Nine minutes after Julian Sloane signed away his daughters, he was already late to celebrate another woman’s baby.
Mara Venn sat in the attorney’s office with her hands folded on her lap, watching the last ten years of her life turn into paper. The conference room was too warm. Rain moved in silver lines down the windows. Somewhere beyond the closed door, her daughters were waiting with a coloring book, two juice boxes, and no idea their father had just agreed they could leave the country without him.
Julian did not read the final page. He only flipped to the yellow tabs and signed where Mr. Arlen pointed.
“Mara receives primary physical custody,” the attorney said, carefully measured. “Travel authorization for Poppy and Claire is unrestricted, provided you receive a written itinerary within seventy-two hours of departure. The asset disclosures are attached. I recommend you review—”
“Fine,” Julian said.
Mara looked at him.
He was wearing the navy suit she had once saved for, the one he said made him feel like a man people should listen to. His hair had been cut that morning. His cufflinks were new. He looked rested in the way only selfish people looked rested after destroying a home and calling it freedom.
His mother, Corinne Sloane, sat to his right in cream wool and pearls. She had spent the last year speaking to Mara as if Mara were an unfortunate stain on a family tablecloth.
His sister Beatrice sat beside Corinne, scrolling through her phone with a bored little smile.
Julian’s phone lit up on the table.
The name Serena appeared.
Everything about him changed.
He smiled before he answered. Mara noticed because that smile used to belong to their daughters. It used to appear when Poppy ran through the hallway with painted paper wings, or when Claire fell asleep in his lap with a cookie in her fist. Now it belonged to a woman who wore white coats in restaurants and posted photographs of her hands on steering wheels she did not own.
“Baby, I’m leaving now,” Julian said into the phone. “No, the lawyer is done. I won’t miss it. Today we find out about our little prince.”
Mara did not move.
Little prince.
The words landed softly, but they left a bruise.
Corinne closed her eyes as if receiving a blessing. Beatrice looked up and smiled.
“Finally,” Beatrice murmured. “Something worth celebrating.”
Mr. Arlen shifted in his chair. “Mr. Sloane, there are several clauses here that should not be rushed.”
Julian covered the phone with one hand. “I said it’s fine.”
“You are also signing consent for international relocation.”
“For holidays,” Julian said impatiently.
Mara spoke for the first time in nearly twenty minutes. “Not just holidays.”
His eyes flicked to her. “What?”
She held his gaze. “Not just holidays.”
For a second, something uncertain crossed his face. Then Serena must have said something through the phone, because his attention vanished again.
“Yes, my love,” he said. “Tell them to keep the room ready. My mother is coming with me.”
He hung up and shoved the signed pages toward the attorney.
Mara had imagined this morning a thousand times. In most versions, she cried. In a few, she screamed. In one, she begged Julian to remember who he had been before
