Chapter 7: The Bentley Ride
nside the Bentley, Caleb climbed into Ava’s lap even though he was getting too big for it.
“Mom, that man looked scared,” he said.
Lucas frowned. “He looked like the picture in Grandpa Arthur’s old newspaper.”
Ava’s hand stilled.
Noah leaned against her side. “Do we know him?”
The driver, Henry, kept his eyes on the road.
Ava looked at her sons. She had promised herself she would not lie to them when the question finally came.
But she had hoped for more time.
“You saw someone from my past,” she said.
Caleb’s eyes widened. “A bad guy?”
“Not a villain in a storybook way,” Ava said gently. “A man who made a very wrong choice.”
Lucas watched her carefully. “Did he hurt you?”
Ava took a slow breath.
“He hurt me with lies. And by not trusting me when it mattered.”
Noah’s small hand slid into hers.
“Did he say sorry?”
Ava looked out the window at Los Angeles blurring past—the palm trees, the glass towers, the bright cruel sunlight.
“No,” she said. “Not yet.”
At the Whitmore estate in Bel Air, Arthur waited in the library, seated in a wheelchair near the fireplace. Age had weakened his legs but not his presence. The boys rushed to him, all talking at once.
“We saw Mom!”
“At the airport!”
“A man was mean!”
“He looked like us!”
Arthur’s gaze lifted to Ava.
So it had happened.
Ava kissed the boys and asked their tutor to take them to the garden. Lucas lingered, clearly wanting to stay, but obeyed.
When the door closed, Arthur’s face hardened.
“Julian Hart?”
“Yes.”
“And Vanessa Vale?”
“Yes.”
Arthur’s fingers tightened on the armrest.
Ava walked to the window.
“He saw the boys.”
Arthur was quiet for a long moment.
“Then he will come.”
“I know.”
“And when he does?”
Ava turned back.
“Then he will finally hear the truth,” she said. “But not as my husband. Not as the man who once had the right to demand answers.”
Arthur nodded slowly.
“As what, then?”
May you like
Ava’s voice was steady.
“As the man who signed away his family because he trusted a lie more than the woman carrying his children.”
