“Good morning to you.” He extends his hand to me. I shake it awkwardly.
“I brought…” I put a carton with two coffees on his desk and sit. “I didn’t know what you preferred, so I got a black one without sugar and one with cream.”
“You shouldn’t have bothered.”
“I also brought…” I place the envelope on his table. “Two scones. One is wholemeal.”
Rowan raises an eyebrow.
“I imagined that…” I point at him with an awkward gesture. “Well, that… You work out a lot.”
He cannot hide a smirk. “You say?”
“It certainly doesn’t go unnoticed all your…” I stop, looking for the right word. “Muscles.”
This time, he laughs.
“Thanks for the coffee, which I prefer black, no sugar.”
I hand him the right cup, happy to have guessed right.
“But you don’t have to bother, really.”
“No bother. After all you are doing for me, it is the least.”
“I haven’t done anything yet.”
“But I trust you.”
“Mmm…”
“You’re my lawyer, right?”
“I am.” He takes a sip of coffee, then sets the cup on the desk next to a stack of papers that I’m afraid are pertinent to my case.
“So,” I begin, nervous. “What’s… what’s going on?”
Rowan takes off his glasses and looks me straight in the eye. “There is no other way to say this.”
“O-okay.”
“The kids’ grandmother, Mrs McCormack, has applied for sole custody. And that’s not all. She has requested their immediate removal from your care.”
I touch my chest with my hand, feeling the weight of his words.
“She considers you unfit to take care of them. And she believes you can be a bad influence.”
“She doesn’t even know me!”
“She has produced a lot of... Evidence to support her thesis.”
“Evidence? What kind of evidence?”
Rowan puts on his glasses again, opens the folder and takes out some photos; he arranges them on the desk under my nose.
“It was a party. A theme party,” I justify myself after seeing photos of The Full Monty night a few months ago at the club.
He pulls out more, arranging them on the desk.
