Chapter 13 - The Divorce Papers I Carried Into a Marriage That Had Never Been Real
I found the envelope in my desk drawer.
Naomi had prepared the dissolution papers weeks earlier, exactly as I had requested. The marriage had protected me during the investigation. It had never been meant to last.
I took the papers to Lorenzo's study.
He looked at them without reaching out.
"You should sign," I said.
"Is that what you want?"
I thought about the first night at the lounge. The snapped fingers. The way I had walked away. Then I thought about the man who had waited outside a hospital room without demanding anything in return.
"I want a life I choose," I answered.
"Then choose it," he said.
He signed first.
I expected relief. Instead I felt grief for a possibility neither of us had been brave enough to name.
At the door, he stopped me.
"Clara. If we meet again, I'd like it to be because you want to see me. Not because someone is hunting you."
I folded the papers into my bag.
May you like
"Then ask me properly next time."
For the first time since I'd known him, Lorenzo looked almost shy.
