Chương 2
I placed both hands on the table.
“My name is on the deed.”
Charles blinked.
Only once.
But I saw it.
A tiny crack.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I do.”
“You think because Lucas added your name that everything is protected?”
The way he said it made my stomach drop.
Not because he sounded confident.
Because he sounded like someone who had already planned this conversation.
I looked at the folder.
“Where did you get those documents?”
He did not answer.
Courtney crossed her arms.
“You’re making this dramatic.”
I turned toward her.
“My husband died three weeks ago.”
Her face tightened.
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
The words came out quieter than I expected.
“You know the date. You know the funeral. You know when my life became convenient for you.”
Charles stepped forward.
“Enough.”
“No.”
I had spent my entire life making myself smaller around that man.
I lowered my voice when he raised his.
I apologized when he was wrong.
I explained myself until I was exhausted.
But Lucas was gone.
And somehow losing him had taken away the part of me that still believed keeping peace was the same thing as being safe.
“You don’t get to walk into my house and erase me.”
Charles grabbed my arm.
The movement was so fast my mind struggled to catch up.
“Dad.”
I pulled away.
His grip tightened.
“Don’t do this.”
“Let go.”
“Listen to me.”
“No.”
The word barely left my mouth before his hand moved.
His fingers caught in my hair.
Pain flashed across my scalp.
The chair scraped behind me.
My hand went immediately to my stomach.
“Charles.”
I said his name differently than I had ever said it before.
Not like a daughter.
Like a stranger.
He dragged me toward the front door.
The kitchen blurred.
The walls Lucas painted himself.
The coffee mug he bought me because it had a crooked handle and he thought it was funny.
The little wooden sign above the doorway that said home.
All of it moved past me while my father pulled me out of it.
Behind us, Courtney laughed.
Not loudly.
Not hysterically.
Just enough.
Enough to make sure I heard.
“Dad, stop.”
He opened the door.
Cold air hit my face.
Then he shoved me.
My knee struck the porch.
I caught myself with both hands before my stomach hit the wooden boards.
For a moment, nobody moved.
Then warmth spread down my legs.
I looked down.
My breath disappeared.
“My water broke.”
Courtney stopped smiling.
Only for a second.
Then her expression returned.
“Charles…”
But he was already looking back inside the house.
Not at me.
At Lucas’s office.
At the place where he believed money was waiting.
That hurt more than the fall.
The fact that my father was more worried about what was inside the house than what he had just done to me.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone.
My fingers shook.
Not because I was afraid.
Because I was trying not to become the version of myself he expected.
The crying daughter.
The confused widow.
The woman who would beg.
I called Samantha Vance.
Lucas’s attorney.
She answered immediately.
“Victoria?”
“My father is inside my house.”
There was a pause.
Not a confused pause.
A concerned one.
“What happened?”
“He attacked me.”
Her voice changed.
“Are you injured?”
“My water broke.”
Another silence.
Then everything on her end became movement.
“Victoria, listen to me carefully. Do not go back inside.”
“I’m not.”
“Call emergency services.”
“After that, call me back.”
“Samantha…”
“Yes?”
“What is going on?”
I heard papers moving on her desk.
“Your father contacted my office yesterday.”
The porch suddenly felt colder.
“He said you authorized him to manage Lucas’s estate.”
I looked through the open doorway.
Charles was inside the house.
Searching.
“He forged my signature?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“But?”
“But Lucas prepared for the possibility that someone would try to interfere after his death.”
I closed my eyes.
The baby moved beneath my hand.
“What does that mean?”
“It means your husband knew there were people around him who cared more about what he owned than who he loved.”
A siren sounded in the distance.
Inside the house, Charles’s phone rang.
He reached into his pocket.
His face changed when he saw the screen.
For the first time that morning, my father looked afraid.
And I understood something.
He had not walked into my home because he was certain he would win.
He had walked in because he thought I was too broken to stop him.
He had made the mistake of confusing grief with weakness.
I watched him answer the phone.
And I waited.
The person on the other end of that call changed everything about the room before anyone even spoke.
Charles stood near Lucas’s office doorway with the phone pressed against his ear, his back turned toward me.
For the first time since he arrived, he looked unsure.
“Mr. Baldwin, I’m going to need you to stop touching anything in that office,” a woman’s voice said through the small gap between the phone and his ear.
My father turned slowly.
He looked toward the porch.
Toward me.
His face tightened.
“Who is this?”
“Detective Alvarez with the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office.”
The color drained from his face.
Courtney stepped closer to him.
“What happened?”
Charles ignored her.
“You don’t understand.”
Detective Alvarez’s voice remained calm.
“I understand that a call was made from this residence reporting a physical assault and a possible unlawful attempt to remove a homeowner from her property.”
Charles glanced at me.
His expression was no longer angry.
It was calculating.
That was something I had learned about him over the years.
Anger was what he showed people.
Calculation was what he hid.
“I’m her father,” he said.
The detective did not respond immediately.
That silence made him uncomfortable.
“My daughter is confused because she’s grieving.”
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I almost laughed.
Not because it was funny.
