You decided it, and a camera recorded it, and worst of all — worst of everything — your son was lying right there, and he learned your answer.

That’s the part you’ll never be able to fix.

Not the divorce, not the custody, not the money.

The part where Leo asked you to stay, and you took his hands off your arm, and he found out, at five years old, precisely where he stood with his father.”

Chapter 17 — Swift and Unmerciful

Over the following six months, the family court proceedings were swift, and thorough, and unmerciful in the specific way that facts are unmerciful once someone finally lays them all on the table at once.