Chapter 12
Vivian
We kept the engagement secret, at first.
Not because of the press, or Ryan, or the world—just because I needed time. Time to believe that something this good could really happen to someone like me.
Alejandro didn’t rush. He let me wake up every morning in his bed, let me wear his shirts and steal his socks, let me pick the worst movies on Netflix and critique his omelets. He never asked when or where or if.
One night, over wine and pasta, he said, “You don’t have to marry me. I’ll still love you.”
But I wanted to. God, I wanted to.
We got married in a courthouse on a Wednesday.
No dress, no flowers, just us and two of his friends as witnesses.
He held my hand through the whole thing, even when I cried at the part about “in sickness and in health.”
After, we ate cannoli from a plastic box and watched the boats on the river.
He slipped a plain gold band onto my finger and kissed me like we had all the time in the world.
“I promise,” he whispered. “You’ll never be alone again.”
The news broke the next morning.
Photos everywhere—me in jeans and a sweater, Alejandro in a suit, both of us laughing. The caption read: JUDGE BELLANDI WEDS MYSTERY DIVORCEE.
Ryan saw it before I did.
He smashed his phone, then called my lawyer and screamed for twenty minutes.
Lisa found out from the internet, too. She called once, let it ring, then texted, “I’m sorry.” I didn’t answer.
I wondered if she really was.
The wedding changed things. Overnight, my mailbox filled with hate mail and fan mail and everything in between. People I hadn’t seen in years wrote to congratulate me, or warn me, or just gawk.
Alejandro brushed it off. “Let them talk,” he said. “It won’t touch us.”
He meant it.
But the security doubled. I noticed new faces on the block, new cars, new cameras.
I asked once, “Are you scared?”
He shook his head. “Not for me.”
In a glass tower downtown, a man in a three-piece suit clicked through photos on a tablet. He stopped on the one of me and Alejandro at the courthouse.
He studied my face for a long time.
He smiled.
“So this is Judge Bellandi’s greatest weakness,” he said to the empty room.
He picked up the phone and dialed.
“Prepare the package. We’re going to make things interesting.”
That night, Alejandro took me to a tiny restaurant by the river. We ate in the kitchen with the chef and drank too much wine.
He toasted, “To second chances. And to the woman who taught me how to love.”
I blushed, but it felt right.
On the way home, I leaned into him, warm and a little dizzy.
“I never thought I’d have this,” I said. “Not after everything.”
He looked at me, eyes soft and sure. “You deserve everything.”
I believed him.
For the first time in my life, I really did.
Holy. Freaking. Heck.
Somewhere, someone watched us from a dark car.
He smiled, too.
But not because he was happy.