Chapter 14 - The Wedding Gift
|
Two weeks before Dominic's trial was set to begin, a heavy package arrived at my brownstone via certified mail.
It was from Dominic's public defender.
Inside was a single velvet box and a handwritten note from Dominic, written on cheap prison stationery:
Evelyn,
I found this in my safe deposit box before the feds seized my assets. It was supposed to be your five-year anniversary gift before everything went wrong. Take it or sell it. I don't care anymore. Just tell Clara one day that I wasn't always a monster.
Dominic.
I opened the velvet box. Inside was a platinum necklace set with a magnificent pear-cut diamond.
I picked up the necklace, holding it up to the light. It was breathtaking, expensive, and completely hollow—just like every gift Dominic had ever bought me during our marriage.
I didn't keep it.
The next day, I had Simone take the necklace to a high-end auction house downtown. It sold for two hundred and forty thousand dollars.
Every single dollar was donated directly to a local shelter for young mothers escaping abusive and financial domestic relationships.
May you like
I sent the receipt back to Dominic's public defender with a short reply:
Clara will know her father was a caution story. Not a monster. A man who traded his soul for a hotel sign, and lost both.
