Or not evidence at all, because I know better than this.
I do.
Maybe I’m not a criminal attorney, but I know speculation is not evidence. A death being private and mysterious is not evidence of murder. Wealthy families keeping personal tragedy out of the press is not shocking. It is not even particularly suspicious on its own.
But all of it together?
The way the articles all seem to tap dance carefully around the same words?
I could not stop.
Mario messaged me later. Just a casual message checking in.
I stared at it until my heart started pounding so hard my hands went cold.
I did not answer.
I couldn’t.
What was I supposed to say?
Hi, yes, I ate and rested, and also I spent the morning reading about your dead wife and wondering if you killed her?
Obviously not.
That would be insane.
I am insane.
There is no way the man I spent Friday night with could do something like that. No way the man who fed me breakfast in his garden Saturday morning, who touched me like I’ve never been touched before, who understood me in a way no man ever has before, could be the same man those articles were talking about.
Those people did not know him.
Those articles did not know him.
Those rags did not know anything.
Not the way I do.
Except.
I don’t know him.
Not really.
I know pieces.
Dangerous pieces. Intimate pieces. Professional pieces. Pieces I keep mistaking for the whole man because my body trusts him faster than my brain can object.
I know what his hands feel like.
I know the sound of his voice when he is amused, angry, close to losing control.
I know he drinks espresso in the morning.
I know his house smells like flowers and food.
I know he can be gentle.
