Call Me By Your Heart novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: The Form

They swabbed my cheek at noon and told me results would be ready by the next morning.

Delilah gave me until four o'clock.

A social worker in a green cardigan called the meeting herself, in the same small room with the box of tissues.

Scott sat on my left.

Marge sat on my right, with her purse in her lap.

Across the table Delilah sat with her father's lawyer and, at the head, Reginald himself, in a fresh suit, calm as a deacon.

The doctor stood by the door.

"We're here to settle who can speak for Jamie," said the social worker. "Mrs. Hargate has asked to present something."

Delilah opened a leather folder.

Her hands were perfectly steady now.

"I'm sorry to do this in front of everyone," she said. "I didn't want my son's illness to turn into a circus. But Ms. MacAleese has made a public claim, and I have the paper that answers it."

She laid two sheets on the table and turned them to face the room.

The first was a form with a gold notary seal.

RELINQUISHMENT OF PARENTAL RIGHTS.

Below it, in blue ink, was a signature.

Brynn M. MacAleese.

The looping B, and the big H with the slash through it.

"Dated six days after the birth," Delilah said. "She signed away all claim to the child. And this..."

She slid the second sheet forward.

It was a photocopy of a check, front and back.

Two hundred thousand dollars.

On the back, a stamp and my name again, and a deposit date.

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