Chapter 3
Sebastian didn't go home that night.
At least... not to the penthouse he shared with Olivia.
I know because my phone didn't stop buzzing until three in the morning.
Text after text.
Voicemail after voicemail.
Most from Olivia.
Screaming.
Threatening.
Promising to destroy me.
You think one edited recording changes anything? I'll bury you so deep you'll never see your children again.
Sebastian is just confused. He'll come back. He always does.
You have no idea who you're messing with, Hannah. The Carters eat girls like you for breakfast.
I deleted them one by one.
But I saved every single screenshot.
Twice.
Once to the cloud.
Once to a hidden drive only I knew about.
I learned early in life that when people show you who they are...
Believe them the first time.
Olivia Bennett was showing me exactly who she was.
And I would be ready.
---
The first rays of sun were just touching the Chicago skyline when my phone rang again.
This time...
It wasn't Sebastian or Olivia.
It was Eleanor Carter.
Sebastian's mother.
The woman who had personally escorted me out of my own life five years earlier.
I stared at the screen.
Let it ring twice.
Then I answered.
"Hannah," her voice came.
Cold.
Polished.
Dangerous.
Exactly as I remembered.
"We need to talk."
"I don't think we do, Eleanor."
"I think you'll find you don't have a choice. I'm downstairs at your coffee shop. The one with the terrible oat milk lattes. I've already bought out the next two hours. No customers. No staff. Just us. Be here in ten minutes or I walk up to your apartment and we have this conversation in front of those three little mistakes you've been hiding."
My blood turned to ice.
"Mistakes?" I whispered.
"You listen to me, Eleanor Carter—"
"Ten minutes, Hannah. Don't test me. You've already won the first round by getting Sebastian all emotional. But you and I both know... this family doesn't lose. Not to girls like you."
She hung up.
I threw on jeans and a sweater.
Left the still-sleeping children with my oldest employee, Maria, who lived in the apartment below mine and had been with me since the triplets were infants.
"Don't let anyone up," I told her.
"Anyone. Not even the police. Call me the second something feels wrong."
Maria nodded.
She had seen the Carter machine in action before.
She knew exactly what they were capable of.
---
The coffee shop was empty when I arrived.
Just Eleanor.
Sitting at my best table by the window.
Hermès scarf perfectly arranged.
Manicured nails tapping against a porcelain cup.
She looked like she belonged on the cover of a magazine.
But I knew the truth.
Underneath all that silk and perfume...
Beat the heart of a woman who would destroy her own grandchild to protect the family fortune.
"You wanted to talk," I said, sitting across from her.
She didn't offer me coffee.
She didn't even stand.
She just looked at me like I was something she had stepped in on the sidewalk.
"Let's skip the pleasantries, Hannah. We both hate each other far too much for that."
She slid a check across the table.
I didn't need to look at it to know how many zeros were on it.
"Five million dollars," she said.
"Cash. Wire transfer to whatever offshore account you want. No strings. No taxes. Just... you and the children disappear. Move to another country. Change your names. And Sebastian never finds out you existed."
I stared at the check.
Five million dollars.
More money than I would make in ten lifetimes of running Little Harvest Kitchen.
Enough to give the children everything they could ever want.
Enough to never worry about anything ever again.
I picked it up.
Folded it in half.
Then I tore it into tiny pieces.
Right in front of her.
Eleanor's eyes narrowed.
"That was a mistake, Hannah."
"No, Eleanor," I said, brushing the pieces onto the floor.
"That was me telling you exactly how little your money means to me. My children are not for sale. And neither am I."
She leaned forward.
The polite mask slipping just a fraction.
"You think you've won because you have that recording? You think Sebastian is going to ride in on his white horse and save you? Let me tell you how this really works. Sebastian is a Carter first. Always. He might be angry now. He might even break up with poor Olivia for a few weeks. But blood is blood, Hannah. And when the dust settles... he will do what I tell him to do. He always has."
"Is that what you told yourself five years ago?" I shot back.
"When you had me thrown out of my own home? When you made me sign those papers in the hospital? When you told your own son I had lost his babies?"
Her face didn't change.
Not even a flicker.
"I did what was best for this family," she said calmly.
"You were a waitress, Hannah. A nobody. You got pregnant on purpose to trap my son. You thought a baby—or three—would buy you a ticket into the Carter dynasty. I couldn't allow that. The Carter legacy is worth more than your feelings. More than your children. More than anything."
She stood and slipped on her gloves.
One finger at a time.
"Here's what's going to happen. Tomorrow morning, my lawyers will file for full custody. We will argue that you are an unfit mother. We will bring up the time you worked two jobs and left the children with neighbors. We will dig up every mistake you've ever made. Every bad decision. Every late payment. And we will convince a judge that those children belong with us. With people who can give them everything."
She paused at the door.
"Or... you can take the deal. Ten million. My final offer. Walk away now and you get to keep being their mother. Just... somewhere else. Far away from us. Think about it, Hannah. You have until Friday at five. After that... I stop playing nice."
She was gone before I could answer.
I stood alone in my empty coffee shop.
The pieces of her check scattered across my floor like confetti at a funeral.
Ten million dollars.
And a very clear choice.
Take the money and run.
Or stay and fight a woman who had never lost anything in her entire life.
My phone buzzed.
A text from Sebastian.
I just left Olivia. It's over. All of it. I told her I never wanted to see her again. She... didn't take it well. I'm sorry for whatever she's already said to you. It stops today. I promise.
I typed back.
Your mother was just here. She offered me ten million dollars to disappear with the kids. Forever.
Three dots appeared immediately.
Then disappeared.
Then appeared again.
Where are you?
My coffee shop.
Don't move. I'm on my way.
He arrived seven minutes later.
Still in the same clothes from the night before.
Eyes bloodshot.
Exhausted.
But when he saw the torn check on the floor...
Something in him snapped.
"She did this?" he asked quietly.
I nodded.
"She also said she's filing for full custody tomorrow. That she'll paint me as an unfit mother and take my children."
Sebastian walked to the window.
Stared out at the waking city.
His back was to me.
I couldn't see his face.
But I could see his hands.
Clenched so tight his knuckles were white.
"She told me..." he said slowly.
"She told me she was going to 'fix' everything. That she would handle the situation. I told her not to contact you. I told her to leave you alone."
He turned around.
And I saw it then.
The same look I had seen in the hospital five years earlier.
The look of a man who had finally realized his own mother was the villain of his story.
"I'm going to stop her, Hannah," he said.
"Whatever it takes. She will not take those children from you. I swear it on everything I am."
"How?" I asked.
"She's Eleanor Carter. She owns half this city. Judges. Politicians. Police. She can make anything true if she says it loud enough and pays enough people."
Sebastian walked to me.
This time...
I let him take my hands.
His were warm.
Solid.
Real.
"Because I own the other half," he said quietly.
"She built this family. But I'm the one who runs it now. And for five years... I let her think she was still in charge. That ends today. If she wants war... I'll give her one. But you need to know something, Hannah. Once this starts... there's no going back. Everything comes out. Every secret. Every skeleton. Every mistake either of us has ever made. Are you ready for that?"
I thought of my children.
Sleeping safely upstairs.
I thought of five years of struggling.
Of working three jobs.
Of going without so they could have more.
I thought of Eleanor's cold eyes.
And Olivia's threats.
And I squeezed his hands back.
May you like
"I've been fighting since the day I found out I was pregnant with three babies I had to raise alone," I said.
"I'm ready."
