“Hey,” Cap said, snapping me out of the thoughts that were on a constant loop in my head. “You okay?”
“Not really,” I said honestly. “This is it. This is…”
“Yeah,” he said grimly. “If it makes you feel any better, I think you did the right thing. You were right about these people, and I think in time, Florrie will see that too.”
“No, she won’t,” I chuckled humorlessly. “She’ll never see this as anything but a betrayal.”
“Do you have any ideas on how to change her mind on that?”
I sighed, slumping down in one of the chairs. “I’ve thought of nothing else for months. I can’t see a way out of this. I don’t know how to make any of this right. Was I wrong? I mean, I know you think I was right, but if this was Maggie, would you have moved heaven and earth to make sure she got what she wanted?”
“Look, I’m not gonna blow sunshine up your ass. I think there’s just about anything I would do for Freckles. I was lucky that she changed her mind about the abortion. That was one of the hardest decisions that I ever had to make, and it nearly killed me. I’m pretty sure that if she had gone through with it, I never would have been the same again. That would have changed my whole fucking life, and I’m not sure there’s any coming back from something like that. I think you’re in the same fucking boat right now. You had an impossible decision to make, but you did what you thought was right. There’s no going back and changing anything now. Beating yourself up over it isn’t going to change the past. And the fact is, the Fullers would have found out about Reid sooner or later. It’s not like you could have just hidden Reid here for the rest of his childhood. This wasn’t a question of if it would happen, but when. There’s nothing you can do to change that.”
I sighed and stared off into space. I felt like my life was slowly ticking away until it would explode, tearing me to shreds. There were no more moves to make, no ways to fix what was about to happen. There was only the hope that after all was said and done, I could find a way to convince Florrie that we were better off together than apart. And that was a tall order that I wasn’t sure I could fill.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWOFlorrie
I felt the pound of the gavel all the way down to my bones. It was a crushing blow, telling me that the life I thought I had was now gone. It was over. There were no more options. I watched as the Fullers tearfully hugged each other, crying because they had just won custody, taking away the last of my heart with them.
I slowly turned, looking up at Alec. His eyes were filled with pain and a slight sheen of tears that I knew he was trying to hide from me. They were pleading with me, begging me to stay, to hold onto what we had, but I couldn’t. I had made a promise to Reid. I swore that I would do whatever it took to keep him with me. I took a step back from Alec, jerking out of his grasp when he reached for me. I couldn’t do this with him. This was all his fault. He did this to us. He tore away the one thing that meant more to me than even him. Reid was no longer mine, not if I stayed here with Alec and accepted what the judge was telling me.
I shook my head slowly, watching as Alec’s eyes slipped closed and pain washed over him. This was it. It was over for us, but I still had a kid that was counting on me, and I wouldn’t let him down. I turned and fled, running from the courtroom, ignoring Alec yelling for me to wait. There was nothing left to wait for.
I got in my truck and peeled out of the parking lot. I didn’t have much time to get back to Reed Security and make my escape. I already had my bag packed. I had stashed it at the back of the property where the escape hatch was. My SUV was ready to go, filled with anything Reid and I would need to make it out of here and across the Canadian border. It was closest, and though there were more ways that I knew to slip across the Mexican border and more ways to hide, it was a longer trip with less chance of success.
I had been working for weeks on getting Reid and I fake passports. I had even optimistically gotten Alec one, even though I knew it was ridiculous to hope he would come with us. I knew that he wouldn’t suddenly change his mind and decide to go along with my plan. That’s why I hadn’t included him in any of them. He didn’t know where I planned to go or what I planned to do exactly. The only one that knew that was Craig, and that was because he swore he would do whatever it took to keep Reid with me. He knew what Reid meant to me and he knew that I just couldn’t walk away. He was the only person I trusted at this point.
I screeched to a halt in the Reed Security parking garage.
