Hell?
“Jesus.”
Oh, he was aware.
“She doesn’t want them, Elizabeth. My wife, the mother of our children—well, one of them, as she was more than happy to point out—is over motherhood. It’s interfering with her job and life.”
She didn’t know what to say.
Elizabeth knew Axelle for a very long time, and since they were in their twenties, she knew the woman didn’t want kids. Then, she got married to Duke, and she figured she changed her mind.
“Duke, I’m sorry.”
“Not as sorry as I am. I need a good divorce attorney,” he said. “If she’s not happy, then I don’t think we should stay married. I want full custody. That’s all. I need help, and I knowthe Blackhawks have the best attorneys. I doubt she’ll fight it, since she’s already looking for an exit strategy.”
Oh, Jesus Christ.
“Duke.”
He stopped her.
“No. I grew up with a missing father, who I always assumed didn’t want me, Lyzee, but I turned out fine. I’m not letting a woman who resents the kids stay in their lives. If she wants to go off, she can. I’m done. I took the kids when she told me to come get them because it’s too much, and we pay for a nanny to help during the day, but to come out and say she’s not interested…”
Elizabeth rubbed the bridge of her nose.
This was a problem for so many reasons.
“Do you want me to talk to her?”
He stopped her.
“No. I want an attorney, and I need it to be the best goddamn attorney in the whole world. I fell down the rabbit hole again, Lyzee. Salem loved her job more, and died doing it. Axelle loves her career, and told me she didn’t want to be a mother. I can’t do this again. I made a mistake, and I need to get out of this mess.”
Yep.
This was going to make everything going forward awkward—even more so than it already was.
That meant Elizabeth had to dig a little with the whole‘heading to the CIA’thing, too. She was going to have a talk with Lewis after he handled the little favor she’d asked for today.
“Are you sure?”
He was never surer in his life.
In fact, his mind was made up.
Duke was done playing games.
“I’ve noticed her being cold to the girls. The nanny told me she doesn’t touch them during the day, and I talked myself into it being because she figured the nanny was doing her job. I don’t want someone icy around them. I don’t want my kids damaged. We were both damaged—me by my mother’s choice to get a sperm donor, Charlie, and Charlie’s choice to marry Abigale.”
Elizabeth reassured him.
This was deeper than friendship, and it pulled her in because Duke was her brother. She had to side with the man who was blood.
Period.
She gave in.
So much for being Switzerland.
