Chapter 37
GIANNI
"You're staring."
"I'm observing."
"You're staring at me like I'm a painting in a museum."
"You're more beautiful than any painting I've ever seen."
Violet turns from the maternity dresses. She’s flattered but trying to cover it up with an amused smile.
“I’m not even sure what sizes I should be looking at,” she says as she flips through the hangers.
“Focus on what you want right now.”
"I mean, I'm barely showing. It feels a little premature for something that’s still months away.”
"It's not premature at all. We’re preparing for what’s going to happen.”
"You sound like you're briefing Spackman."
"Spackman doesn't look nearly as good in a wrap dress."
She laughs. Short, surprised, the kind that escapes before she can catch it. It's the first real laugh I've heard from her in the days since she saw things I never intended her to see.
We haven’t talked about it directly. She spent that night in one of the guest rooms but came back to my bed the following evening. She didn’t say anything, just slipped under the sheets and pressed her back against my chest and I held her without saying a word.
The distance has been closing since then, little by little, in the way trust has to be when it’s shaken. I keep my gestures to her small and limited, and I haven’t pressed the issue. Now’s not the time. I’m not sure when will be.
Today I brought her to a boutique on Madison Avenue that my assistant found. It’s discreet, appointment-only, the kind of place where nobody photographs you and the staff pretend not to recognize the names on the credit cards.
It’s the first time we’ve been out together since the gala, and I’m treating it with the importance it deserves.
I watch as Violet holds up a dress of deep blue fabric in front of her as she stands before the dressing room’s full-length mirror.
An expression takes hold on her face I’ve learned to read.
A slight downturn at the corners of her mouth, then the way her eyes move to her hips, her stomach.
It’s a reflex to the times when men like Lance would be at the ready with a comment about how she’s too much.
"It's stunning," I say.
"You haven't even seen it on."
"I don’t need to.”
She meets my eyes in the mirror. For a moment, the armor drops and I see what’s underneath: something softer, a glimpse of the sort of woman she might have been if the world had been kinder to her.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“I just…don’t know how to do this.”
“This?”
She gestures around her. “This normal stuff. Like, shopping for maternity clothes and baby things with someone who actually wants to be here.”
I say nothing, letting her express her thoughts.
“Lance didn’t give a shit. If anything, he always acted like my pregnancy was this annoyance he had to deal with. I’d tell him I needed this or that and he’d toss the card at me, tell me to get whatever I needed. But what I needed…”
“Wasn’t that,” I finish.
“Yeah. You being here, being supportive? Interested? It feels like a costume I'm trying on."
"Then try it on. See if it fits."
She smiles. “It will."
I step behind her. My hands settle on her hips gently, over the fabric of the dress she's holding, and I rest my chin on the top of her head. In the mirror, we look like something I never imagined I'd have, something I spent forty-five years convincing myself I didn't deserve.
“This body is everything. I love what it's doing right now. Growing the life we created.”
Her eyes shine in the mirror, but she doesn't cry. She just leans back against my chest and breathes.
"Whatever you’re worried about, don’t. We'll figure it out," I say. "All of it. Together."
"You keep saying that."
"Because it’s true.”
The saleswoman appears with two more dresses, her arrival snapping us back into the moment.
The front door of the shop opens, and I turn. I see him before Violet does. The bell chimes and my instincts fire when I see Lance Dawson. He’s dressed casually in jeans and white oxford, hands in his pockets. The easy smile, the unhurried stride, puts me in a defensive posture instantly.
There’s no doubt in my mind that he followed us here. Which means he knows about the baby.
Violet sees him. I feel it in her body before I see it on her face; the instantaneous tension, the muscles locking, the way she pulls away from my chest and puts six inches of space between us.
She doesn't need to hide anything. Not from him. Not anymore.
"Well," Lance says, scanning the store with theatrical interest. "Maternity shopping. I suppose I should say congratulations."
Violet's hand moves to her stomach, the gesture involuntary and protective.
"Agent Dawson," I say. "This is a private appointment."
"Just passing by." He picks up a onesie from a display table, examines it, sets it down. The casualness is practiced and weaponized. "I actually wanted to let Jessica know that the custody hearing has been scheduled. Two weeks from Friday. Family court, downtown."
Violet pales to a frightening white.
"My lawyer submitted the filing last week," he continues, addressing her directly now, cutting me out of the conversation with practiced ease.
"Given the current living situation—cohabiting with an individual under active federal investigation, exposure to known criminal associates, potential endangerment of a minor—I'd say we have a strong case. "
"You don't have a case," Violet says. “This is revenge. This is you trying to use Patrick to get to me.”
"I have a legitimate concern for my son's welfare."
"You’ve never given a shit about him before. All he knows about you is that you’re someone to be afraid of. He doesn’t want anything to do with you.”
The mask flickers just a fraction, the same crack I saw in the courtroom, a glimpse at the small, furious man underneath the performance, exposed for half a second before the visor snaps shut.
“He doesn’t know who I am because you kept him from me. The boy deserves a father.”
“He does deserve a father. But you don’t deserve him.”
His eyes narrow, and for an instant I wonder if he might do something in the middle of the store that he can’t take back. Lance clenches his fists, and my body tenses.
He opens his hands. "We'll let the judge decide," he says, his tone once again smooth and controlled, the mask back on. "See you in court, Jessica"
He turns to me, and the smile becomes more menacing. "Take care of her, Mr. Russo. While you can."
I step forward, close enough that he has to look up, close enough that the saleswoman retreats to the back of the store and Violet's hand tightens on my arm.
"Give it your best shot, Dawson," I say. "The custody filing. The investigation. Whatever you're building with Marino behind closed doors on Thursday nights at Caruso's in Bensonhurst."
The smile dies.
"Yeah," I say quietly. "I know about that. And by the time your custody hearing rolls around, I'll know about everything else, too. Every dirty warrant, every fabricated report, every buried complaint. Every single thing you've spent a decade hiding behind that badge."
He stares at me. The mask is gone once again; the real Lance Dawson is standing before us with his hands in his pockets and murder in his eyes.
I shouldn’t taunt him. But at the same time, he needs to know what he’s up against. Maybe there’s a part of him—a small part—that will still listen to reason.
"You're making a mistake," he says.
"You’ve said that already, and yet here I am, still standing.
" I lean in and lower my voice. "The difference between you and me, Agent Dawson, is that I don't threaten people. I inform them of outcomes, and the outcome of this situation is that you lose. Everything. Starting with your career and ending with whatever's left of your reputation when I’m finished with you.”
Uncertainty flickers across his face, and uncertainty is one thing a narcissist cannot tolerate. Without a word, he turns on his heel and leaves.
Violet is shaking. I pull her against my chest and hold her, the blue dress crumpled between us. Behind us, the saleswoman pretends to organize a rack in the corner.
"He's not going to win," I speak into her hair.
"How do you know?"
Because I know things about Violet's past that I haven't told her yet.
Because Spackman's investigation went deeper than the fabricated identity into the records Lance thought he'd buried.
And because Kylie, with the resources I gave her and the brilliance she was born with, is building a profile Lance Dawson doesn't see coming.
"Because I don't lose," I say.
Maybe she’ll find the magic bullet, the evidence so damning, so irrefutable, that it takes Lance off the board permanently.
And if she doesn't—if the legal path fails, if the digital trail runs cold, if the courts and the evidence and the proper channels aren't enough—then I'll do what I've always done.
Whatever is necessary.