Chapter 19: Colleen's Last Move

Jo's POV

Sam was off the step before Colleen's knuckles touched my door.

I was right behind him, in his coat, crossing the road in the dark.

"Don't knock," I said.

She turned.

Her hand was still raised, and Cody's backpack hung from her other shoulder.

"I'm not here to fight," she said. "It's midnight, Jo. I'm here for my son."

"He's asleep."

"Then I'll wake him."

"You'll wake the whole street," Sam said.

Porch lights had started coming on along Linden Court.

The woman with the ponytail stood in her bathrobe at the end of her walk.

One of the carpool mothers had her phone up.

The front door of 118 opened.

Carlton stood in it, gray in the face.

Behind him on the stairs, in sweatpants and bare feet, was Cody.

"Mom," he said.

"Baby, get your shoes. We're going."

"No."

She closed her eyes for a moment.

When she opened them she had put the smile back on, thinner than before.

"Jo," she said. "Let's be adults. You want your house. I want my son to have a fresh start. Those aren't so far apart."

"Go on."

"I'll give you twenty thousand dollars. Tonight."

She lifted her chin.

"You drop whatever you plan to do about that deed, and I take Cody to Atlanta. Everyone walks away."

"Twenty thousand dollars," I said.

Keep reading free with an account. Start He Gave My House to His Ex, So I Took My Life Back from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.