“What happened to you?” he asked, stepping closer.
Madeline swallowed hard. “Dad… Ryan and his sisters took my car. I—I haven’t been able to get it back.”
Jonathan’s expression sharpened—focused, almost dangerous.
“Grab the kids,” he said quietly. “We’re leaving.”
Madeline blinked. “Where?”
Jonathan picked up the stroller as if it weighed nothing.
“To fix this. Today.”
As he made a single phone call, Madeline felt the world shift—because whoever he called answered with: “Yes, sir.” Jonathan drove Madeline and the kids to his apartment—a quiet, spacious unit overlooking the Hudson River. She had only been there twice since her wedding, always telling herself things were fine with Ryan, so there was no need to worry her father.
But as she sat on his couch with a cup of hot tea, Jonathan watched her with a kind of heartbreak only a parent could feel.
“Start from the beginning,” he said.
Madeline hesitated, then everything poured out—the missing car, the insults, the way Olivia and Chloe mocked her for “acting like a princess who wants luxury,” the morning she slipped on ice while carrying both kids because Ryan refused to drive her.