Chapter 8 - The Decision Greer Couldn’t Take Back
Two days later, Greer made the call she had been avoiding.
She reported the birthday incident to the Kansas child-protection hotline.
She gave her own name.
She described exactly what happened.
She also disclosed that she had struck Sabine.
The intake worker asked whether Fletcher had been injured.
“No.”
Whether food entered his mouth.
“No.”
Whether there were other known incidents.
“I have concerns. I don’t have proof.”
That answer mattered.
Greer had spent most of her life believing protecting someone meant acting before anyone else could.
Now protection required admitting what she did not know.
Afterward, she cried in her car for five minutes.
Then she called Denise.
“I did it.”
“Good. Now let the professionals decide what the report means.”
“Sabine will know it was me.”
“Yes.”
She did.
By evening, Rick called.
“She says you’re trying to take Fletcher away.”
“I’m trying to make sure nobody forces food into his mouth again.”
“Greer—”
“And Eli hired an attorney.”
Silence.
That was the part Greer could not undo.
Eli had spoken to a Kansas family-law firm.
He intended to establish paternity formally and ask the guardianship court for a structured path into Fletcher’s life.
Not immediate custody.
Not a dramatic removal.
A path.
Rick sounded frightened.
“Why would you bring him into this?”
“He’s Fletcher’s father.”
“You don’t know what kind of man he is.”
“Neither does Fletcher. Because nobody let him find out.”
Rick hung up.
The next morning Sabine’s lawyer emailed Denise.
Greer was no longer welcome on Sabine’s property except by written agreement.
Any attempt to remove Fletcher would be treated as custodial interference.
The letter also described Greer’s assault in detail.
Denise read it twice.
“This is not catastrophic.”
“It feels catastrophic.”
“It’s leverage.”
“Against me.”
“Yes.”
Greer stared at the office carpet.
“What happens now?”
“Now you stop being the person who reacts fastest.”
Eli arrived in Kansas City three days later.
He stayed at a hotel near the airport.
Greer met him in the lobby café.
He did not hug her.
She was grateful.
For the first hour, they talked about Holly.
Not the guardianship.
Not Sabine.
Holly.
Eli knew things Greer didn’t.
That Holly hated decaf coffee.
That she listened to old Motown records when she cleaned.
That Fletcher had kicked whenever Eli played a G chord against Holly’s stomach.
Then Eli slid his phone across the table.
A photograph filled the screen.
Sabine stood outside Holly’s funeral service.
She was facing Eli.
Beside them stood Rick.
Greer zoomed in.
Her father’s hand rested on Eli’s shoulder.
Not aggressively.
Almost sympathetically.
“You said Dad told you it wasn’t a good time,” Greer said.
“He said more than that.”
Greer looked up.
Eli’s face was tired.
“He told me Holly had made a decision before she died.”
“What decision?”
“That Fletcher would never know I was his father.”
Greer stopped breathing.
“Did my mother say that?”
Eli looked toward the window.
“I believed him.”
May you like
Then he looked back.
“Until Sabine started answering my messages as you.”
