Chapter 6 - The Letter from Middlebury
Adam took the envelope with fingers that felt completely numb. He walked out of the law firm, down the elevator, and into his parked car in the underground garage.
He sat in the driver’s seat of his Mercedes, the engine idling silently in the concrete cavern. He slid a finger under the envelope's flap and tore it open.
Inside was a single sheet of heavy, off-white stationary. Her handwriting was crisp, clean, and entirely devoid of the tremors that had marked her final entries in the blue notebook.
Adam,
If you are reading this, Arthur has explained the legal situation to you. Do not waste your firm’s money trying to overturn the temporary custody order. You will lose, and it will only make the public details of your time in Naples worse for your firm's shareholders.
I am writing this not out of anger, but out of a desperate need for clarity. For three years, I believed we were building a life together. When I became pregnant, I thought we were building a family. But on March 1st, when they cut our daughter out of my body and you looked at your watch because you were worried about missing your flight to Florida, I realized the truth.
You did not want a family, Adam. You wanted an accessory. You wanted a wife who looked elegant at your company galas, a mother who produced an heir without causing inconvenience to your routine, and a home that operated like a five-star hotel where you were the perpetual guest of honor.
When my incision tore on the fifth night, and I lay on the floor of Nell’s nursery holding her while blood soaked through my nightgown, I called you eleven times. The nurse was not there yet. I couldn't reach the phone on the counter. I lay there on the rug for forty minutes listening to our daughter cry, waiting for you to answer.
When you finally texted me three hours later asking if I had remembered to dry-clean your tuxedo for the April gala, I knew my marriage was dead.
Nell is doing well. Her fever has dropped. She weighs eight pounds now. She has your eyes, Adam—the same dark, restless eyes that are always looking past the person in front of you toward something else.
Do not come here. If you want to see your daughter, you will comply with the court's required parenting evaluation. You will attend the court-ordered anger management and therapy sessions. You will show up to the custody hearing in May as a man who understands what he broke.
The roses you left on the counter were lovely. Pink and white. They were the same flowers you bought me when you proposed in Montreal. Did you remember that, or did the florist at the airport pick them out for you?
Marina.
Adam dropped his head against the steering wheel.
The horn blared loudly in the quiet garage, an agonizing, continuous cry that echoed off the concrete walls. He pressed his face hard into his arms and let out a sound he hadn't made since he was a child—a wretched, sobbing gasp that ripped through his chest.
The florist at the airport had picked them out. He hadn't even looked at the bouquet. He had just handed over his card and said, "Give me whatever looks expensive."
He lifted his head, his eyes burning with salt water, and stared at his reflection in the rearview mirror. He saw a stranger—a man surrounded by luxury, wrapped in Italian wool, driving an eighty-thousand-dollar automobile, completely and utterly alone.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket, found the contact for his Managing Director, and hit call.
“Adam?” his director answered. “Where are you? The board meeting for the Shoreline development starts in twenty minutes.”
“Cancel my appearances for the next two months,” Adam said, his voice flat and dead.
“What? Adam, you’re leading the pitch!”
“I’m taking a personal leave of absence,” Adam said. “Effective immediately. Put Vance in charge.”
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“Adam, are you crazy? If you step back now, you lose your senior partnership track!”
“I’ve already lost everything that matters,” Adam said, and hung up the phone.
