Divorced, Yet He Can't Let Me Go novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: Mother

Eleanor Wentworth had never raised her voice in my presence.

She raised it now, in a courthouse corridor with a bailiff, two clerks and a man holding a parking ticket all watching.

"You are not well," she said again. "You were always delicate, dear. We all saw it. A girl who can't hear on one side, who spends her days drawing bunnies, who runs from a fire and into a lawyer's office."

"I didn't run to a lawyer. I haven't got one."

"You ran to a judge. And you showed him a video of a widow."

"I showed him a woman carrying a gas can."

"A woman who buried my younger son!" Eleanor's voice cracked on the last word. "Lorna is all I have left of Daniel. And you want to put her in a prison."

I stopped.

It was the cracked word that stopped me.

I had expected a wall.

I had not expected her to be crying.

"Eleanor," I said, more quietly. "I don't want to hurt anyone who loved Daniel."

"Then drop it."

"I can't."

"She's family."

"I'm family. June is family. She stood at the bottom of my stairs and watched me, Eleanor."

"That is a terrible thing to say about a girl who cooks your dinners."

"Yes," I said. "It is."

For a moment neither of us moved.

Bea came up the corridor with June on her hip, and Eleanor saw her granddaughter.

Her whole face softened.

It was shameful how fast it happened.

"May I?" she whispered.

I thought about saying no.

I thought about it for as long as it takes to breathe in.

Then I put my hand on Bea's arm and nodded.

Eleanor took June and held her against her navy coat, and she shut her eyes.

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