Chapter 22: The Hearing
The hearing was on a gray Tuesday in November.
Chatham County Superior Court, courtroom 4B.
Darnell hadn't withdrawn the petition yet.
He couldn't.
Ethan had explained it to us. If Darnell simply dismissed the case, Renée could find another way. Another lawyer. Another angle. Another petition in another county.
But if the truth came out in a courtroom, on the record, in front of a judge, there would be no more angles.
"Can he do that without his own lawyer finding out?" I'd asked.
"Hargrove Bell represents him," Ethan said. "But he's the client. He can fire them any time he wants."
"When?"
Ethan smiled thinly.
"Timing," he said, "is everything."
The courtroom was half empty.
Renée Dupree sat in the second row behind the petitioner's table. She wore a cream-colored suit and pearls. She looked so much like her sister that my father went pale when he saw her.
She smiled at him.
Darnell sat at the petitioner's table beside a silver-haired attorney named Phillip Vance. Vance had three junior associates and two rolling cases of binders.
Judge Gloria Ashford took the bench. Sixty, Black, reading glasses on a chain, and a reputation for having no patience at all for games.
Vance stood.
He spoke for twenty minutes.
He was very good.
He talked about due process. About the sacrifice of military service. About a father denied the most basic right in American law: to know his own child.
Then he talked about me.
About the yacht. About a "grieving, distracted single father" who had left a medically fragile three-year-old "with a near-stranger" and "retired to a private stateroom."
He held up a photograph of the starboard rail.
"This child," he said, "nearly died under the supervision this court is being asked to preserve."
I gripped the edge of my chair.
My father's hand clamped onto my knee.
Vance finished.
"We ask the court to vacate the adoption and award temporary custody to Mr. Price pending a full hearing."
He sat down.
Judge Ashford looked over her glasses at the petitioner's table.
"Mr. Price. Is there anything you'd like to add before I hear from the respondent?"
Darnell stood up.
Vance whispered something to him sharply. Darnell ignored him.
"Yes, Your Honor," Darnell said. "I'd like to fire my lawyer."
The courtroom went silent.
Vance turned in his chair. "Mr. Price—"
"I'd like to fire my lawyer," Darnell repeated, "and withdraw my petition. With prejudice. And I'd like to tell the court who's been paying for it."
Behind him, Renée Dupree's smile froze.
Judge Ashford set down her pen.
"Go on, Mr. Price."
Darnell reached into his jacket and took out a folded stack of papers. Marcus Webb's work.
"I've never paid Hargrove Bell a dime, Your Honor," he said. "They were paid by the Southern Heritage Family Fund. That fund is run by Ms. Renée Dupree, sitting right there. She's the sister of Celeste Callahan, the woman serving twenty-five years for trying to drown my daughter."
A murmur ran through the courtroom.
Renée stood up. "That is absolutely—"
"Sit down, ma'am," Judge Ashford said, without raising her voice.
Renée sat.
Darnell kept going. His voice was shaking, but he didn't stop.
"Ms. Dupree told me Mr. Callahan was negligent. She told me he was asleep while my daughter nearly died. She told me I'd never see Zuri unless I sued. She never once told me that her own sister was the one who held my baby over the ocean and let her go."
He turned and looked at Renée.
"You used me," he said. "You used my grief. You used my baby girl's mama's memory. And you used me to try to take a child from the only father she's ever known, so your sister could get out of prison and your family could get her money."
Renée's face had gone white beneath her makeup.
Darnell turned back to the judge.
"Your Honor, I didn't know my daughter existed for six years. That's a real wrong. Somebody should have looked for me harder. But Zuri doesn't need to pay for that. She's paid enough." His voice cracked. "I met her three weeks ago. She showed me how her sugar phone works. She told me her Mommy Simone is taking care of her first mommy in heaven."
He wiped his eyes.
"She has a daddy. He's sitting right there. He hung upside-down off a boat for her. I'm not going to be the one who takes that away."
He looked at me.
"I'd just like to be her friend," he said. "If he'll let me."
Judge Ashford was silent for a long moment.
Then she took off her reading glasses.
"Mr. Price," she said. "Your petition is withdrawn with prejudice. This adoption stands."
I couldn't breathe.
"Furthermore," the judge said, turning slowly toward the second row, "this court is referring the matter of the Southern Heritage Family Fund, its funding sources, and its director's contact with the petitioner to the Chatham County District Attorney and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for investigation of fraud, witness tampering, and interference with a protected victim."
May you like
Renée Dupree stood up, grabbed her purse, and walked quickly toward the exit.
Two sheriff's deputies were already standing at the door.
