Chapter1

"Damon belongs to me now. Let him go, and stop using your kid to hold on to him."

That was the message Nora sent me, attached with a photo of my husband playing dad to her son. I didn't cry. I didn't scream.

I just forwarded the screenshot straight to my divorce attorney.

For years, I waited for Damon to choose us. I waited through the lies, the broken promises, and the night he left me alone in the delivery room so he could hold her hand.

When he walked out on our five-year-old son at the airport for her, something in me finally snapped.

I had already let go of waiting. And Damon? Soon, he will learn exactly what it is he threw away.

---

Damon froze, then reached for Leo out of habit. "Buddy, Daddy really has something urgent to deal with..."

"Okay, Mr. Reed." Leo stepped back, out of reach, his fists balled at his sides. "You should go."

I pressed my hand to my mouth. My eyes were stinging.

For as long as I'd known him, Damon had always had room in his schedule for Nora. Every time he left for her, I knelt down and gathered our crying son against me. "It's okay," I'd say. "You've got me. Daddy's just busy."

Leo used to cry. He used to grab Damon's leg and hold on with both hands. I'd assumed today would go the same way, and I had braced myself to catch him when he fell apart.

Instead, he pushed his father's hand away. No tears. No pleading. He was five years old, chin up, blinking hard, handling it like a grown man.

That was what broke my heart.

Guilt crossed Damon's face. He stood and turned to me. "Can you calm him down? Once I've dealt with this, I'll get on the next flight and meet you there."

Before I could answer, Leo said, in a small, clear voice, "Don't bother, Mr. Reed. We don't like being bothered by strangers."

Nobody spoke. The noise of the terminal seemed to fall away.

Then the boarding call for Maui crackled over the speakers. Leo took my hand and squeezed it hard, and gave me a smile that never reached his eyes.

"Come on, Mom. Let's go have fun."

My throat burned. I smiled back anyway.

The trip had been Damon's idea. A fresh start, he'd called it, a way to make Leo feel safe again and show him we were still a family. The night before, Leo had been too excited to sleep, rattling off every picture he wanted us to take on the beach.

And Damon had broken that promise too. For Nora.

I first saw the cracks when I was eight months pregnant.

Nora was the widow of Marcus Cole, Damon's best friend since college. Seven years ago, a truck had come barreling toward Damon in a crosswalk, and Marcus had shoved him out of the way. Damon survived. Marcus didn't. "I owe that family everything," Damon told me the week we got engaged, and I understood. I even admired him for it.

Then one night he stayed out until dawn. The next morning there was a smear of red lipstick on his collar, bright as a warning light. He kissed my forehead and said a drunk client had stumbled into him at a networking dinner.

What he didn't know was that an hour earlier, Nora had texted me photos of the two of them at the window of a penthouse suite, the city spread out below.

I made a silly private bet with myself that he would tell me the truth. I lost.

For the baby's sake, I swallowed it.

The night before I went into labor, he took a call in my hospital room and reached for his coat. I caught his sleeve, doubled over in pain, and begged him not to go. He patted my hand.

"Don't worry, babe. I'll be back in five minutes."

I lay there counting five-minute stretches until I lost track. He never came back, not even after Leo was born.

I found out later that he'd spent that whole night in the ER at the children's hospital next door, holding Nora's hand while her son, Ethan, struggled through an asthma attack.

The next day, I asked him for a divorce. I told him calmly that I'd step aside so he could go be with the family he cared about more.

Damon, who never lost his composure, dropped to his knees, eyes red. "Nora is just family. She has no one else, and I made a promise to Marcus. Elena, we have Leo. I swear I'll love you both with everything I have."

We'd been together seven years. I looked at his face and, God help me, believed him.

Then he lied to me again. He broke his promises to Leo, too.

The third time he walked out on our feverish son because Nora called, something in me went quiet for good. I found an attorney and filed. In less than a month, the papers would land on his desk.

A friend tried to talk me out of it. "Think about Leo, Elena. Boys need their fathers."

I shook my head, smiling bitterly. "He has a father. That man has just never made him feel loved. I'm protecting my son."

When Damon sheepishly suggested a trip to clear our heads, Leo's whole face lit up, and I couldn't be the one to put that out. I made myself a deal. One last chance. If he really stays with us, I'll withdraw the petition.

Then, at the airport, a single call from Nora, and he was gone again.

Standing in the TSA line, I looked back once. Damon was nowhere in the crowd. He hadn't even stayed to watch us through security. He had already run back to her.

On the other side of the checkpoint, Leo walked ahead of me, stiff and careful, never looking back. Then he stopped, turned, and pushed his face into my coat. His whole body shook.

"Mom," he said into the fabric, his voice cracking, "I don't want a dad anymore. I just need you."