Chapter 7 - The Kiss Before the Courtroom
Winter settled over Chicago.
Hannah’s case stopped being a blur of emergencies and became paperwork.
Statements.
Corrections.
Dates checked against notebooks.
Some days she felt strong.
Other days, a black SUV slowing near a curb made her hands shake.
She began seeing a counselor.
She found temporary work helping a neighborhood café organize inventory.
The pay was modest.
The owner checked her hours and paid them all.
Hannah nearly cried over her first accurate paycheck.
Her father framed her new employee photograph as though it were a medical degree.
“Dad.”
“I’m proud.”
“I’m wearing a hairnet.”
“An authoritative hairnet.”
By spring, prosecutors had charged Adrian and several associates with offenses connected to the financial schemes and efforts to obstruct the investigation.
Scott faced charges of his own.
No one promised Hannah a particular verdict.
She appreciated adults who had finally stopped promising things they couldn’t control.
Dominic’s proceedings moved separately.
His cooperation did not erase the enterprise he had directed.
He negotiated through counsel, accepted responsibility for specified crimes, and prepared to enter a plea.
The evening before the hearing, Hannah asked to see him.
They met at a small diner Denise knew.
Dominic arrived wearing an ordinary wool coat.
Without the mansion around him, he looked younger.
And more tired.
Hannah pushed a paper bag across the table.
“What’s this?”
“Orange rolls.”
He opened it.
“You baked?”
“That’s generally how they happen.”
He smiled faintly.
“Thank you.”
She watched him take one.
“I’m not doing this because you helped clear my name.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
His gaze lifted.
“I hope so.”
Hannah looked down at her coffee.
She had practiced this conversation and disliked every version.
“I like talking to you.”
The words sounded absurdly small beside everything outside the booth.
Dominic stayed very still.
“I look for your messages,” she continued. “And then I get angry with myself.”
“Don’t.”
“You’re not in charge of my emotional schedule.”
A quiet smile.
“No.”
She swallowed.
“I know what you did. I know there are people who don’t get to have pleasant diner conversations because of men who worked for you.”
“Yes.”
“I can care about you and still know that.”
His face changed.
Not triumph.
Grief, perhaps, at receiving something he could not reasonably demand.
“Hannah.”
“I’m not waiting outside prison like a character in a song.”
“I would never ask.”
“I’ll have a life.”
“You should.”
“And if I write, it’s because I want to.”
“Yes.”
She exhaled.
“That was my speech.”
“It was good.”
“I practiced.”
“I could tell.”
She kicked him lightly beneath the table.
He laughed.
Then the laughter faded, leaving something warm and frightening between them.
Outside the diner, rain glittered beneath the streetlights.
For a moment, Hannah remembered the night she entered his car.
How small her world had become.
How little she had expected from it.
Dominic stood beside her without moving closer.
“May I kiss you?” he asked.
The question nearly undid her.
Not because it was elaborate.
Because it left the answer with her.
“Yes.”
His hand touched her cheek lightly.
The kiss was careful, warm, and far too brief.
When he stepped back, Hannah’s eyes stung.
“I’m still angry about the bank account,” she whispered.
“So am I.”
“I meant you checking it.”
“I know.”
She laughed through the sudden ache in her throat.
The next morning, she did not attend the hearing.
She went to work.
At lunchtime, Denise called to explain what had happened.
Dominic had entered his plea.
Sentencing would come later.
Hannah stood behind the café, holding a bag of flour against her hip.
For a long moment, she let herself be sad.
Then she carried it inside.
May you like
There were orders waiting.
She had a life to build.
