AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘Do you honestly think you could win against me in a court of law?’
She shrugs, trying to play it off, but I catch her hands shaking.
Although I recognize she’s desperate, I don’t like being cornered, especially not by someone who promised me they wouldn’t.
Her bravado doesn’t last long. ‘Please.’ She reaches out and grabs my hand. ‘I’ll do anything.’
Maybe I am as much of an asshole as others think I am. Because only an asshole would have such a cruel idea and then let it take root in their mind. Only an asshole would make a woman in duress pay such an unfair price.
If I were to say no to her little scheme right now and follow through with the annulment as planned, we would cease to be legally tied – whether she signed a post-nuptial agreement or not. With my legal resources and the fact that both of us were too drunk to even remember getting married, there is no way I wouldn’t be awarded an annulment. The Moore family assets would be safe, and I could minimize any publicity hit the family may take from my actions with the help of my lawyer and a public relations team.
However, due to my promise to Bell about ensuring Alice’s job, I can’t fire her. Annulled, I’d still have to see her at work.
‘If I do this, you owe me. Whatever I say goes in addition to the NDA and post-nuptial agreement my lawyer will draw up.’
She nods so fast I wonder if she even hears me.
‘Fine then.’ I consign myself to being an asshole. To using her moment of weakness to regain control. ‘I’ll have my lawyer draw up the paperwork.’
Alice hugs me, causing me to stumble back into the door with a bang, my arms instinctively wrapping around her, holding her to me.
Just so she doesn’t fall. No other reason.
A second later the door hits me in the back.
‘Everything okay in here?’ The social worker smiles wide as she pushes herself into the room. ‘I have paperwork for you both to sign.’
* * *
Alice
‘We should be there in a few minutes, Mr Moore, sir.’
Thomas’s chauffeur seems to have gotten over his shock of meeting his boss at the hospital entrance with two women and an six-year-old girl in tow.
I have not. Gotten over my shock, that is. Over Thomas, Kayla, my job.
I angle my head toward Mary who’s leaning against the window while hugging the stuffed cat I bought her at the hospital gift shop before we left. It was a lame attempt to make her feel better about her mother not returning, but she seems to like it.
After making the deal with Thomas, we signed paperwork that would release Mary into our care.
Contrary to what I would’ve guessed, Mary hadn’t shown much reaction to being told about my marriage. She took it a lot better than I had.
Instead, and maybe this was because of her recent stay at a shelter, her eyes had lit up when Thomas mentioned she’d have her own room. Now those eyes are at half-mast, the nap she took in the hospital not having done much to make up for the loss of sleep from the night before.
I feel her pain. My eyes feel dry and itchy, but the hum of anxiety keeps them wide and alert.
As soon as the ink was dry, Ms al Abbas insisted on accompanying us to Thomas’s house ‘to get the pesky home check out of the way’. So now I’m wedged between Mary and Thomas – my right leg flush alongside his left while the social worker rides shotgun.
Minutes feel like hours as New York crawls past us in Sunday traffic.
‘I promise—’ I barely breathe as I talk to Thomas out the side of my mouth ‘—as soon as Kayla returns and Mary is safely cared for, we’ll leave.’
Eyes forward, I see the bruised skin around his eye stretch as his brow arches. ‘If she returns.’
‘What do you mean, “if”?’ The usual defensiveness I get about Kayla or Mary fails to reach its normal vehement peaks, but I still can’t help the sharpening of my tone.
Ms al Abbas’s head jerks to the left at my voice, apparently now discernible from the front seat.
