Chapter 23: Served

Calvin stopped at the foot of the steps and held up his folder for the camera.

"I'm here to make a statement," he said. "The press should hear this."

The man with the camera on his shoulder swung it toward Elise.

Nobody stopped him.

"Good morning," Calvin said, in the warm, grave voice he used for investors.

"I'm Calvin Kenyon, the former chairman of this company, and I'm here as a father."

He opened the folder.

"This is an emergency petition for custody of my daughter, June. I have grave concerns for her safety."

A murmur ran around the plaza.

"Her mother burned our home's contents in a fit of rage. She was filmed striking me in public."

"She has left our baby with strangers, and she is in a relationship with a married man."

"A married man," Elise repeated.

"Nolan Fairchild was married until Monday. I have the dates."

He turned to the camera, wearing the sad smile.

"I only want what's best for her."

Elise handed June to her mother.

Margaret took the baby without a word.

Elise came down the steps one at a time and stopped three feet from Calvin.

The lens followed her.

"Everything he said is true," she said, to the camera.

Calvin blinked.

"I burned what he gave me."

"I slapped him in a ballroom, in front of two hundred people, after he gave my family's heirloom to his other baby."

"I slept with Nolan Fairchild on Sunday night. He had filed for divorce that morning, and I'd been separated from my husband for two months."

"That is the whole of it."

She looked straight into the lens.

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