Chapter 7
Celina finally requested a formal meeting.
She arrived at Rachel’s office with her own lawyer.
She looked different without the engagement ring.
Smaller somehow.
Less certain.
Luciano felt no satisfaction.
Rachel began.
“Why did you seek residential placement information for Ellie?”
Celina looked at Luciano.
“Because she was struggling.”
“No,” Luciano said. “She wasn’t.”
“You weren’t there.”
There it was.
Not denial.
An attack on his absence.
“You traveled constantly.”
“I checked her school.”
“Children behave differently at school.”
“I spoke to Maria.”
“Maria worships that child.”
“I spoke to the babysitter you fired.”
Celina stopped.
Luciano continued.
“I spoke to her teacher. Her pediatrician. Marianne. The swimming instructor. The house staff.”
Celina’s lawyer intervened.
“My client is not required to justify every childcare concern.”
Luciano looked at Celina.
“She is if the concern ends with my three-year-old’s bedroom being emptied.”
Celina’s eyes filled.
“I was trying to help.”
“By telling her she was going to an orphanage?”
“I lost my temper.”
“You keep calling decisions tempers.”
Celina looked down.
Luciano placed the household calendar on the table.
“Why were nearly all the appointments scheduled when I was away?”
She hesitated.
“Convenience.”
“Why was Maria off?”
“No reason.”
“Why did you replace two other caregivers before you started reporting behavior problems?”
Her face changed.
Luciano saw it.
Not guilt exactly.
Fear of the sequence.
Rachel leaned forward.
“What outcome were you trying to create?”
Celina whispered, “I wanted the house to work.”
Luciano frowned.
“What does that mean?”
She looked at him.
“I wanted us to have a chance to be a family.”
“You were removing my daughter.”
“I was trying to make you see what was happening.”
“What was happening?”
Celina opened her mouth.
Then stopped.
Her lawyer touched her arm.
The meeting ended.
But Luciano understood one thing he had not before.
May you like
Celina did not see herself as someone trying to destroy his family.
She believed Ellie was the reason the family Celina wanted could not exist.
