Chapter 4 - The Boardroom and the PlaygroundBy Monday morning, the war had officially begun. But it wasn't fought in courtrooms yet—it was fought on turf I never expected Luca to invade.
I was sitting in the corner booth of a quiet café near Lincoln Park Elementary School, reviewing design layouts for my interior architecture firm, when the brass bell above the door chimed.
A shadow fell over my table.
I looked up.
Luca Moretti stood there, wearing a charcoal cashmere sweater and slacks, looking entirely out of place amidst diaper bags, stroller wheels, and crying toddlers.
"What are you doing here?" I asked, not bothering to hide my annoyance as I closed my laptop.
"I dropped Lily and Lucas off at their preschool," Luca said calmly, sliding uninvited into the booth across from me.
My blood ran cold. I dropped my pen. "You what?"
"I introduced myself to the director," Luca continued, pouring himself a cup of coffee from my pot with infuriating composure. "Brought a few corporate sponsorship proposals for their new playground fund. Turns out, a million-dollar donation buys a lot of administrative flexibility. They were more than happy to let their father take them to class."
"You psychopath," I hissed, leaning across the table, my voice shaking with rage. "You terrorized my children's school?!"
"I didn't terrorize anyone. I spent twenty minutes talking to my son about dinosaurs and tying my daughter's shoelaces," Luca shot back, his dark eyes softening just a fraction before hardening again. "Do you have any idea what it felt like, Nia? Walking into that classroom and realizing I've missed four years of their lives? Four years of their first steps, their first words, their birthdays?"
"And whose fault is that?" I snapped back, my eyes stinging with hot, angry tears that I refused to let fall. "You traded those years for board meetings and society galas! You don't get to waltz back in now and play doting father just because your conscience is bothering you!"
"It's not my conscience, Nia. It's my blood," he said firmly.
Before I could tear into him again, my phone chimed on the table.
An incoming email notification from my corporate bank: Notice of Wire Transfer.
I unlocked the screen and blinked in sheer disbelief.
Fifty million dollars had just been deposited into my personal account by a holding entity linked directly to Moretti Global.
"What is this?" I demanded, shoving the screen in his face.
"A retainer," Luca said smoothly, taking a sip of his coffee. "For you to hire the best family law attorneys in the country—so we can negotiate joint custody without destroying each other in a public trial. Because if we go to court, Nia, I will win. But if we work this out like adults, we can set up a schedule that respects your life while giving me the right to be a father to my children."
I stared at him, my mind spinning. Fifty million dollars. To a man like Luca, it was pocket change. To anyone else, it was an empire.
"I don't want your blood money, Luca," I said, pushing the phone away.
May you like
"It's not blood money. It's child support, retroactively applied," he countered, his expression unyielding. "Keep it, burn it, donate it to an orphanage—I don't care. But I am not walking out of my children's lives again. Tomorrow afternoon, I'm picking them up from school. And you are going to be there, because I am not doing this without you."
He stood up, dropped a hundred-dollar bill onto the table, and walked out of the café with the steady, unshakeable stride of a man who always got what he wanted.
Related Stories
