Stop it. He's security. That's all.
"Court will reconvene at 9 AM tomorrow."
The gavel comes down, and I escape to my chambers before anyone can corner me with questions.
When I get up to leave, Cole materializes at my door like he's been there the whole time and shadows me through the marble hallways, down the elevator, across the parking garage. Neither of us speaks. The silence feels like a held breath.
The drive home blurs past in fragments: red lights, pedestrians, the familiar turns I could navigate in my sleep. Cole's hands steady on the wheel while I stare out the window and try not to think about Victoria Lockwood's clinical description of a girl dying while fully conscious.
Unable to call for help. Unable to fight back.
Chesca barrels into me the moment I walk through the door, chattering about her spelling test and the drama on the playground and how Uncle Sal let her have two cookies instead of one. I hold her tighter than usual, breathing in her little-girl smell of playground dirt and strawberry shampoo.
She's here. She's safe.
Dinner is pasta, something easy I can make on autopilot while my mind runs in circles. Chesca sets the table without being asked, her new responsibility since she turned eight, and I pretend not to notice Cole watching us from the living room doorway.
Now that the dishes are done and homework is spread across the counter, the evening has settled into something that almost feels normal.
Almost.
Cole sits in the living room with a book, and the casualness of it makes my skin crawl.
This isn't normal. None of this is normal.
"Mom." Chesca drops her pencil with a dramatic sigh. "This doesn't make sense."
I wipe my hands on a dish towel and lean over her shoulder. Subtraction with regrouping. Third-grade math designed by people who clearly hate both children and parents.
"You have to borrow from the tens column, remember? Cross out the five, make it a four—"
"But WHY?"
Cole's voice comes from the living room. "Common Core has claimed another victim."
Chesca giggles. The sound is bright and unexpected, and something in my chest cracks at the edges.
I bite the inside of my cheek, but the smile escapes anyway.
Stop it. Stop softening toward him. He hasn't earned it.
"Finish the last three problems," I tell Chesca, forcing sternness into my voice. "Then bath, then bed."
"Can Cole read me a story?"
The question hits me like cold water.
"No."
"But—"
"I'll read to you. Like always."
Her face falls, but she doesn't argue. Just bends back over her worksheet, pencil scratching against paper.
I glance at the living room. Cole's watching me over the top of his book. Something unreadable in his expression. Like he expected this. Like he's willing to wait.
I look away first.