He had called me hysterical. Then unstable. Then, when I quietly packed a single bag, moved into a modest rental in Brooklyn, and hired Miriam, he called me a greedy, ungrateful parasite.
Now, he wanted the judge to believe exactly what his PR team had been leaking to the tabloids for months: that I was a gold-digger who had trapped him with a calculated pregnancy, only to suffer a mental breakdown when he had rightfully “moved on” to find true happiness. His legal team had spent the last ninety days painting me as fragile, heavily emotional, and entirely dependent on his goodwill.
Sloane shifted in the gallery behind him. She was wearing winter-white silk—a bold choice for a courtroom—and my sapphire earrings.
I noticed the stones immediately. The deep, ocean-blue catch of the light. My grandmother’s earrings. The ones I had left in the wall safe at the penthouse.
Richard followed the trajectory of my gaze. He leaned slightly over the back of his chair, his eyes locking onto mine, and his smirk widened into a grin of pure, malicious triumph.
“Consider them a preview,” Richard whispered, his voice slicing through the quiet room, “of exactly how little you’ll be taking home today.”
The heavy wooden doors at the back of the room swung open. The bailiff cleared his throat. “All rise for the Honorable Judge William Harrison.”
Everyone in the room stood. As I pushed myself up, my hands bracing against the table, my son kicked hard beneath my ribs. It was a sharp, sudden jolt, as if he were objecting to the proceedings before I even had the chance to open my mouth.
Judge Harrison took his seat. He was a man in his late sixties with the tired, weathered patience of someone who had spent decades watching rich men confuse their financial contracts with basic human morality. He adjusted his reading glasses and looked down at the mountain of folders before him.
Richard’s lead attorney, a bulldog of a man named Marcus Thorne, didn’t even wait for the judge to settle. He practically leaped to his feet.
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