Chapter 12 - WHAT DANIEL WAS REALLY PROTECTING
Their first face-to-face meeting took place in a conference room at Melissa’s office.
Daniel came with his attorney.
Rachel came without the girls.
The purpose was practical: temporary finances, property access, and parenting arrangements before the upcoming hearing.
Daniel looked thinner.
Rachel hated that she noticed.
He avoided looking at her until Melissa mentioned supervised parenting time.
“Absolutely not.”
Rachel spoke before her lawyer could.
“They watched you put me on the floor.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“I never hurt the girls.”
“You made them watch.”
“I was angry.”
“Thirty-one times?”
Daniel’s attorney touched his arm.
Daniel pulled away.
“You want to turn my daughters against me because you found out I had a procedure?”
Rachel stared at him.
“Why did you blame me?”
He looked toward the window.
“You don’t understand what it’s like carrying that place.”
“Then sell it.”
His head snapped around.
There it was.
Not the son.
The farm.
“My father spent his whole life building it.”
“Your father is dead.”
Daniel stood.
His attorney told him to sit.
“You think I don’t know that?”
For the first time, Daniel’s anger cracked enough for something underneath it to show.
He admitted he had not wanted a third child.
The farm was already underwater.
Rachel had nearly died emotionally after June’s birth, though her body recovered.
Daniel feared another baby would break both of them financially.
He also feared telling his father, then later his mother and brother, that he had chosen to end the possibility himself.
“So you made me the coward,” Rachel said.
Daniel’s eyes dropped.
“I needed them off my back.”
“And the bowl?”
He did not answer.
Rachel understood anyway.
Blaming her had worked.
Every time the farm failed, humiliation gave Daniel temporary relief from his own.
Rachel stood.
“You weren’t protecting this family.”
Daniel finally looked at her.
“I was protecting what was left of me.”
May you like
Rachel picked up her bag.
“That’s what you destroyed.”
