Chapter 14 - The Verdict and the Prison Visit: Final Words to the Man Who Looked Away
Rowan Vance was convicted on all eleven felony counts: Grand Larceny in the First Degree, Corporate Embezzlement, Scheme to Defraud, and Tax Evasion.
Judge Harrison sentenced him to nine to eighteen years at the Green Haven Correctional Facility—a maximum-security state prison in Dutchess County.
Two weeks after the sentencing, I did something no one expected me to do.
I requested a single, formal non-contact administrative visitation.
I arrived at Green Haven on a gray November afternoon. I wore a tailored black wool coat, my hair pulled back in a neat chignon, carrying only my driver’s license and wedding ring surrender certificate.
The visitation booth was divided by thick, bulletproof plexiglass. On the other side, the metal door buzzed open, and a corrections officer led Rowan into the booth.
He was unrecognizable.
The styled hair, the designer linen blazers, the smug, arrogant smirk—all of it was gone. Rowan wore a coarse, dark-green prison jumpsuit. His head was shaved down to the scalp, his face was gaunt, his eyes sunken and surrounded by dark, hollow circles. His hands were secured in front of him with heavy metal waist chains.
He sat down on the metal stool, picking up the heavy plastic telephone receiver with trembling, calloused hands.
I picked up the receiver on my side.
"Phoebe..." Rowan whispered, his voice trembling through the static line. A pathetic, desperate glimmer of hope flickered in his dead eyes. "You came. I... I knew you would come. You still care about me, don't you? You came to tell me you're filing an appeal?"
I looked at him through the glass. My heart rate didn't elevate. My hands didn't shake. I felt absolutely nothing. Looking at him was like looking at a stranger sitting on a subway bench.
"I didn't come to help you, Rowan," I said, my voice calm, even, and crystal clear. "I came to return something that belongs to you."
I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out a small, sealed legal envelope. I held it against the glass.
Inside was the certified Final Decree of Absolute Divorce, accompanied by the official State Vital Statistics document renaming my son: Leo Gideon Sterling.
Rowan stared at the document through the glass. The last lingering trace of color drained from his face.
"You took my name off his birth certificate...?" he choked out, tears welling in his hollow eyes.
"You gave up the right to give him your name when you abandoned him on the floor of St. Jude's," I replied softly. "Leo will grow up in a home filled with unconditional love, integrity, and truth. He will learn what it means to be a real man from his grandfather. He will never know your cruelty. He will never hear your voice."
Rowan began to weep, pressing his chained hands against the cold glass. "Phoebe, please... don't erase me. I was foolish, I was weak, but I am his father! Give me one chance... ten years from now, when I get out... just let me see him from afar!"
"No, Rowan," I said, looking directly into his tear-filled eyes. "When you get out, we will be half a world away, living a life you will never be part of. You made your choice for a birthday dinner. This is the bill."
I slowly hung up the telephone receiver.
Rowan screamed, slamming his chained fists against the plexiglass, begging, sobbing, and thrashing as two corrections officers grabbed him by the shoulders, pulled him back from the booth, and dragged him down the long, dark concrete hallway into the depths of the prison.
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I turned around, walked through the heavy steel security doors, and stepped out into the crisp, clean autumn air.
I took a deep, full breath of freedom, got into the waiting car, and never looked back.
