Chapter Thirty-One

LARA

I check on the turkey in the oven yet again and try not to let the pounding of my heart send me into a blind panic. In a matter of less than an hour, Ethan, Riley and his parents will be at my father’s house, and we’ll have our first Thanksgiving dinner together as a whole family.

When Ethan and I had planned this little scheme together I’d known that it was going to be tense. I’d known there was a risk that I would have to really and truly follow through on my threat to cut my father out of my life, and Riley’s, if I couldn’t persuade him to give up the suit. We can’t talk about the situation over dinner itself, so I know I need to take advantage of the last little bit of time before everyone arrives to sit down with my father and make one last plea to him.

Since I’d missed one big family Thanksgiving, I’d already gotten kind of a handle on doing Thanksgiving dinners on my own. For this year, with everything at stake, I’d taken a few short cuts, ordering pies and a few side dishes from a catering company I know makes them well, while focusing on the turkey and stuffing and cranberries and a couple of odds and ends of my own. I’d spent the last couple of days prepping things at my apartment, while watching Riley, and now all I have to do is make sure the turkey comes out the right way, and the stuffing gets cooked through.

I make sure the turkey is doing what it’s supposed to be doing, and then find my father, seated in the living room. He’s been looking sulky and discontented ever since I arrived the night before, but he manages to give me a smile.

“If you want I can cut into one of those pumpkin pies for you,” I say, sitting down on the other end of the couch from him.

“I think I’ll hold off a bit,” Dad says, shifting in his seat and taking a sip of his coffee. The Parade is on, and he’s watching it, but I’ve never seen him looking quite as lonely as he does right now. I have a moment where it hits me again just how desolate my father’s life has gotten since my mother died and then my sister. Apart from me and Riley, who does he really have? A couple of friends he talks to, and my mother’s sister, who’s busy with my cousins’ lives.

“It’s going to be good to have everyone together, and do this for Riley,” I say, keeping my voice as light as possible. If I can keep a fight from happening before Ethan, his parents and Riley get here, I want to make sure to do just that.

“I don’t want to see Ethan or his parents,” Dad says sullenly.

“But you want to see me and Riley, right?” I raise an eyebrow and Dad nods.

“If that’s the only way I get to have my family around me for Thanksgiving, I’ll do it,” he says.

“Dad, I want to talk to you, before anyone gets here,” I say. I take a deep breath, my heart’s started pounding in my chest again. I don’t know, for about two seconds, if I can really go through with this.

“I figured you would,” Dad says. He gives me a slightly chilly smile and sets down his coffee.

“I need you to withdraw the case against Ethan,” I say firmly. I keep my face as neutral as possible, and hold my dad’s gaze as I tell him.

“I’m not going to do that, sweetie. He doesn’t deserve to be a father to Riley after everything he’s done. If it weren’t for him, Riley wouldn’t be getting shuffled between the two of you and Alexis would still be alive,” he says.

I count to three in my mind, controlling my initial reaction as best as I can.

“If it weren’t for him, Riley wouldn’t even exist,” I counter.

“He did one good thing in a slew of terrible ones. That doesn’t give him a pass,” Dad says sullenly.

“He’s Riley’s father, and he loves her. Would you have just sat by while someone tried to take me or Alexis away from you when we were kids?” I raise my eyebrows, giving my father a long, significant look.

“Of course not, but I didn’t rip apart a family to start my own,” Dad insists.

“Ethan’s goal wasn’t to rip a family apart, and if you’re going to blame him for that you need to blame Alexis just as much,” I point out.

“What?” Dad stares at me in shock.

“Alexis wasn’t some puppet. She made a choice. Just as much as Ethan made a choice,” I say. I don’t dare mention the one-night stand. Perhaps my dad knows or guessed, perhaps he doesn’t, but it is certainly not my place to say anything about the parents of his granddaughter.

“Choices that destroyed lives,” Dad says.

“The point stands that she could have told him no, and pushed him out of her life out of loyalty to me, and she chose not to. She ripped this family apart just as much as Ethan did. And she’s dead now, so what does that even matter at this point? The person who’s pulling what remains of this family to shreds is you.”

“I’m trying to re-consolidate my own family,” Dad says to me. I shake my head.

“I need to make something really, completely clear to you, Dad,” I tell him. I am suddenly aware that I have become the parent and he is the one behaving like a child. I take another quick, deep breath. My phone buzzes in my pocket and I’m pretty sure that it’s Ethan letting me know he’s on his way from his parents’ house.

“What’s that, Lara?” I hold my father’s gaze for a long moment, gathering my courage. No matter what I told Ethan the other day when we finally and firmly committed to this course of action, I’ve been having my own doubts too. My own cold feet. But we have to do this, and I know it.

“If you keep this suit up, then I’m going to testify in a way that will guarantee that you can’t have custody of Riley,” I tell him.

“Why would you do that?”

I press my lips together and swallow against the tight feeling in my throat before I speak.

“I can’t let you use Riley as a pawn to get back at Ethan. If you insist on making this a battle, you and Ethan’s parents are going to both be fighting against Ethan and me. I will tell the court the truth. That you’re emotionally unstable, that you’re only doing this for revenge, and that Riley would be better off in a foster care placement than she would be with you,” I say, slowly and quietly.

“You’d put her in foster care?”

I shake my head.

“I have no intention of her ever going to foster care, but I am not going to let you take her away from her father just because you’re lonely and grief-stricken and guilty and bitter,” I tell my father. “If I have to, I’ll make sure that you can’t get any access to her at all, on pain of going to jail, rather than let you harm her like that.” I stand up and go back into the kitchen.

Sure enough, Ethan is on his way.

We should be there in about fifteen. Batten down the hatches.

I smile to myself weakly, the worst part, I hope, of the day should be behind me. The rest of the day the court cases are off the table as conversation topics. Hopefully both my dad and Ethan’s parents take that seriously.

We’ll be ready for you!

I check on the turkey again and remind myself to breathe.