Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 101524 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101524 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
“I want to speak with her.”
“After I get her from school, I’ll make sure to tell her that you called and to remind her to check her e-mail...” I’m cut off when an animated voice comes on the line saying that we’ve been talking for three minutes and that it’s going to cost a dollar seventy-five to continue.
She must decide that she doesn’t want to continue the call because the voice comes back saying that the call has been ended.
Setting my phone down, I stare at it for a moment, then burst into tears and cover my face.
“Shit,” Logan whispers, circling me in his arms and pulling me over to his lap. Burying my face against his neck, I sob so hard that my body shakes. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not.” I try to catch my breath, but it feels impossible. It feels like a million pounds are sitting on my chest, and there are hands wrapped around my throat, stopping me from getting air into my lungs. I don’t know that she could change the custody agreement that we have, but the idea that she can scares me. Actually, it terrifies me. I don’t know what I would do, or what I could do.
With a quiet curse Logan stands with me in his arms and walks to the living room taking a seat on the couch. “You need to breathe,” he whispers against my ear while rubbing my back. I try and try again, it feels like it takes forever before I’m able to breathe without feeling like I’m struggling and even longer to stop crying. Wiping the tears from my cheek with the long sleeve of my shirt, I squeeze my eyes closed.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” His hand slides up my back into my hair. “You wanna tell me what that was all about?”
“It was Zuri’s mom.” A fresh wave of tears floods my eyes. “She’s been emailing and hasn’t heard back from Zuri.”
“Okay.”
“She mentioned that she’s having second thoughts about our arrangement.” I make air quotes.
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“She’s talking about me having custody of Zuri.” My throat aches, “She said that she wonders if she shouldn't have just let CPS take her.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“No.” I shake my head while wiping away the tears that continue to fall.
“So, she’d rather have her daughter in CPS custody than with her sister, who has provided her with not just a roof over her head but love and stability?”
“I don’t think that Sharon cares about love and stability; she just cares about herself,” I choke out. God, it shouldn’t hurt to say that out loud or to admit it to myself, but it does.
“Alright.” He cups my jaw and wipes away the tears I’ve missed. “What do we need to do to make sure that she can’t change the custody agreement?”
“I don’t know.” I swallow, thinking about it. “When everything happened with Sharon, my dad mentioned he had a lawyer I could use.”
“How about you call your dad and get that number?”
“He’s probably working.”
“I guarantee you that he’s not going to care that you’re interrupting his workday with this situation.” Of course, he’s right, my dad won’t care, but I hate dragging him into this. “Come on.” He helps me off his lap. “Let's go get your phone.”
Not even thirty minutes after getting off the phone with my dad, he and my mom are standing in my living room, then ten minutes after that, my parents and I are on our way to the lawyer’s office, with Logan promising to pick up the kids from school.
The conversation with the lawyer isn’t an easy one, but I feel somewhat better after talking with Ruthie Stevens, a woman who has been a child custody attorney for over thirty years. After explaining the situation to her she reassured me that Sharon could not just take guardianship away from me without just cause, and that given her current circumstances, it wouldn’t be easy for her to fight me even if she wanted to.
Still, we make plans to start working on putting some things in place just in case, including filing the paperwork to terminate Sharon’s parental and visitation rights. Not because I want to keep her from Zuri or keep Zuri from her, but because if she claims that the reason Zuri is not e-mailing her back is because I’m not allowing Zuri to contact her, that could lead to me actually losing my guardianship and Zuri being placed elsewhere. It’s not the solution I want, but at the end of the day, I want to protect Zuri. And I will drain myself dry to do that.
Nineteen
LOGAN
“You have a lot of tattoos,” Coop says, staring at Nalia’s dad with a wide-eyed look on his face. An expression that hasn’t changed much since Nalia and her parents showed up with pizza about thirty minutes ago.