“Almost,” Jasper replied in a voice that sounded nothing like the kind man I thought I knew. “She is nervous about the legal language, but I told her it was just a standard family insurance procedure.”
Then I heard his younger brother, Heath, chime in about how they needed that signature to access my trust. My grandmother had left me a house in Columbus and an education fund for Toby and Lulu that I had mentioned to Jasper months ago.
“She is going to sign it,” Jasper said with a dry and arrogant laugh that I will never be able to forget. He told them that I was desperate and afraid of being alone at thirty four with two children from different fathers.
“Poor thing, she actually thinks I am her salvation,” he continued while his family laughed at the idea of me being expensive luggage. Jasper explained that once I signed the document, he would use my assets to pay off his massive gambling debts.
“She is soft and thinks love is about enduring everything,” he whispered with a monstrous kind of certainty. The call finally cut off, leaving me sitting among the wedding decorations while my heart hammered against my ribs.
I looked toward the dark hallway where my children were sleeping and realized they had been trying to warn me for months. The woman who was willing to marry out of fear died in that moment, and a protective mother rose up in her place.
By two in the morning, I had two suitcases open on my bed and was packing only our most essential items. I grabbed our passports, birth certificates, and the small metal box where I kept my emergency freelance savings.
A text from Jasper lit up my phone asking me not to forget the signature on the family portfolio document. I put my phone on airplane mode and went to wake up the children for a surprise trip.
“Do I have to bring that itchy suit Jasper bought for me?” Toby asked with a serious expression. I told him to leave the suit behind and only pack his dinosaur and his favorite building blocks.
We left the house in my old sedan and I placed the keys under the doormat as a silent goodbye to the life he had fabricated. I drove for four hours until we reached a quiet motel where I finally opened the document Jasper wanted me to sign.