PART 1
“Three years,” I said, staring at the package on my kitchen table. “Three years without one dollar of child support, and when he finally remembers he has a daughter, he sends her this?”
After our divorce, Alexander vanished like we had never existed. He married Camila Whitmore, the heiress of one of the richest families in Manhattan, and their wedding was splashed across every society magazine like some fairytale.
He traded his wife and child for money, designer suits, private flights, and European vacations. And now, out of nowhere, a delivery guy had brought a package to my tiny apartment in Queens.
Inside was an old rag doll.
Dirty.
Torn.
Smelling faintly of dust and something sour.
It felt like an insult wrapped in cardboard.
I grabbed the doll by one leg, ready to throw it straight into the trash, but my five-year-old daughter Sophie launched herself at me like she was protecting something alive.
“No, Mommy, don’t throw her away!” she cried, clutching the ugly little doll against her chest. “It’s from Daddy. My daddy sent it to me.”
My heart broke in a way anger could not protect me from.
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