“She wouldn’t stop crying, Chloe.”
“She was cold, Jason. But then again, you already abandoned one child.”
Jason looked at me then, and I saw it hit him. I was the witness.
“You made motherhood sound like failure,” I said. “But yesterday, motherhood was the only thing in that airport bathroom that worked.”
Jason gave a short, ugly laugh. “You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
I was the witness.
“No,” I said. “I’m done mistaking you for a good man.”
“Paige…” he started.
The detective cut in. “Sir, stop talking. You’re making this worse.”
Chloe wiped her face with both hands and stared at him. “Worse? He left our baby on a bathroom floor. How is there a worse version?”
Jason turned to her. “She wouldn’t stop crying, Chloe. I hadn’t slept. I just needed ten minutes of quiet.”
“You’re making this worse.”
Vivian stepped toward him. “I protected you when you humiliated your wife,” she said. “I called you immature. Then selfish. Then overwhelmed. But this?” Her voice sharpened. “This is evil.”
She looked at the detective. “I’ll give a full statement. And as of today, he gets nothing from me. Not one dollar. Not one excuse.”
“Mom, tell them I wasn’t thinking straight,” Jason said.
“I know,” Vivian said. “That’s always been the problem.”
The detective nodded toward the officers at the door. “Sir, come with us.”
“This is evil.”
Jason’s jaw tightened. He looked at me one last time. “You always did love making me the villain.”
I almost laughed. “Jason, you left a ten-day-old baby alone in an airport bathroom. I didn’t make you anything.”
The officers took him out. The front door shut. The house seemed to exhale.
***
Chloe sat down hard on the sofa. “I left for one day,” she whispered. “One day.”
She looked up at me, wrecked and young. “Did she cry the whole time?”
“Not after I her picked up,” I said gently. “She was cold and hungry, that’s all. The paramedic said she was okay.”
“I left for one day.”
Vivian turned to me. “Paige, I owe you more than an apology.”
“That makes two of us,” Chloe said hoarsely. “I didn’t know who you were. I just thought you were another person from his life he had managed to hurt.”
Vivian drew a breath. “I watched you bleed, struggle, and carry Owen while my son tore you down, and I called it stress. I was wrong. You told the truth about him, and I failed you.”
She glanced toward the hallway. “I won’t fail that baby again, either.”
“I didn’t know who you were.”
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