Chapter 17 - The Poisoned Hour
The visitation room was painted a sterile pastel yellow, filled with plastic toys and monitored by a bored social worker named Mrs. Higgins, who sat behind a glass partition typing on her computer.
I sat in the corner, every muscle in my body coiled like a steel spring, as Daniel sat on the floor opposite Noah.
Noah, now clinging to my leg, looked confused and terrified by the strange man with the intense, unblinking eyes.
"Hey buddy," Daniel whispered, extending a plastic fire truck toward my son. His voice carried that synthetic warmth he always used when cameras were around. "Look what Daddy brought you."
Noah shrank back, burying his face into the fabric of my skirt. "No. Want Mama."
A dark flash of fury passed across Daniel’s eyes before he masked it with a patient smile for the supervisor's benefit. He leaned closer under the pretense of tying his shoelace, putting his face inches from mine.
"You taught him well, didn't you, Grace?" he whispered, his voice dropping into a venomous hiss so low that the microphone across the room couldn't pick it up. "Enjoy holding him while you still can. Sterling’s lawyers are already drafting the petition for sole physical custody. I’m going to take this boy, strip your foundation of every dime, and send you back to the gutter you crawled out of."
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"Touch him, Daniel," I whispered back, my voice vibrating with a primal, lethal ferocity I didn't know I possessed, "and you won't survive long enough to spend Sterling's money."
Daniel chuckled, a sound like dry leaves scraping over concrete. "We'll see, Grace. The game has only just begun."
