22. Delilah
— ? —
Delilah
The doctor’s office smells like antiseptic and good news.
Dr. Moss reviews my x-rays on the illuminated board, pointing at shadows and lines that mean nothing to me but everything to her. Her expression is pleased - genuinely pleased, not the careful optimism she’s been giving me for weeks.
“Your leg has healed remarkably well, Mrs. Montoya.” She turns to face me, removing her glasses. “Better than I expected, honestly. The bone has set perfectly. The tissue damage is minimal.”
“Does that mean-”
“I’m clearing you for light exercise. Walking without the crutches. Swimming if you want. We’ll talk about riding at your next appointment - I want to see how the bone responds to increased activity first.”
For the first time in what feels like forever, something like hope flutters in my chest.
Riding again. Being myself again. Being the woman I was before the fall, before everything went wrong.
“How long until I can ride again?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” Dr. Moss smiles. “Soon. Build up your strength first. But your prognosis is excellent.”
I leave the office feeling lighter than I have in months. The sun is bright, the air is warm, and for one perfect moment, I let myself imagine it - climbing onto Storm’s back, feeling the power beneath me, the wind in my hair, the crowd cheering-
Then I get home.
The envelope from Christina Charles sits on my kitchen table. Plain white. My name in neat black letters.
I know what’s inside before I open it.
Divorce papers.
I spread them across the table, page after page after page. Legal language, dissolution of assets, custody arrangements. Words like petitioner and respondent and irreconcilable differences. Seven years of marriage reduced to signatures and notarization.
My hands shake as I turn the pages.
I think about Allana. Her drawings on the refrigerator. The blue tears on her father’s face. Are you gonna come home, Mommy?
I think about Lucas. Walking through a storm to check on me. Making heart-shaped waffles with the wrong timing and the right intentions. I love you, he said. I know that doesn’t fix anything.
I think about the necklace. The one Aimie planted. The evidence that wasn’t evidence at all, just another manipulation, another lie, another weapon in her arsenal.
I pick up a pen.
A knock on the door.
I shove the papers under a stack of magazines, heart hammering. I don’t know why I’m hiding them - he’ll see them eventually, he’ll have to sign them too - but some instinct kicks in, some need to keep this private for a few more minutes.
I open the door.
Lucas stands on the porch. He looks different today - alert, purposeful, something burning behind his eyes that wasn’t there this morning.
“What do you want?”
“I need to tell you something.” His voice is steady, but I can see the tension in his shoulders, the set of his jaw. “Can I come in?”
I should say no. I should close the door, sign those papers, be done with this.
But I step aside.
He walks in, and his eyes go immediately to the table. The magazines aren’t quite covering everything - a corner of white envelope pokes out, Christina’s letterhead visible.
His jaw tightens. But he doesn’t comment.
“I fired Aimie,” he says.
“I heard.”
Something flickers across his face - surprise, maybe, that word has already reached me. But he pushes forward.
“There’s more.” He takes a breath. “The necklace - she bought it herself. Put it on my desk where you’d find it. The whole thing was a setup to make you think I was cheating.”
I should feel vindicated. Should feel triumphant, finally proven right after weeks of being called paranoid, delusional, jealous.
Instead, I just feel tired.
“Rosa told me.”
“Good.” He nods. “Good. I need you to know I never - I would never-”
“I know.”
Silence stretches between us. All the words we should be saying, all the things that still need to be addressed - the weeks of neglect, the dismissal, the way he chose the business over me again and again - but neither of us speaks.
“There’s something else. The night you fell. The arena cameras were supposed to have recorded everything. But the server reset the next day and wiped most of the footage.”
“Convenient.”
“I had IT working on the server recovery,” Lucas says. “Dario’s been on it for days. They’ve pulled partial footage from the night of the rodeo - it’s not clear enough to see faces yet, but Mr. Velez doesn’t think the debris was an accident. And neither do I.”
“You think she sabotaged my run?”
“I think she wanted you out of the way. And she almost succeeded.”
The words hit me like cold water. All this time, I thought my fall was bad luck. A freak accident. The universe conspiring against me at the worst possible moment.
But what if it wasn’t?
What if she planned it?
“That bitch.” The word comes out venomous, torn from somewhere deep. “I can’t believe she would-”
I stop. Think.
“The security cameras. There should be more footage from that night.”
“If she did it, we might be able to prove it,” Lucas says. “Once Dario finishes the full recovery, we might have proof.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
He meets my eyes. Holds them.
“Because you deserve the truth. And because I want to find it together.” He pauses. “If you’re willing.”
I think about the divorce papers under the magazines. About the pen still sitting on the table. About all the reasons I have to sign those papers and walk away from this man who failed me when I needed him most.
But I also think about Aimie. About what she tried to do. About the fact that she almost killed me - might have tried to kill me - and got away with it.
“Fine,” I say finally. “Let’s find out the truth.”