Then she looked at Daniel.
“But I am also going to hear what these children have to say.
And no one in this courtroom will coach, prompt, threaten, or interrupt them.
Is that clear?”
Daniel nodded stiffly.
Lucas pressed play again.
This time the recording began in what sounded like a kitchen.
A cabinet shut.
Glass touched a countertop.
Daniel’s voice said, “Your mother cannot give you what I can.”
Lucas answered, “She takes care of us.”
“Taking care of someone isn’t the same as providing a future.”
“She says we don’t have to choose.”
Daniel laughed once.
It was not a pleasant sound.
“Of course she says that.
She knows she’ll lose if you tell the truth.”
“What truth?”
There was a long silence.
Then Daniel said, “The truth I need you to tell.”
Emily closed her eyes.
Those six words hurt more than the insults she had endured during the divorce.
Not because they were aimed at her.
Because they had been aimed at her son.
Daniel had taken a nine-year-old child and made him responsible for winning an adult battle.
The recording continued.
“You want Mason to stay with you, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then remember what we practiced.”
The device clicked off again.
The judge removed her glasses.
“Lucas, where did this recorder come from?”
Lucas glanced at Emily, then at his father.
“Dad gave it to me last year for a school project.”
Daniel shut his eyes briefly.
The irony landed across the courtroom without anyone saying it aloud.
The judge asked, “Why did you record those conversations?”
Lucas’s fingers tightened against the rail.
“Because nobody believed me when I said Dad kept telling us what to say.”
Emily’s chest tightened.
She had believed something was wrong, but Lucas had never told her that much.
“Who didn’t believe you?” the judge asked.
Lucas looked embarrassed.
“I didn’t really tell anybody everything.
I tried telling Mom that Dad was making things complicated, but she said I didn’t have to talk about court if I didn’t want to.”
The judge nodded.
“So why make the recording?”
Lucas looked at Mason.
“Because he said he could separate us.”
Mason’s head dropped.
Emily instinctively moved toward him, then stopped herself, uncertain whether she was allowed to cross the space.
The judge noticed.
“Mason, you may stand beside your mother if you wish.”
Mason crossed the distance immediately.
He pressed himself against Emily’s side.
Daniel watched him go.
