Chapter Ten

"What's the main concern here Mrs. Scott?"

"Please, call me Brooke." Brooke smiled at the middle aged lawyer sitting behind his cherry wood desk in his high class office, "The main concern here is my children. I want them to be safe."

"And you don't think they could be safe in St. Louis with their father?"

"No, at least not yet. Lucas just… announced one day that he was gay and my kids, the two younger ones, they don't understand what that means. And I don't think they need to find out by experiencing it first hand. To them… this whole thing is confusing and I don't want to confuse them further by sending them to a place they've never even heard of for any extended period of time."

"Ok…" The lawyer took some notes and looked back over at Brooke, "The base fact is that Lucas, try as he might, will probably not be able to take everything from you. Something like that rarely happens these days and certainly not in these circumstances."

"That's good then…"

"There's a catch though." The lawyer stopped her mid-celebration, "Settlements are exactly as they sound… they make both parties SETTLE. You want full custody of your kids then you're going to have to give up something else. You want the house, that's something else you have to be willing to give up. You understand what I'm saying?"

"I don't want full custody though. I want him to be able to see them whenever he wants, but I want him to do it here. He's the one pushing for full custody now."

"Alright…" The lawyer paused and nodded for a minute while he thought, "I would like to wait until he makes the first move then. Let him file his petition for divorce with everything that he wants to get out of it. His lawyer can contact me and then when I have his list of demands, I'll contact you and we can go over it. See if there's anything we can give him and we'll go from there. How does that sound?"

Brooke looked to Nathan for reassurance and he nodded at her.

"Ok. That sounds good." Brooke agreed.

"Alright, I will call you as soon as I hear anything. If Lucas contacts you again, my advice as your lawyer is to tell him to contact me. Don't discuss any of this with him anymore just in case he's trying to rile you up. Let me handle him."

"Yes sir, I can do that." Brooke smiled and shook the mans hand as she and Nathan prepared to leave the office, "Thank you for seeing us on such short notice."

"No problem. Nathan here has done me many a favor, I owed him at least this one and you have a good case."

"Nonetheless, thank you."

"I'll meet you in the car." Nathan said to Brooke as he stopped outside of the lawyer's office, "Ok?"

"Alright." Brooke headed for the car.

As soon as she was out of earshot, Nathan turned to his friend and narrowed his eyes.

"You're not giving her false hope are you?"

"Not at all. She does have a good case Nathan. And as long as we handle things the right way, she'll get everything she wants. It's just gonna take some time."

"Ok, because she deserves the truth and she's strong so she could handle the truth if you had to tell her there wasn't a chance in hell she was going to win this thing."

"She has every chance in hell to win this thing but I gotta tell you… putting me against Lucas Scott? He's the fastest rising corporate lawyer in the US. He's half my age and already makes 3 times the money I make. This case could make or break my entire career."

"If you didn't want to take it, you didn't have to."

"It's not that I didn't want to, I'm just saying it's risky… for me. But we'll work it out. Like I said, the case is strong and I'm sure we'll get Brooke everything that she wants."

"And hey, on the bright side, if your career ends because of this case, I'll just put you on personal retainer and you can retire early." Nathan grinned at his long time friend as he began to head for the elevator.

"Oh very fun Nathan. I'm laughing on the inside!"

"Whatever Tim. Call me as soon as you hear from Lucas."

"Alright man."

Nathan rode the elevator down and headed for his car, slipping into the driver's seat and pausing to look over at Brooke who was staring at him amusedly.

"Tim's a nice guy." She finally said after several moments of silence, "What'd you talk about after I left?"

"Just wanted to make sure I knew everything." Nathan replied as he started the car, "It's set. He'll make sure that you're taken care of."

Brooke just smiled and turned to look at the passing scenery.

"Thanks again by the way." She said later in the ride, "For calling in a favor and getting me a good lawyer. You don't have to do this. You could still stick with Lucas."

"My brother's being a royal jackass about all of this. I'll stick with you thanks." Nathan smiled over at her, "Besides you're prettier and a much better cook. I am starving."

Brooke laughed loudly.

"Well, the kids have to be picked up and today is the one day they don't have other things going on. How about we pick them up and I'll make you all dinner?"

"That definitely sounds like a plan." Nathan agreed easily, "And we should invite mom since we skipped out on lunch. She'll want to know what's going on."

"You really think we should tell her?" Brooke was skeptical on that front.

She loved Karen and she knew Karen loved her, but going against her oldest son? Brooke was highly doubtful that Karen would see things the same way Nathan did.

"Of course, she's my mom. And if nothing else, she'll at least call Lucas and tell him he's a dumb-ass."

"It won't look bad on my part if I'm rallying his family against him?"

"He'd do it to you in a heartbeat."

"Yeah, but I'm getting to his family first. He won't have the chance."

"Don't worry about it Brooke. We're not rallying mom against him. We're just telling her the facts. She can do with them whatever she'd like to."

And she did…

"How could you?" Karen screamed into the phone receiver, "How dare you threaten to take everything away from her? This is Brooke for Christ sake Lucas! Your WIFE! And maybe you don't love her anymore or you've decided to do something else with your life but you do NOT threaten to take her children from her. I raised you better than that!"

Luckily both Laney and Vaughn were at the neighbor's house working on a school project with their classmate and Tavian and Saylor were at the store with Brooke while Karen laid into Lucas. Nathan had never heard her this angry and there had been plenty of times when they were younger when they had given her reason to be angry with them. This topped every speech they'd ever received.

"There is no excuse for being that heartless do you understand me? Not one excuse. Your children's welfare depend on a loving, caring environment. A stable environment and I don't know how you plan on giving them that when you're clearly selfish as hell. I'm backing Brooke on this one and clearly Nathan is too. What can you possibly gain from all this now?"

Nathan couldn't hear Lucas's reply, but it couldn't have been what Karen wanted to hear because she immediately hung up and sat silently fuming.

"Mom…"

"Don't speak Nathan. There aren't words for how angry I am at him right now."

Nathan just nodded and sat with her in silence until Laney and Vaughn came bursting through the door.

"Hey, where's mom?" Vaughn asked as she, Laney, and the two teens from next door stood standing in the living room doorway.

"She went to the store to get dessert I believe. Why?"

"Cause we wanted to ask her something. Grandma? Are you ok?"

"I'm fine sweetheart." Karen pasted a smile on quickly and looked up at the kids, "What was it that you wanted to ask your mom? Maybe we can make a decision for her."

"Um, well we wanted to know if we could stay the night next door. Haley said it would be ok…" Vaughn said.

"Mrs. Keller." Nathan corrected her quickly and she groaned.

"She said to call her Haley and besides, she didn't change her last name when she married Chris because she's a singer so she kept James as her last name." Vaughn explained, "But it doesn't matter. Can we stay?"

"It's a school night. I don't think so." Nathan wasn't saying no because it was a school night really. More because the scrawny boy standing behind Vaughn looked way too happy at the prospect of her spending the night.

"They live right next door Nathan and the girls could use some fun." Karen objected to his decision, "Let them spend the night. If Brooke has a problem with it when she comes home, then we'll go get the girls from next door and bring them home."

"Thank you Grandma." Laney and Vaughn both kissed their grandmother's cheek quickly before they took off for their rooms, dragging the teenage girl who had been standing with them in the same direction.

The boy began to follow but Nathan stopped him.

"Hold it right there slick. What's your name again?"

The teenager looked scared but faced Nathan and answered.

"CJ."

"CJ?"

"It's short for Chris Jr."

"Right. CJ, stay away from my niece."

"Nathan!" Karen scolded her own son and turned to CJ, "I'm sorry sweetie. Nathan's a little protective of the girls. What he's trying to say is that he understands the age that you're at and the age the girls are at and he knows how much you probably like them, or just one of them, same difference, but that in their best interest and yours, it would be better if you just stayed friends."

"That's not what I was trying to say." Nathan objected.

"Yes it was." Karen smacked his knee and smiled at CJ still standing in front of her, "You understand CJ?"

"I understand and you don't have to worry. Vaughn and I…"

"I don't like the way Vaughn and I sounds like a pair." Nathan butted in again, "Sounds too much like a couple."

"She's my girlfriend." CJ admitted, "But Brooke and Lucas know that and so do my parents. They're all ok with it."

"I'm not ok with it." Nathan looked over at his mother, "You're still gonna let the girls spend the night over there?"

"I'll go talk to the parent in charge. You can come with me CJ. I'd be afraid what Nathan might do if I left you two alone…" Karen raised her eyebrow at her son as she guarded the teenager out of the house.

Nathan could hear the three girls giggling and he had to admit it felt good to hear them laugh. Laney and Vaughn could definitely use the fun at this time in their lives.

"Hey, where was your mom going? I just saw her and CJ leaving the house." Brooke came inside the house and dropped all her groceries onto the counter top.

"The girls are gonna spend the night next door if it's ok with you. Mom went to make sure that chaperones would be present at all times so that the little punk couldn't make moves on Vaughn."

Brooke just laughed as Nathan entered the kitchen and stared at her.

"CJ and Vaughn can barely hold hands without giggling and moving away from each other. Trust me, there will be no moves made between them. And besides, Laney and Shauna are around them constantly. Your sisters watching you? Not something I think they'd like."

Nathan was feeling slightly better about the situation but he was still uneasy.

"Hey, where's Tavian and Saylor?"

"They fell asleep in the car." Brooke grinned at him, "Help me bring them in and I'll make you a sundae."

"I would have helped you anyway but now that you offered a sundae…" Nathan smiled back and they headed out to the car together