Chapter 181

Lily's POV

The drive down from Silver Peak took three hours, but I barely registered the passing landscape—pine forests giving way to foothills, mountains shrinking in the rearview mirror until they were just a jagged line on the horizon. My hands gripped the steering wheel of the rental sedan, knuckles white, while my mind stayed fixed on the nursery I'd left behind.

William had still been asleep when I'd kissed his forehead one last time, my lips lingering against his warm skin until I thought I might not be able to pull away. Tuesday, I'd whispered into his downy hair, though he couldn't understand. I'll be back Tuesday. Mama's not leaving you. Not really.

But it had felt like leaving. It had felt like tearing myself in half.

Ryan had stood in the doorway of the East Wing, watching me load my single suitcase into the trunk. I'd packed light—just my clothes, my laptop, the divorce papers tucked into the side pocket where I wouldn't have to look at them yet. Everything else stayed behind: William's clothes, his toys, the carefully organized nursery supplies. They belonged here now. To Silver Peak. To the Carter family heir.

"The custody agreement is in your email," Ryan had said, his voice carefully neutral, like we were discussing a business transaction instead of dividing up our son's life. "Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday. Nine AM to six PM. If you want to stay longer, or if—"

"I'll follow the agreement," I'd cut him off, unable to bear the way he was trying to be generous when we both knew the terms had already stripped me bare. "I won't ask for more. You don't need to offer me charity."

"Lily—"

"Don't." I'd finally looked at him then, saw the shadows under his eyes that matched my own. "We agreed. You let go, I let go."

He'd nodded, stepped back, given me space to leave. And I'd driven away without looking back, because if I'd looked back I would have seen Silver Peak in the morning light—that beautiful prison where my son was waking up without me—and I wouldn't have been able to keep driving.

Now, three hours later, I pulled up outside the Denver apartment building and sat in the car for a long moment, engine ticking as it cooled, staring up at the unremarkable brick facade. This was it. My new life. The one I'd chosen.

The one that didn't include waking up to William's sleepy coos, or his small fingers wrapped around mine, or the weight of him in my arms while I nursed him in the pre-dawn quiet.

My phone buzzed. A text from Megan: Landed. Be there in 20. Don't you dare start unpacking without me.

I allowed myself a small smile. Megan had insisted on flying out from San Francisco despite my protests, had probably already booked herself into some boutique hotel downtown and planned a week's worth of "healing activities" that would involve wine and aggressive positivity. The thought was exhausting and comforting in equal measure.

The apartment was exactly as I'd left it over a year ago—back when Ryan and I had reconciled, back when I'd believed we could make it work. The landlord had kept it for me all this time, some arrangement Ethan had made that I'd been too grateful to question. I let myself in with the key that still fit the lock, set my suitcase by the door, and stood in the middle of the living room that felt like an archaeological site from another life.

Dust coated every surface. The air was stale, trapped. Furniture sat exactly where I'd left it—the secondhand couch, the coffee table with the wobbly leg, the bookshelf still half-filled with my computer science textbooks from CVU. It looked like a museum exhibit: The Life of Lily Parker, Before. Before Ryan came back. Before Silver Peak. Before William. Before everything fell apart and I ended up right back where I'd started, only now I was someone's mother and someone's ex-wife instead of just myself.

I walked to the window and pulled back the curtains, releasing a cloud of dust that made me cough. Afternoon light flooded in, harsh and unforgiving, illuminating every cobweb and water stain. This place had waited for me like a patient ghost, and now I was supposed to fill it with furniture, with life, with anything that would make it feel less like a way station and more like home.

But all I could picture was the nursery at Silver Peak. The Italian crib. The soft morning light. William's face when he woke up and I wasn't there.

I pressed my palm against my stomach and let myself break. Just for a minute. Just long enough to cry until my throat was raw and my eyes burned and the worst of the grief had somewhere to go.

Then I wiped my face, unpacked my laptop, and opened my email.

Work. I needed work. I needed to be Lily Parker again, not just William's mother or Ryan's ex-wife or the woman who'd failed to keep her family together. I needed to remember who I'd been before all of this—before the marriage, before the pregnancy, before I'd convinced myself that love would be enough.

The email from Ethan was waiting at the top of my inbox, timestamped from this morning: [Welcome back. Your desk is ready whenever you are. No pressure—take the time you need. But we miss you. —E]

Simple. Professional. Kind without being pitying. Exactly what I needed.

I typed out a response before I could second-guess myself: [I'll be in Monday. Thank you for holding my position.]

Tomorrow would be Monday. Less than twenty-four hours to transform from the woman who'd just left her son at Silver Peak into Lily Parker, software engineer, ready to rejoin the world of code and deadlines and normal professional life. As if any of this was normal. As if I could just flip a switch and become the person I'd been before.

Then I opened the custody agreement and forced myself to read through it one more time, even though I'd already memorized every word. The mother shall have visitation rights on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday of each week, from 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM... Cold. Clinical. Reducing my relationship with my son to a schedule, to hours and days that someone else had decided were sufficient.

My phone rang. Ryan's name on the screen.