The next day, it had taken us several false starts and several more orgasms to get out of bed, but eventually we managed it, parting ways after a late breakfast. He had a shift and I had to go get Tiffany. That didn’t stop us from texting each other repeatedly throughout the day with increasingly flirty innuendo.
Monday dawned bright and cheery, and I couldn’t help the smile still plastered on my face. Maddox had to work this morning, but he’d texted me on his walk to the station. I was already up getting Tiffany ready. We had to come to look at a new property and this one wasn’t in too bad of shape, so I didn’t mind bringing her. She loved to ride along with me.
My phone began to ring as I stepped out of the car, so I opened the back door so Tiff could get out and explore and answered the call. It wasn’t a number I recognized, but that happened a lot in my business. Renters called from unknown numbers, property managers or realtors called to see if I had any interest in buying their properties, and so on.
“Hello, this is Bethany Leeds.”
“Ms. Leeds. My name is Martha Brennen I’ve been retained as counsel for the Bearth family.” My stomach dropped to the ground. They’d actually done it. They hired a lawyer. Those complete and total assholes. I opened my mouth to tell her to shove it, but she beat me and spoke before I could. “I apologize for calling you out of the blue, but since you have no lawyer for me to go through, I had no other option.”
“What do you want?” I asked through clenched teeth.
“The Bearths have officially filed for custody. I’d like to set up a mediation so we can all sit down and try to come to some sort of agreement to keep this mess out of court.”
My blood boiled with anger and outrage. “How dare they?” I seethed. “I am a good mother. I will not go to mediation. You can just sue me for custody. See you in court.”
I hit the button on my cell to hang up on her and wished for the old days with clunky house phones. They’d been so satisfying to hang up on someone with.
My anger boiled as Tiffany ran around the yard with a stick, completely oblivious to the phone call I’d just had, thankfully. At least this hadn’t affected her. The one meeting we’d had with Kyle’s parents, in the park, had been just a blip on her radar. She’d forgotten it almost as soon as it happened. Almost falling off the monkey bars had been a more lasting memory.
I found the key and walked the house, and tried to make notes that Kara would want, but I had to look at the same things over and over because I couldn’t focus. Tiffany ran from room to room once I gave the home a look-around to make sure there weren’t any missing pieces of floor or random nails. Once, in a property I hadn’t bought, I’d even found evidence of squatters, complete with old needles. Since then, I at least looked around first, and always had my pepper spray in my pocket.
After several minutes of trying to focus and failing, I gave up. “Come on, Tiff,” I called. “We’ll come back. Mommy needs to call a friend.”
“Who? Can I come?” She came careening out of the back bedroom and stopped in front of me. “What friend, Mommy?”
“I’m going to call my friend Maddox. He can give me some good advice. Let’s get you home first, okay?”
She nodded. “Maddox was nice, and he makes yummy soup.”
Since she didn’t ordinarily like soup, the fact that she’d eaten Maddox’s so well had been a miracle. I hoped it meant some of her picky eating habits were going to fade soon. The parenting books said picky eaters often got more adventurous as they got older. I sincerely hoped that was true.
After helping her buckle into her high-back booster, I headed back toward our house. Along the way, I changed my mind and decided I’d much rather talk to him in person. He’d told me he was on desk duty and would be at the station all day. “Tiff,” I called over my shoulder. “Do you want to go see a real police station?”
She squealed in excitement, as I’d hoped she would. “Yes!”
We drove past our road and on toward town. I couldn’t tell if Maddox was inside since he rarely drove, so I texted him. Hey, are you at the station?
His reply was only seconds later. Yep. Followed by, Bored to death. Mondays are the worst.
Well, good then. I got Tiff and hurried inside, anger still coursing through me. The thought of Kyle’s parents somehow possibly succeeding and taking my sweet girl away from me made me a mixture of panicked and terrified.
And beyond furious.
Maddox jumped up in surprise when we opened the door and stepped in. I’d never actually been inside. It was like I would’ve imagined a small-town sheriff’s office would look. A couple of rows of desks, with just a couple of doors leading off the main area. There was a reception area with a small wooden waist-high fence that blocked the office area of the station from the waiting area.
“Hey,” he called. “I didn’t imagine you’d be here after that text.” He shook his head. “Surprised I didn’t know,” he muttered.
“How could you have known?” I walked through the small swinging door toward him.
Tiffany bounded through then ran around me. “Hey, Maddox! Mommy took me to an old yucky house, and I saw three spiders and there was dirt everywhere.”
He squatted beside her and wiped a smudge of dirt off of her cheek. “I see that. Was it haunted?” Maybe I wasn’t as good of a mother as I thought I was. I hadn’t even noticed the dirt on her face in my preoccupation.
She threw her hands in the air
