Chapter 23: Her Table

On Monday morning the press was camped across the street from my father's house, twenty cameras deep.

They had been there since the pier.

Roz stood in the hall with the signed divorce papers in her hand and her glasses pushed up on her head.

"Killian has signed it. You sign the last page again, I file it Tuesday, and you are free. Say the word."

I looked at the paper for a while.

Sammy sat on the bottom stair with his shoes on the wrong feet, eating toast.

"Roz," I said. "Do you have a pen?"

She handed me one.

I did not sign.

I walked across the hall, opened the front door, and stepped onto the top step in my coat.

The cameras woke up all at once.

"Mireille! Mireille, is it true you're divorcing him?"

"Ms. Peabody, what happens to the boy?"

"Is it true your father..."

I put up a hand, and they stopped.

Sammy came out behind me and took hold of two of my fingers.

"My name is Mireille Peabody," I said.

"My father is Sammy's father. Sammy is five, and he is my brother, and I am his legal guardian."

"There is no scandal here, and there is nothing to be ashamed of."

"The woman who tried to make it a scandal is in jail, and she is going to stay there."

A reporter shouted, "And Killian Hayes?"

I looked across the street, past the vans.

He was standing on the far curb in a plain dark coat with his bandaged hand held at his side.

He had been standing there since six.

I had seen him from the landing and said nothing.

"Mr. Hayes," I called. "Come across the street."

The cameras swung.

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