Chapter 7
Vivian
The rumors started small. A comment at the grocery store, a double-take at the café, a lingering look at the gym. Then the photos hit the local blogs: me on Alejandro Bellandi’s arm at the fundraiser, laughing like I’d never known pain.
People noticed. People cared. For the first time in ages, I was interesting.
My inbox filled with questions and warnings. Some congratulated me; most wanted dirt. I ignored it all, but sometimes, at night, I read the meanest ones just to feel something.
One woman wrote, “Don’t let him use you, honey. Rich men don’t change.” I laughed so hard I almost cried.
Alejandro never mentioned the gossip. He just kept showing up: emails, texts, the occasional hand-delivered cappuccino. He was subtle, never crossing a line.
He invited me to his home—just for dinner, nothing more. “It’s quieter here,” he said.
I said yes before I could talk myself out of it.
The house was nothing like I imagined. I expected cold marble, bodyguards at every door, the sterile grandeur of someone who’d outgrown real life.
Instead, it was warm. Lived-in. There were books on every surface, dog-eared and marked in three languages.
Family photos lined the hallways—childhood, holidays, ordinary moments.
It looked like someone actually lived there.
He cooked. Real food, not freaking takeout. He poured me a glass of wine, watched as I sipped it, and waited until I felt comfortable before asking anything real.
We talked for hours. He told me about growing up in Italy, about his mother’s death, about building a life from nothing. I told him about Lisa, about the baby, about the marriage I’d tried so hard to save.
He listened. Really listened.
At one point, I said, “Everyone thinks you’re this cold, untouchable judge. But you’re… normal.”
He smiled. “That’s the point. If they knew I was just a man, they wouldn’t listen to me.”
I laughed, surprised by the sound of it.
He poured me another glass of wine.
When it was late, he offered to drive me home. I almost refused, but it felt safe. He didn’t try to touch me. He didn’t even brush my hand.
When we pulled up to my apartment, he turned off the car and sat quietly.
“I want you to know,” he said, “I’m not interested in a headline. Or a trophy. I like you, Vivian. Not the story of you.”
I believed him.
For a second, I wanted to kiss him, to prove I was still alive. But he beat me to it—by not kissing me at all.
He smiled, squeezed my hand, and said, “Goodnight.”
I floated up the stairs, dizzy with hope.
Meanwhile, Lisa’s world was shrinking.
The pregnancy was hard. She threw up every morning, fainted twice at the grocery store, and cried herself to sleep every night. Ryan wasn’t home much, and when he was, he hovered near the door, eyes darting, always half-absent.
They fought all the time. Lisa begged him to talk, to hold her, to tell her things would be okay. He ignored her. Or worse, he blamed her for everything.
“Why can’t you just be happy?” he’d shout.
She’d scream back, “Why can’t you just be here?”
Sometimes, I heard her from the hallway, sobbing into a pillow.
I wanted to comfort her, to be her sister again. But I couldn’t. Not after what she’d done.
Alejandro called on a beautiful Saturday. “Can I take you somewhere?”
He picked me up in a car so old it had crank windows and a tape deck. “I collect things,” he explained.
We drove out of the city, past fields gone gold with summer, and stopped at a tiny bakery in a town I’d never heard of.
We ate pastries and talked about nothing. I felt like a kid on her first real date.
He took my hand as we walked, but only for a second, just enough to remind me I was still wanted.
Back home, Lisa’s pride kept her from apologizing. She never said she was sorry, not for Ryan, not for the baby, not for making me feel small.
But her face said everything. She was drowning, and she knew it.
Sometimes I caught her looking at the door, as if she was waiting for someone—maybe our mother, maybe me, maybe a past version of herself that wasn’t so alone.
The night after the bakery trip, Alejandro called just to say goodnight. He told me about a case he’d finished, about a dog he’d rescued from the courthouse parking lot.
We laughed about nothing, and when we hung up, my face hurt from smiling.
Across the city, Ryan watched us.
He sat in his car outside my apartment, engine idling, hands clenching the steering wheel until the skin went white.
He saw Alejandro walk me to the door, saw the way I laughed, saw how I lingered in the light before going inside.
He seethed, rage curdling into something colder.
When he went home, Lisa asked where he’d been. He pushed past her, headed for the liquor cabinet, and drank until he passed out on the couch.
The next day, Alejandro invited me over for dinner again.
This time, I brought a pie.
We cooked together, joked about who would win a chili cook off, teased each other about music and TV and old movies.
After dinner, we sat on the back patio, watching the city lights flicker on one by one.
He reached for my hand, warm and gentle.
I closed my eyes, letting myself believe this could last.
He leaned in, just enough to let me decide.
I wanted to kiss him, but he hesitated, pulling back.
“Not yet,” he whispered. “You deserve to heal first.”
The restraint floored me. No one had ever waited for me before.
He drove me home, silence full of hope.
From the street, I saw him.
Ryan, standing in the shadows, watching us.
His face was twisted, broken.
In that moment, I realized he wasn’t just angry.
He was desperate.
Holy. Freaking. Heck.
And I wondered if any of us would survive what came next.