Dear Adam, page 31
The message was clear: Stay away. Let me deal with this.
A week later, a reply had arrived.
She hadn’t opened it.
Now there were three. Three unopened envelopes, lined up in a row, addressed in her mother’s tight, spidery handwriting.
Nine months was a long time in solitude. She’d read every book she owned at least three times. She’d cried as she read Never Let Me Go until she dropped her Kindle and cracked the screen.
Nine months was also a long time to sit with everything she had done.
And everything he had done.
Not Adam.
Aidan.
Keene had explained that he was the one behind it all. The messages. The conversations. The connection. It hadn’t been an AI Companion. It had been him. She hadn’t fallen in love with a machine. She’d been duped into falling in love with a man who hid behind one. And somehow, that felt worse.
A knock at the door shattered the thought. She leaned into the peephole, then stood back. Taking three deep breaths, she removed the chain and opened the door.
Keene strode in and headed straight for the kitchen table, uninvited.
Pumbaa flattened his ears and hissed from the arm of the couch.
“Sit,” Keene indicated one of the kitchen chairs, oblivious to the fact that he was in her apartment.
She obeyed without offering him a drink.
Keene adjusted the cuffs of his charcoal suit, then glanced at her with his piercing eyes, calm and assessing. “Judge Langley did us a favor, ruling no photographs of either defendant could be released by the press.”
Ava nodded, picking at her nails.
“So far, we’ve kept all photos out of the press,” he continued. “The judge didn’t want your... injuries turned into clickbait.”
Ava smoothed her curtain of hair across the left side of her face. “Right.”
“But don’t mistake that for protection,” Keene said. “The trial will be broadcast via fixed cameras. And the jury? They’ll see you in person.”
She nodded stiffly.
Keene leaned forward, voice low and steady. “Listen carefully, Ava. We’re walking into a fight where perception is everything. They’ve built a case around motive and implication. They want a villain in lipstick. A savvy, manipulative woman who played dumb and cashed out. That’s the narrative.”
“It’s not true,” she said quietly.
“I know that. But I don’t have to convince me.” He tapped the table between them. “I have to convince twelve strangers who are primed to hate tech fraud, cold ambition, and women who lie. Especially women who claim to be victims afterwards.”
She flinched, but he didn’t pull back.
“You’re facing an uphill climb. We have to win them over. Early. I need them to understand your story—not the headlines—the real one. I need them to feel the pressure you were under. The shame. The desperation to be seen as something more than a disfigured woman with trauma in her rearview mirror.”
Ava’s lips parted, but no sound came.
Keene softened, just slightly. “I don’t say that to rattle you. I say it because we need to be strategic. We play the long game, but we open strong. Our defense is to make the jury want to believe you.”
“Will Ada—Aidan be there?”
“It’s a joint trial. He will have his own attorney and will sit on the opposite side of the courtroom.”
“I don’t know if I can do this,” she whispered.
“You can,” he said firmly. “You’ve survived worse than this. You can answer truthfully and look a jury in the eye. That’s all this is. Just another fire. I’ll handle the burn.”
The metallic snap of his briefcase muffled her gasp.
He slid a crinkled piece of yellow-lined paper across the table. “Wolfe’s attorney gave me this for you.” He shut the case with finality.
He rose, then paused. “I’m one of the best at this, Ava. But I need your trust. And I need your composure. Be brave. Be real. The rest—I’ll handle.” He nodded once. “I’ll let myself out.”
The front door clicked shut behind him.
She swallowed the bile that rose in her throat. She still didn’t know what Aidan looked like, which made it harder to hate him properly, but she’d managed anyway.
She’d imagined cruel eyes. A manipulative smile. A voice that sounded kind because he knew exactly how to fake kindness.
How could he?
She stared at the piece of paper lying on her kitchen table like a confession. She unfolded it with trembling fingers.
Just ten words scrawled on a torn piece of yellow legal paper:
Your journal is safe. I never read it.
I’m sorry.
But how could she believe that?
When everything she’d believed had been built on a lie?
Chapter 52
Trial Day One
The chinos itched.
They weren’t his. Neither was the shirt, white and stiff, still creased from its packaging like a fresh lie. On his feet, a pair of stiff loafers. Someone had guessed his size, and they pinched when he walked. No belt, of course. Nothing he could hang himself with, that was down to the jurors or the public. He hadn’t seen a real mirror in months, but he could feel how hollow his cheeks had become.
He sat on the bench in the courthouse holding cell, ankles chained, wrists cuffed in front of him. The concrete beneath his boots was scuffed smooth with nervous pacing. He wasn’t the first man to wait here, and he wouldn’t be the last.
The lock clicked. Aidan looked up as the guard opened the door. “Your attorney,” the man said, stepping aside.
Elwood ducked in, briefcase in hand, shoulders already tight with tension. He set his scuffed briefcase on the table with a thud, then adjusted the knot of his crooked tie.
“Morning,” he said, shooting Aidan a glance. The glint of a scratched watch face caught the light as he rolled back his sleeve to check the time. “They’ll call us in soon. The Judge is prompt.”
Aidan didn’t move. “Is she here?”
“No idea.” Elwood frowned. “Prosecution’s holding firm. Joint conspiracy to defraud. You’re still being tried together.”
Aidan closed his eyes for a heartbeat. “And her plea?”
“Still not guilty.”
He didn’t know if that was a relief or a reckoning.
“You ready?” the lawyer asked.
No.
“Yes,” Aidan said.
The guard reappeared. Aidan stood. The chains pulled taut with the movement.
He wondered if she would look at him.
He wondered if she still saw Adam when she closed her eyes.
If, in the jury’s eyes, he was the predator—or the bait.
No more waiting.
Time to step out into the open.
The courtroom was colder than he expected, not just in temperature from the overzealous air conditioning that buzzed from above like a vulture circling, but in atmosphere. The walls were paneled in pale wood, the benches polished to a sterile shine. Everything looked pristine, but nothing felt clean.
Aidan shuffled in, chains still cuffing his wrists. Although wearing civilian clothes, his restraints stayed on until the judge entered. The clink of metal echoed with every step as the bailiff led him down the center aisle.
At the front, two defense tables faced the bench—one for him and Elwood, and on the other side of the courtroom, one for Ava and her attorney. Across the divide sat the prosecution’s desk, flanked by laptops and files.
The District Attorney wore a charcoal suit. Every strand of her silver-streaked hair was coiled into a low bun like a loaded spring. She didn’t fidget and didn’t blink; she just sat watching everything, like a hawk waiting for the wind to shift.
Between them, the court reporter sat motionless, hands poised over a stenotype machine, her expression blank.
Uniformed guards stood at the edges of the room. Ushers directed the slow trickle of spectators into the gallery above—press, bloggers, and gawkers, peering over the rail like birds on a wire.
He told himself not to look left or right.
Instead, he glanced up.
And that’s when he saw her.
Clarissa.
She sat in the third row of the gallery, dressed in a navy turtleneck and tailored slacks, her trench coat folded in her lap. Her lipstick was darker than he remembered, a red wine stain, almost. Her glossy hair was pinned back in a low twist, her eyes locked on him.
His breath stopped in his throat.
What the hell?
He hadn’t spoken to her since Pier 39. Since she’d slid into that taxi and slammed the door. How did she even know? About his arrest. About the trial. About him.
It had been all over the news and social media, of course, but no photos. And she’d only ever known him as Walker, the pilot.
He stumbled slightly, and the bailiff gave a nudge to keep him moving.
At the defense table, Elwood motioned to the chair beside him. Aidan sat stiffly, the cuffs clinking as he folded his hands. But his gaze stayed locked on the gallery.
Clarissa didn’t look away.
He couldn’t make sense of it. She wasn’t the type to offer sympathy. She didn’t do second chances. And she definitely didn’t do courtroom drama.
His pulse thundered in his ears.
He lifted his hands and rubbed his face, the chains clinking softly.
As he lowered them back into his lap, he saw her.
Ava.
She was seated at the opposite table, beside her attorney. A cream suit and high-neck blouse. Her hair was worn long, swept across one side of her face like a veil.
Aidan’s gaze froze.
She turned.
Their eyes locked.
Time slipped.
His first thought was surreal and instinctive: The woman from the coffee shop.
It had been almost a year. But it was her.
The same sadness in her posture.
His second thought landed like a punch: Oh God, her face.
Where her hair fell away, the damage was unmistakable. The scarring was rawer than he remembered—deep grooves, puckered flesh, the drag of one eye, and the downturn of her mouth into something unreadable.
And then came his third thought.
Slow.
Final.
But real:
This is who I fell in love with.
He didn’t blink.
Didn’t breathe.
And he didn’t turn away.
Chapter 53
Trial Day One Continued…
On the morning of the trial, Ava stepped out of the shower and dressed in the cream suit her attorney had recommended. The fabric felt stiff and unnatural, understandable after nearly 270 days in PJs or lounge wear.
Russell Keene had explained that she’d be seated across the courtroom from Aidan. That she wouldn’t have to look at him.
Although… she might.
She didn’t know what he looked like.
And she was curious.
Curious to see what the monster looked like.
She couldn’t face breakfast, but she opened a tin of pilchards for Pumbaa. She wrinkled her nose at the sour, cloying smell as she mashed them on a plate. A splash of oil landed on her jacket sleeve.
“Damn it,” she hissed, grabbing a dishcloth to blot it, but the stain held fast. Of course it did. She crouched to place the bowl on the floor.
Pumbaa padded over, tail twitching. She reached for him, but he veered sideways and sat just out of reach.
Her hand hovered for a moment, then dropped to her lap.
The car ride to the courthouse passed in a blur. Keene sat beside her, shuffling papers and muttering last-minute reassurances, but Ava barely registered a word.
The courtroom doors loomed ahead like a mouth about to swallow her whole.
When the car pulled to the curb, the door opened, and without warning, the driver threw his coat over her head. She was led out blind, one hand gripping the crook of Keene’s arm, the other clenched at her side.
The crowd was a wall of noise.
Reporters surged forward, their voices colliding in a barrage of demands and accusations.
“Ava, do you deny the charges?”
“Was it all a hoax from the beginning?”
“What’s it like being ghosted by a machine?”
“Did an algorithm break your heart?”
Their words overlapped, trampling each other like stampeding hooves.
Flashes burst through the fabric covering her head, strobing red and pink against her closed eyelids. She kept her head down, her breath fogging in the wool lining. Her chest tightened, but she didn’t stop walking.
Let them shout. Let them jeer. She was already past shame.
Inside, the air was cooler, quieter, but somehow still thick with judgment. The coat was lifted off, and she blinked against the sudden light. She combed her fingers through her hair, smoothing it down. The familiar curtain fell across half her face, but it didn’t stop the weight of eyes crawling over her skin.
She didn’t dare meet anyone’s gaze as she was ushered down the aisle and toward the defense table. Keene murmured something, but she didn’t hear what.
Her gaze drifted instinctively to the gallery.
And that was when she saw her.
Clarissa.
Perched in the third row, legs crossed, glossy hair pinned back, arms folded, face impassive.
Ava froze. Her stomach turned to lead. Keene edged her forward.
Come to gloat, no doubt.
Of course, it was her who had turned Ava in. Clarissa had always resented her. And now here she was, watching it all unravel. Probably fermenting smugness beneath that turtleneck sweater.
Ava turned away, bile burning the back of her throat. She couldn’t look at her.
Then she heard the chains.
The soft clink of metal against metal as the courtroom doors opened again. The sound rooted her to the spot—the sound fitting for an animal, a monster who had duped her.
They led him in, wrists cuffed, ankles shackled. He wore chinos and a creased white shirt. His shoulders were broader than she’d imagined, but it was his face that struck her dumb.
Him.
The man from the coffee shop.
The one with the sad eyes lined like crinkled paper. She hadn’t looked too closely at the time, had barely glanced at him. But now that she saw him again, the recognition was instant.
Her lungs refused to expand. Her fingers trembled at her sides.
She couldn’t breathe.
She couldn’t tear her eyes away.
Aidan was scanning the courtroom. His expression was careful, unreadable. And for a moment, only a flicker, Ava was certain his gaze landed on Clarissa.
Of course it did.
Clarissa had always been the type to draw attention without trying. To hold a room like she owned everyone in it.
Ava’s chest tightened.
Slowly, slowly, he turned his head. And that’s when he looked at her.
She braced herself. For the wince. The flinch. The quiet horror most people failed to hide the first time they saw her face. Even Keene had faltered when he first saw her.
But Aidan didn’t recoil.
He held her gaze.
Not for a heartbeat. Not for a blink.
For real.
Unmoving.
Unflinching.
Something curled and shifted within her. A strange, aching confusion. She didn't know if it was relief, rage, or something more.
But his eyes remained locked on hers. Like he saw her. Really saw her.
Like he knew exactly who she was and wasn’t afraid.
The gavel banged.
She blinked.
And the moment shattered.
The crack echoed through the courtroom like a gunshot.
“All rise,” the bailiff called, his voice flat but forceful.
The gallery rose to their feet.
Judge Langley entered through the side door, bald head gleaming beneath the fluorescents, his black robes trailing like smoke. Deep grooves carved into either side of his mouth hinted at decades of weighty sentences. He climbed the dais with a slow, deliberate gait and surveyed the courtroom like a man who already knew who was guilty, that the trial was just a formality. “You may be seated.” He sat with the finality of a vault door slamming shut.
The room rustled as people obeyed. Ava’s chair scraped against the parquet floor as she sat, her hands clenched in her lap. Cameras lined the back wall, sending a live feed across the country. She closed her eyes for a moment.
She could feel it… a second audience beyond the walls.
Behind her closed lids, she pictured the residents of Fairbridge crowded into the Prescott Golf and Country Club, gathered around the wall-mounted TV, mouths agape.
The air shifted, not with sound but with stillness, like tall grass whispering beneath the weight of a predator settling in to wait.
She kept her head down.
Judge Langley lifted a folder from the bench and opened it with a quiet sigh. “We are convened today in the case of The United States of America versus Aidan Wolfe and Ava Sinclair, case number—”
She tuned out the rest. Hearing her name—her new name—spoken aloud in that low, deliberate voice made the hairs on her neck rise. A lone gazelle, exposed at the edge of a watering hole.
“The prosecution may proceed,” the judge said, closing the file and giving a deliberate nod.
District Attorney Marcy Cleaver rose. Mid-fifties, silver-streaked hair pulled into a tight, no-nonsense bun. Her gunmetal gray blazer hugged her frame with precision, the pencil skirt tailored to match. She moved with the calm confidence of someone who had stalked bigger prey and won. Her eyes swept the room, not curious, but calculating.
She stepped out from behind her desk and walked deliberately toward the jury box, hands folded neatly in front of her. “Good morning.”
Her voice was crisp and controlled. Designed to travel. “Over the next few days, you are going to hear a story. A story about technology. About deception. And about trust. A story about a woman, Ava Sinclair, who built her career on lies. Who infiltrated one of the most prestigious venture capital firms in the country. Who manipulated investors, colleagues, and wasted precious public funds… all while hiding behind a carefully constructed persona.”
