Chapter 8 - SELINA CAME FOR MY SON
The petition was ridiculous.
That did not make it harmless.
Selina claimed I was “emotionally unstable following childbirth.”
She claimed I was isolating Leo from his paternal family.
She claimed Dad’s sudden involvement represented “an unknown and potentially coercive environment.”
When Claire read the filing, she laughed once.
Then stopped.
“This is aggressive.”
“Can she win?”
“Emergency visitation? Unlikely.”
“Then why file?”
“To create a record.”
Dad frowned.
“Of what?”
“That Phoebe is unstable.”
My stomach turned.
The word again.
Emotional.
Dramatic.
Unstable.
A vocabulary Selina had been building for years.
I whispered, “She planned this.”
Claire looked at me.
“Maybe not this exact filing.”
“But the language.”
“Yes.”
I remembered family dinners.
Phoebe is sensitive.
Phoebe overreacts.
Phoebe doesn’t handle stress well.
Little comments.
Witnesses.
Repetition.
Not enough to prove anything.
Enough to shape perception.
Rowan arrived at Claire’s office thirty minutes later with his new attorney.
Mason Hale.
He looked terrible.
“What happened?”
I slid him the petition.
He read the first page.
Then the second.
His face changed.
“No.”
Claire watched him.
“What?”
“She’s using things I told her.”
I went cold.
“What things?”
He looked sick.
“Our arguments.”
“Which arguments?”
“When we fought about work.”
“When I miscarried?”
Silence.
That answer nearly knocked the air out of me.
Two years earlier, before Leo, I had lost a pregnancy at eleven weeks.
I had cried for days.
Selina had sent flowers.
Rowan had told her I was struggling.
Now the petition described a “history of emotional collapse related to pregnancy.”
I stood.
“You told her?”
“She was my mother.”
“She weaponized my miscarriage.”
“I didn’t know.”
“No.”
My voice shook.
“You never know until the damage reaches you.”
He closed his eyes.
“You’re right.”
That almost made me angrier.
Mason interrupted.
“Rowan, do you support this petition?”
“No.”
“Then we need that in writing.”
“Do it.”
Claire looked at him.
“You understand that opposing your mother may worsen your own position?”
Rowan’s expression hardened.
“My position deserves to worsen.”
Everyone went quiet.
He continued.
“But she’s not using my son.”
That was the first consequence he accepted without bargaining.
At the hearing, Selina wore pale blue.
Soft.
Maternal.
Concerned.
She did not look like a woman tied to suspicious consulting payments.
She looked like someone who brought casseroles after funerals.
Her attorney spoke carefully.
“My client’s concern is not control. It is continuity.”
Claire stood.
“Continuity of what?”
The judge looked over her glasses.
“Counsel.”
Claire nodded.
Selina testified.
“I love my grandson.”
Claire asked, “When did you first meet him?”
Selina hesitated.
“I haven’t yet.”
“Why?”
“Phoebe refused.”
“Did you visit the hospital?”
“No.”
“Did you leave your birthday dinner when informed Phoebe was in labor?”
Selina’s mouth tightened.
“No.”
“Did you encourage Rowan to leave?”
“No.”
“Did you tell Phoebe that women have been giving birth for thousands of years?”
The courtroom went silent.
Selina stared at me.
“Yes.”
Claire nodded.
“No further questions.”
Then Rowan testified.
His mother looked at him as if betrayal had a smell.
Mason asked, “Do you believe your wife is an unfit mother?”
“No.”
“Emotionally unstable?”
“No.”
“Did she prevent you from seeing Leo?”
“No.”
“Did she offer contact?”
“Yes.”
“Did your mother attend the birth?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Rowan swallowed.
“Because we were at her birthday dinner.”
“And you?”
“I stayed.”
“Why?”
Rowan looked at me.
Then at the judge.
“Because I failed my wife.”
Selina’s attorney stood.
“Objection.”
The judge frowned.
“On what basis?”
The attorney sat down.
The petition was denied.
Outside the courtroom, Selina cornered Rowan.
“You humiliated me.”
He looked at her.
“You filed against my wife.”
“She’s divorcing you.”
“That doesn’t make her my enemy.”
“She’s turning you against your family.”
“No.”
He looked tired.
“You did that.”
Selina’s face changed.
“You ungrateful little—”
She saw Dad approaching and stopped.
Then her smile returned.
“Mr. Sterling.”
Dad didn’t smile back.
“Mrs. Mercer.”
“I suppose you think you won.”
Dad glanced at me.
“This isn’t my fight.”
Selina laughed softly.
“Everything is your fight when money is involved.”
I watched Dad’s eyes narrow.
Then Selina said something strange.
“You should ask your daughter how much she really knows about the Westbridge account.”
My pulse stopped.
Dad turned to me.
“What account?”
Selina smiled.
There.
A deliberate weapon.
A secret thrown into the open.
But this one had roots.
Westbridge.
The fake company listed on my mortgage documents.
Claire stepped closer.
“Mrs. Mercer, I recommend you stop speaking.”
Selina’s smile faded.
Too late.
I looked at Rowan.
He looked confused.
Good.
He didn’t know either.
I turned to Dad.
“I’m going to find out.”
Selina walked away.
May you like
For the first time, she looked less like a mother protecting her family.
And more like a person trying to outrun evidence.
