Chapter 29
SOFIA
The security door of the shelter clicked shut behind me, but the visual of Jude telling me he loved me stayed with me.
I leaned my back against the wall of the hallway, my chest heaving, picturing him.
He hadn’t slept or shaved in days.
His shirt hung off his broad shoulders in wrinkled folds.
His stubble was rough and scruffy, and his jawline was now a dense, unkempt thicket of stubble.
His eyes were bloodshot, surrounded by deep, hollow shadows.
When I first laid eyes on him in the shelter’s reception, a massive, agonizing wave of compassion and fierce, instinctual love crashed over my chest.
Every fiber of my soul screamed at me to cross the room and cradle his bearded face in my hands.
I wanted to nurture him, bathe him, cook him a hot meal, and hold him close until the haunting shadows left his eyes.
I wanted to forgive him, to wipe clean the agony of the last few weeks, and to whisper to him that my love for him hadn’t changed.
Yet I couldn’t give in to the yearning.
The memory of how he treated me with contempt and scorn, how he spoke down to me, still cut deep.
The wounds were too fresh, his lack of faith in me too jagged and raw.
To run into his arms now would be an act of self-betrayal, an erasure of the dignity I fought so hard to reclaim.
I had to hold fast, ignoring my aching heart, because loving him couldn’t mean breaking myself.
I understood his knee-jerk reaction when he saw those photos.
What broke me was what happened next.
When I looked him in the eye and told him it was a setup, yet he still trusted a convicted blackmailer over me.
He tossed away everything we built for three fake images.
The anger was bad enough, but the hurt was worse.
It killed me that the man I loved could think so little of my character.
In Paris and Rome, we got close. He held me, protected me, and made love to me.
He threw all of it away, and I couldn’t see past the wreck he left behind.
JUDE
Two weeks later, band practice and laying down tracks for a new EP resumed.
Bishop arranged a block of rehearsals at our private studio in Nashville.
I missed three sessions in a row; needless to say, my bandmates got furious.
Deacon called me in my Ram one late night, his frustration evident through my truck speakers.
‘You’re blowing off the production schedule, Judah,’ he rasped. ‘The label is calling about our track deadlines, and you’re AWOL. Where’re you?’
‘I’m where I need to be, Deac,’ I muttered, cutting the connection before he could launch into a lecture.
As I had for the last fortnight, I remained camped outside her shelter and the bus depot, my Dodge Ram serving as my permanent surveillance post.
One afternoon, I observed Sofia walking past a chain-link fence bordering a used car lot adjacent to her workplace.
She paused, her eyes fixed on a blue Honda Civic with a faded hood but intact tires.
She stared at the windshield, peering at the sticker.
Her fingers tapped a restless rhythm on her thigh, and she bit her lip before she turned away, her shoulders drooping.
She probably realized her cleaning wages wouldn’t cover the down payment.
The moment she cleared the corner, I threw my truck into drive and rolled onto the lot.
I spent ten minutes negotiating with a greasy salesperson in a polyester tie, paying cash for the same Honda.
I got him to add a comprehensive mechanical overhaul done at their garage.
I included insurance and arranged shipment with a transport crew my production team used.
Two days later, a flatbed dropped the Civic right outside the boarding house entrance.
I parked sixty yards down the street, eyes on the delivery driver as he asked for her at the front desk.
Minutes later, my heart slammed as Sofia stepped onto the sidewalk.
The deliveryman handed her the keys, spinning an elaborate yarn.
One about a benefactor who spotted her at the dealership and worked with the car lot owner to donate the vehicle to her, citing the vulnerability of her traveling to work late at night.
Through my windshield, I observed suspicion tightening her features.
She examined the key fob, then her gaze scanned the street, searching for the catch.
Tucked in an alley, she never saw me.
The delivery man kept prattling on to convince her.
I’d paid the man more than enough to ensure she never said no.
His persuasion worked, as her desire for reliable transportation won out.
She threw up her hands in surrender.
The delivery guy tipped his hat to her and left.
She walked around the vehicle, shaking her head in disbelief, then opened the driver’s side door and slid inside.
After sitting behind the steering wheel for a bit, she got out, locked up, and went back into the shelter.
She emerged half an hour later, showered and changed, and eased into the car, heading out.
I followed at a discreet distance as she took her first drive to a suburban grocery outlet, keeping three cars between us to avoid detection.
When she got out of the grocery store and was loading her bags into her trunk, she glanced and saw me in my car across the parking lot.
Slamming the luggage compartment, she came charging at me.
I sighed, stepping out of my ride.
She came right up to me and poked a finger in my chest.
‘Bodhi Judah Valenti, leave me the fuck alone.’
My lips twisted even as my heart lurched.
‘Never.’
Sofia arched a brow.
‘Was that you, gifting me the Honda?’
‘You’re my wife,’ I rumbled, my jaw tightening as I refused to apologize for marking what was mine. ‘My job is to take care of you.’
‘Why?’
‘I want you back, babe. In my bed, my home, my life.’
She narrowed her eyes at me.
‘You gave away your right to claim me the second you believed a mob setup over my devotion, Jude. No silver-tongued promise or second-hand wheels buys back a wife you branded a liar.’
Her words hit like successive punches to the ribs, yet I held her gaze, refusing to let her see how rattled I was.
‘Yet you’re keeping the keys,’ I smirked.
‘Until I buy my own ride, yes,’ she snapped, her eyes flashing fire. ‘Then I’m throwing them right at your fucking face.’
She whirled around and stormed away.
The rejection tore into me, but witnessing her fight back only lit a fire in me.
Fuck, she was a masterpiece.
Which only made me want her that much more.
The hunt was on.
SOFIA
When I tried to focus on my cleaning shifts, my mind replayed Jude’s harsh accusations on a continuous loop.
At the same time, I tried to make sense of his betrayal.
How could a man with his background and experience be so naive as to fall for a down-and-dirty scam?
I sometimes rage-cried in my Civic as I drove to work in the second car Jude bought me, love-hating him, so angry at him, yet still in awe of him.
Later that night, I texted my friend group on WhatsApp, seeking their wisdom.
Sofia: He keeps coming around, looking for me, ladies.
Anya: What does he have to say for himself?
Sofia: He discovered I was telling the truth and wants me back. He’s seemed so broken. I want to comfort him, but the hurt is just too deep. I can’t take him back.
Anya: Listen to me, Sofia. We won’t sit here and call him a monster because we know what he did to protect you. Anger is easy, but it won’t fix your heart.
Tina: You don’t have to forgive him now, but you also need to ask whether one bad argument means you lose each other for life. Listen to your heart; allow it to do the guiding, not your pride.
Esperanza: Quiet the noise around you, cara. Fierce love requires intense honesty with yourself. If your love is true, it will map the way back to him. Stay safe, chica.
I leaned my head against the cold wall, mulling their words.
They weren’t dismissing my agony. They were reminding me I needed to find a way forward I could live with for life.
Sofia: You girls remain my bedrock. What would I ever do without you? xox
No matter how complicated my arrangement with Jude became, I had a circle of fierce, loyal friends who’d always have my back.
Maggie tried to call me a couple of times, and I blocked her number without hesitating, doing the same thing when Kian’s name flashed on the screen.
I wanted nothing to do with his family for now.
My sole remaining objective was to earn enough by scrubbing grease-stained bays.
I had every intention of paying back every single cent Jude ever spent on me, regardless of whether I eventually decided to sever the final cord with him.
Between my job and the shelter, I went to the library and borrowed books to read in the evenings.
I also began a new weekly ritual: visiting the small Episcopal chapel tucked into the St. Albans Parish grounds, next door to the shelter.
The tiny brick structure was a quiet sanctuary amid the urban chaos.
Its stained-glass windows refracted the afternoon sun into vibrant pools of ruby and sapphire light across the worn oak pews.
A threadbare crimson carpet lined the center aisle.
Its fibers rubbed thin by decades of faithful footsteps, yet the entire room retained an undeniable, elegant beauty that was both ancient and quaint.
They no longer held active corporate worship services there.
However, the wooden doors remained unlocked twenty-four hours a day.
Kept pristine and dust-free by a dedicated local caretaker, he ensured the community always had a clean, safe refuge to escape the noise.
I slipped into the very back row at least once a week to meditate, welcoming how the profound silence settled my thoughts as I worked to reconcile my fractured past with my uncertain future.
JUDE
I became Sofia’s ever-present guardian.
Every single night, I sat across the street from her brick boarding house.
She had a routine.
She drove to work at the depot at 12 a.m. and returned at six in the morning.
I followed her there and back, then I kept my gaze locked on her second-story window until her desk light finally went out at six-thirty.
I only slept when she did, my breath fogging the windshield, my spine cramped along the leather seat.
One night, I saw her struggle to start the ignition of her beat-up Civic.
Damn, the battery must have died.
I pulled up next to her as she trudged toward the bus stop in the dark, lowering the electric pane.
‘Sofia,’ I rumbled. ‘Babe, your car is dead. Get in the car with me. I’m driving you to work.’
She ignored me, marching straight to the bench to wait for the next bus.
The woman was fuckin’ stubborn.
I couldn’t force her into my ride, so I let her be.
I pulled up a few spots in front of the stop, waiting until she got on the bus.
Then I trailed the bus all the way to the depot, where I kept vigil outside the gates.
At nine the next morning, after she got back from work, I stepped out of my Ram in front of her shelter, carrying a fresh battery and a socket wrench.
Military deployments and years of car tinkering with Kian made a simple Honda battery-charging change child’s play for me.
I popped her hood, stripped the corrosion off the terminals, and bolted the new block into the tray.
I left a note for her at the shelter’s front desk that the Honda was operational.
At noon, Sofia dashed outside, flung a cold glare straight in my direction, and tested the ignition.
The engine purred.
She let it run for a beat, then trudged back inside without giving me another look.
I got even more assertive as time went on.
One night, before her grueling shift, a courier made a delivery.
Fresh from the kitchen of my favorite Michelin-starred Italian restaurant in Nashville, straight to the shelter.
In the white carry boxes were plates of hand-rolled agnolotti and pan-seared sea bass.
Along with braised fennel and delicate potato gnocchi tossed in black truffle butter.
After she took the delivery, I caught her lifting the lid of one container.
She shook her head with a mix of exhaustion and frustration, knowing who bought it.
Her lips pursed in annoyance, but still, she took the piping hot food inside.
Raw elation shot through my veins.
She could fight me all she wanted, but I was still feeding her.