Saved and Saving: The Single Daddy CEO

Chapter Three

Blaiz

As I expected, Dominique was playing in his bedroom when I arrived home. Naturally, the first thing I did was go to his room and give my son a big hug. Sadly, he wouldn’t get up from his spot on the floor until I told him it was okay to get up.

Abrielle didn’t drop him off last weekend like she was supposed to. I hadn’t got to spend quality time with Dominique for almost three weeks. It was one of the longest stretches Abrielle had gone without asking me for money since her most recent divorce.

If only she would pack up and go back to Europe without our son. Then we could live a peaceful life that doesn’t involve being used all the time. The fact that she used Dominique to get money, and not just from me, was the most infuriating thing about that damn woman.

I could have gotten over all the lies and cheating. In time. But I can’t get over the way she treats our son.

Anytime he is with her, all he does is stand there with his head down and his hands resting in front of him. If he gets excited and starts laughing, he gets immediately shushed or straight up told to shut the f**k up.

If it were up to me, he wouldn’t spend another second with that shitty excuse of a mother. No kid deserves to be treated that way.

After giving Dominique a long hug, I took his little hand in mine and led him to the dining room. It was almost nine at night, so I figured he had eaten dinner already, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t share a fun dessert.

Dominique was only six years old. Yep, you read that correctly. Abrielle left me for another man when he was just over a year old. As you can tell, that marriage didn’t last long either.

After I made sure Dominique was sitting safely at the dining table, I stepped into the kitchen and got us both a serving of peach cobbler with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Cobbler became my all-time favorite dessert the first time I had it after moving to the States. Now my staff knows to keep some made at all times. I guess you could say it is my comfort food.

When I set the plates down on the table, Dominique beamed a smile at me and started to squeal with excitement, but he quickly stifled it, only letting a tiny, little squeak leave his mouth before throwing his hand over it to stop himself. I had to stop myself from instinctively frowning, knowing his behavior was the result of his mother’s harsh treatment towards him.

Instead, I returned the smile and let out a “woohoo” to show Dominique that it is okay to express his excitement whenever he is with me. He is the center of my life, and I was determined to change the way things had been going.

It wasn’t fair for Dominique to be used as a pawn in Abrielle’s schemes just to be mistreated the rest of the time. I couldn’t stand back and allow this nonsense to continue any longer. It was having too much of a negative effect on my son, and I had to make a plan right away.

As we ate our cobbler in silence, I thought about the different ways I could go about this, but none of them were fast solutions. I could go through the courts and get full custody, but the courts are slow, and this couldn’t wait any longer.

I could attempt to reason with Abrielle, but to what avail. We all know that she isn’t going to easily part with her one regular source of money.

By the time we had both finished eating our cobbler, I still hadn’t thought of a good idea. Instead of thinking any further, I pushed the thought to the back of my mind for the moment, so I could enjoy this time with Dominique.

After putting our dishes in the kitchen, I led Dominique to the back patio. It was a bit chilly, but I made sure he had a thick blanket wrapped around him.

While out there, we admired the stars while talking about how school was going for him. He was now a first-grader, and they were starting to read the harder books. Dominique told me about how he had been struggling with a lot of the words, and that he had tried to get his mom to help, but she refused. Just another reason to get him the hell away from her.

We talked for close to an hour before I insisted we go back inside and warm up. I should have been going to bed to ensure a good night’s sleep before the banquet tomorrow, but I had more important matters to tend to. Starting with a nighttime reading lesson and bedtime story for Dominique.

Losing track of the time, I helped Dominique read through five of the books he had been struggling with. By the time we finished, it was nearly two in the morning, so I gave Dominique a goodnight kiss to his forehead and got a half-slurred goodnight from him, making me chuckle a little.

I swear, at this point in my life, this kid was my entire reason for living. He gave me the motivation to be a better person than before, and to do things based on his needs over my own.

Once I got myself into bed, I went back to racking my brain, trying to come up with some way to make life better for my son. Some way to get Abrielle out of his life and out of mine. Sadly, some people just aren’t meant to care for children, and Abrielle is most certainly one of them.

I must have laid there, pondering the possibilities for nearly two hours, when I concluded I only had one choice and it would be a long shot. At first light, we would pack up and leave. Nothing would be left behind, except Abrielle.