“I will.” Daisy hugged her. Then, Daisy hugged Lizanne too, a brief, firm squeeze, then grabbed her bag and marched toward the entrance.
Rose stood. She looked at the brick of the school building, got back in the car, and closed the door.
The camera crew peeled off at the corner. Rose opened her laptop in the passenger seat to dig through her inbox, while Lizanne drove toward their favorite coffee spot. The email from her lawyer sat halfway down the screen.
She read the subject line.
Custody Demand.
Something cold turned over in her chest. She read it again. Then she set the laptop on her knees and stared out through the windscreen at the ordinary morning moving past her window, at a world that had no idea what she’d just read.
“Rose.” Lizanne’s voice came from a distance. “What is it?”
“Pull over.”
When she had done it, Rose turned the screen toward her. She didn’t trust her voice yet.
Lizanne read it.
Jeremy Planter. Daisy’s father. The man who had walked out before Daisy could even stand. In four years, he had sent two letters, both through an intermediary, both complaining about child support he couldn’t afford. Then she’d heard nothing for two years. Until the cards. He had been like a bad dream. Now, the bad dream was filing for custody.
The letter cited Rose’s deliberate concealment of the child. It mentioned a media circus and the instability of the fake relationship.
“How can he be serious? He’s been out of the picture for years!”
“Not exactly,” Rose said. Her voice came out thin and unsteady. “He sent a card to Daisy on her birthday and then again at Christmas and I—I didn’t tell you. I tore them up. I thought if I ignored it, it would go away.”
Lizanne didn’t speak immediately. When she did, her voice was quiet and careful.
“I knew about the birthday card. I didn’t know about the Christmas one. You should have told me. I’m not angry,” Lizanne said. “But we can’t be keeping things from each other. Not about this. Not about Daisy. I cannot be the last person in the room to find out something this important.”
Rose pressed her hand flat against the laptop. “I know. I know that now.” She looked out the window. “I don’t know what to do. What if he gets her? What…”
“He is not getting near her.” Lizanne said it the way she said things she meant absolutely. She grabbed Rose’s hand. “We’ll get in front of this. Don’t worry. You have a lawyer right?”
“Yes but…he’s saying I hid her. That’s not true. The court knows where we live. He could have easily found out.” The wobble in Rose’s voice was back. “What if he goes to the press? What if he …”
“Rose.”
Rose stopped.
“None of that is going to happen,” Lizanne said. “We call your lawyer. Right now. It will all be alright.”
“You can’t promise that.”
“No,” Lizanne said. “But I can promise you aren’t doing this alone. Every resource I have—everything I’ve built—goes toward keeping Daisy exactly where she is.”
Rose looked at her. Her eyes were burning, but she didn’t look away.
“Call your lawyer,” Lizanne said.
***
Later that afternoon, Daniel Reiss sat at the head of the dining table, his legal pad centered in front of him. He was an old school sort of guy, pen and paper vs. tablets and laptops. Sitting around the table were Quinn, Kayla, Pat, Craig, and Rose’s mom, who was on her right, holding her hand, while Lizanne did the same on her left.
Reiss didn’t waste time on a preamble.
“Jeremy Planter has very little to work with,” Reiss said. “He left the state when Daisy was an infant. He hasn’t paid child support. He has no documented contact with her in years. No relationship exists. What he has is a television show suggesting Rose has money now. That brings out people like this.”
