Paige leaned in close.“I’m sorry about the past.But I had to come home, Nicole.And I’m here to help, whatever that looks like.”
Nicole blinked back tears.“Thank you...especially tonight.”
Their laughter softened as tears seeped in.Amanda’s gaze broke away for a moment.
“Well,” Amanda said softly, “I found out a few days ago that Joe, my husband, has been living a double life for years.With a man.That’s his reason for a divorce.My husband is gay.”
The table went still.
“I never dreamed that the divorce could get worse, but now I know the truth.Now, I know why he won’t go to counseling.Now I understand why he lost interest in sex.Now I know that there was nothing I could do to keep him.”
Paige slipped her arm around Amanda’s shoulders.“Shocking.So much for twenty years of marriage.”
Amanda swallowed.“I don’t know who I am anymore.I’ve always been a wife and mother.Now I’m just a mother of five kids who have all grown up and moved away except for Brent.He’s the last chick at home..No one needs me anymore.”
“We need you,” Crystal said, rubbing her own rounded belly.“Remember this is baby number two, and I still have trouble when they get sick.You’re the calming force that helps me see that this is just part of life and I’m not going to kill them.”
Nicole giggled.“I’d be terrified.”
“I was,” Crystal said.
Jennifer grabbed Amanda’s hand.“Honey, you write your own second act.We’re all here to cheer you on.Look at me.My second act is so much better than the first.”
The women leaned into each other, a cocoon of empathy and shared vulnerability.There were tears, confessions, and hugs as they huddled.Nicole had never felt closer to these women than she did just now.
Nicole caught Paige’s eye; it had been so long.No words were needed, just a breath passed between them.
Paige whispered, “Want me to go with you tomorrow to the courthouse?Just...supporting you in the back.”
Tomorrow was the first day of the trial.Tomorrow was the day she would face her nemesis and, oh, how she wanted to beat him.
Nicole nodded, feeling nervous about sparring with Tripp.“That’d mean everything.”
They lifted their glasses.
“To the women who write their own stories,” Jennifer toasted.
“To love we once thought lost,” Crystal added.
“To family by choice,” Amanda said.
Nicole held Paige’s gaze, the wine warm in her belly, the past dissolving in the glow of this moment.
For the first time in years, she felt ready to believe that love didn’t just end.Sometimes it just needed the right room, the right voices, and a glass of wine to come home again.
“To being strong and not needing a man to make our life happy.We make our own happiness,” Paige said.
“To beating Tripp in court,” she said.
“Cheers,” they all cried.
Maybe it was vindictive, but twenty years of believing he’d betrayed her didn’t just vanish overnight.It would take time and answers before she could accept that they’d both been deceived.
Until the trial was over, the courtroom would be the only place their voices touched—each word laced with everything they couldn’t say.
Chapter7
The courtroom smelled like old wood, tempered by the low hum of anticipation, a breath the room already held before everything began.Silver beams of morning filtered through stained-glass windows, illuminating specks of dust drifting in still air.Nicole Reyes stood at the prosecution’s table, fingertips brushing the polished surface, while in the corner of her mind, Bianca Laurent’s face glowed, alive and hopeful, against everything that had taken her away.
