Jocelyn’s POV
The courier arrives at Helena's apartment at nine-fifteen, clipboard in hand, asking for my signature like he's delivering groceries instead of legal warfare.
I sign without reading. My hands move on autopilot while my brain is still processing the morning—Eli's green eyes, Natasha's calculated calm, Mia's confusion splitting her face in half.
Helena rips the envelope open before I can.
Her face goes white. "Fuck."
"What?"
She doesn't answer, just hands me the papers with fingers that tremble.
‘Petition for Emergency Custody Modification: Minor Child Mia Rose Hartwell-Wolfe’
The words blur together. Legal terminology stacks into sentences designed to destroy lives with clinical precision. Natasha Reeves isn't just establishing Eli's paternity—she's coming for my daughter.
"Petitioner requests immediate temporary custody of subject minor to establish sibling relationship prior to petitioner's terminal diagnosis. Father's demonstrated pattern of deception and abandonment indicates inability to provide stable environment..."
My vision tunnels. The paper crinkles in my grip, edges cutting into my palms.
"She planned it." The realization hits like a freight train. "The school visit this morning—she wanted Mia to meet Eli before filing this, wanted to establish connection so the judge would..."
"So it looks like she's thinking of the children." Helena finishes my sentence, jaw tight. "Building evidence that she cares about their relationship while Zayden's the one who kept them apart."
I'm already moving, grabbing my keys, my phone, my bag—everything I need to commit violence without actually catching charges.
"Where are you going?"
"To kill my husband."
The drive to Wolfe Tower takes eleven minutes. I make it in seven.
Zayden's office door isn't locked. Amateur mistake.
He's on the phone when I enter, standing by the window in shirtsleeves and exhaustion. Hasn't slept, hasn't shaved, looks like hell served cold.
Good.
He sees me and his expression shifts—guilt wrapped in caution wrapped in something that might be relief. "I'll call you back."
"Don't hang up on my account." I slam the custody papers onto his desk hard enough to scatter other documents. "I'm sure whatever business crisis you're managing is more important than your wife finding out you're about to lose your daughter."
He sets the phone down carefully, too carefully. "Jocelyn…"
"She filed for custody of Mia." My voice cuts through whatever excuse he was building. "Natasha Reeves, mother of your secret son, is trying to take my daughter away! And you knew this was coming, didn't you? That's why you looked like a corpse yesterday when I walked in."
"I found out last night. Landon—"
"Last night." I laugh, sharp enough to draw blood. "You found out last night that the woman you paid to disappear is now using your lies to rip my family apart. How efficient. How fucking convenient."
Zayden moves toward me. I step back, hand raised like a traffic cop.
"Don't. If you touch me right now, I'll break something expensive."
He stops, jaw working around words that won't help him. "We can fight this. Landon's already…"
"I met her this morning." The confession stops him cold. "Natasha and Eli. At Mia's school. She wanted me to see him ‘before things got complicated’. Her words, not mine."
His face drains of color. "You what?"
"Surprised? Thought you'd be the one controlling how this imploded?"
I move closer now, feeding on his fear.
"She brought him to Mia's school. Let our daughter see her half-brother for the first time on a bench outside the principal's office. No warning, no preparation. Just—'surprise, here's the family your father's been hiding.'"
"Jesus Christ." He runs both hands through his hair, destroying whatever remained of his composure. "Is Mia—"
"Confused? Traumatized? Yeah, she's spectacular." My voice rises despite my best efforts. "She asked me why you didn't tell her she had a brother. Asked why nobody thought she deserved to know. And I stood there with no answers because I'm just as blind as she is."
"I was going to tell you."
"When?" The word cracks like a whip. "Before or after your son's mother filed to take mine away?"
Zayden's hands clench at his sides. "That's not fair."
"Fair?" I'm shouting now, past caring who hears. "You want to talk about fair? Eli showed me a photograph this morning. Me, at the gala, wearing that silver dress. Natasha's been showing it to him for eight years, building a narrative where I'm the reason his father abandoned him."
"That's not—"
"He asked if I was the woman from the picture. If I'm why his dad forgot he existed."
I'm in Zayden's space now, close enough to see the horror spreading across his features.
"She's been poisoning that child against me since he was born. Showing him photos, telling stories, making me the villain in his abandonment. That's what you enabled with your silence."
"I didn't know she was—"
"You paid her two million dollars and thought she'd just disappear? You really believed money would erase a child?"
My hands are shaking. I press them against his desk to stop the tremor.
"She's dying, Zayden, and she's spent every one of those months planning how to destroy us, how to make you feel what she felt."
He sinks into his chair like his strings have been cut. "I'm sorry."
"Sorry." The word tastes like poison. "You're sorry. That fixes everything, doesn't it? Your apology will definitely stop the custody hearing, definitely undo eight years of lies, definitely explain to Mia why her father's been hiding her brother."
"What do you want me to say?"
"Nothing." I'm already turning toward the door. "There's nothing you can say that makes this okay. Nothing that explains why you looked at me every morning and chose to keep lying. Why you let me believe we were building something real while you were still paying to bury your past."
"It was real." His voice cracks. "Everything with you and Mia was real."
I stop, hand on the doorframe. I don't turn around, can't look at him without wanting to scream.
"Natasha said something this morning. She said she wanted me to understand what it's like to be outside looking in while someone else gets everything you wanted."
I finally face him, let him see the devastation he's caused.
"She's not wrong. I've been outside your truth this whole time, looking in at a marriage I thought was mine."
"Jocelyn, please…"
"I need you to stay away from us. From me, from Mia. Until I can figure out how to explain this to our daughter without teaching her that men like you are worth trusting."
The door closes on his broken expression. I make it to the elevator before my legs give out completely.