custody arrangement? A structured transition?"
Perez looked at Kira. Kira looked at the table. Her hands were still folded. Her thumbs pressed against each other.
"No," Perez said. "Full custody or trial."
Price turned to my side. David looked at me. I looked at the documents on the table. The stills from the lobby footage. Kira's face in the seating area, her hands on her belly. The envelope between them.
I shook my head.
"No," David said. "We'll proceed to the hearing."
Price nodded. He made a note. "Mediation is concluded without resolution. The matter will proceed to a formal custody hearing as scheduled. Both parties will be notified of the procedural requirements."
We stood. Kira stood. Our eyes met across the table. She held my gaze for three seconds. Her mouth opened, but then her lawyer touched her elbow. She turned and walked out.
I watched her go. The door closed behind her.
David gathered the files. "The hearing is in a week. Priya will prep Ms. Calloway's testimony. We'll file the Graham evidence with the court. The abandonment record is solid." He looked at me. "We're in a strong position, Declan."
"I know."
"Then why do you look like that?"
Because Kira's lawyer was right. Kira was the casualty. My chief of staff paid her off, and she relinquished my daughter because she believed I didn't want her. The legal ground was mine. The moral ground was a wasteland, and I was standing in the middle of it.
"I look like a man with a hearing in a week," I said. "Let's get ready."
The penthouse smelled like garlic and something slightly burned. The smell of home.
Mrs. Parrish was gone. Dominique was in the nursery with Lena. I set my keys on the counter, loosened my tie, and followed the sounds to the kitchen.
Thea was at the stove. A pot of something simmered. A cutting board covered in unevenly chopped vegetables sat beside the sink. She was stirring with one hand and scrolling her phone with the other, and when she heard me, she looked up.
Her face changed. She set the spoon down. "Tell me."
I told her. I stood in the kitchen with my tie loosened and my hands in my pockets and told her everything. Graham's confession. The LLC, the Caine sabotage, the Kira payoff from the building fund.
I told her about the mediation. Kira's lawyer. Kira's face when the Graham evidence was presented. The request for full custody. The refusal to compromise. Trial in a week. Everything.
Thea listened. She didn't interrupt. She didn't offer solutions. She didn't try to fix any of it. She stood in front of me and put her hands on my face — both hands, her palms warm against my jaw, her fingers at my temples — and she held me there. Close.
I closed my eyes. Her thumbs moved across my cheekbones. The kitchen was warm. The pot simmered on the stove.
"I'm here," she said. Her touch lingered a moment longer, steadying us both, before she let her hands drop and turned back to the stove.
Then we ate. The food was edible — a victory by Thea's standards, a minor miracle by anyone else's. The pasta was slightly overcooked. The garlic was golden, not black, and she looked at me when I noticed and raised one eyebrow and said nothing.
I smiled. She almost smiled back.
After dinner, we checked on Lena together.
The nursery was dim. The nightlight glowed.
Lena was on her back, her fists at her sides, her lips parted, her breathing slow.
I stood beside Thea at the crib and put my arm around her shoulders.
She leaned into me — her head against my chest, her hand resting on the crib rail.
We stood there. My daughter below us. The woman beside me.
"No matter what happens at that hearing," Thea said. Her voice was quiet. Almost inaudible. "I'm not going anywhere."
She tilted her head up. I kissed her softly. The taste of wine and garlic. Her hand found my chest.
We went to my room. The door closed. The watch came off. The city glowed. We moved slowly, quietly, and gently. She said my name against my mouth, and I said hers against her skin.
After. Her head lay on my chest. Her hand over my heart. Her breathing slowed. Then it was gone.
I lay in the dark, with Thea asleep on my chest. Lena was asleep in the next room. The monitor blinked green on the nightstand.
The lawyers said it was a slam dunk. I knew the legal ground. I had the resources, the custody order, the documentation, the testimony. I could make the world what I wanted it to be. I'd been doing that my entire life.
But Kira was still Lena's mother.
Anything could happen. Judges were human. Courtrooms were unpredictable. The law was a framework, not a guarantee.
I lay in the dark and held the woman on my chest and listened to my daughter breathe through the monitor, and I made myself a promise: Whatever happened in that courtroom, I would be ready.
I needed to be the man Thea deserved. That was the father Lena deserved.
I closed my eyes. And for the first time in weeks, I slept.