Chapter 200: Better days
The days passed in a blur of gray mornings and restless nights, the city outside the courthouse indifferent to the storm that raged in Mara’s chest. The courtroom had become a second skin, four pale walls, the heavy scent of varnished wood, the quiet shuffling of papers, and the low hum of tension so thick it made the air hard to swallow.
Mara sat at the plaintiff’s side, a storm cloud in human form, her hands clenched tightly in her lap. Beside her, her brothers sat like her armor: Steve, stone-faced and unreadable; Stanley and Stanford, quiet but watchful; even Stefan, for once, had traded his bravado for a somber stillness. Every one of them was here because this wasn’t just about her. This was Justice. Ethan, Velerie, and Vera were also in court.
Across the room sat Lucy, her blonde hair twisted into a tidy braid, a tissue crumpled in her trembling hand. Her lawyer had been dismissed. She’d insisted on defending herself again, like the last time a bold move or a desperate one, no one could quite decide. But when she rose to speak, there was a tremor in her voice that made the gallery lean in.
"All the accusations against me," Lucy began, her voice cracking on the first word, "they’re built on lies. Half-truths, twisted facts. I didn’t... I didn’t know whose child it was. I was told it was mine. Now I’m being told my baby had died."
Her gaze flicked to Mara, eyes glassy and red-rimmed. "I was pregnant. I... I thought I gave birth to my child. And if someone swapped those babies... if Philip —" she faltered, a sob catching in her throat, "if he gave me Mara’s child while my own was taken from me... then I’m as much a victim as anyone else."
A murmur swept through the courtroom like a gust of wind rattling old windows. The judge banged the gavel once for order, but Mara barely noticed.
Lucy turned fully toward her now, not bothering to wipe her tears. "Mara," she said, the name soft as silk but sharp as a dagger, "I loved Andrew. I still do. You have no idea what it felt like.... Thinking my baby was gone, and now being told maybe, just maybe, my Andrew wasn’t mine. That he was yours."
Her voice broke, and for a moment, the courtroom was silent save for the faint ticking of the old clock above the judge’s bench. "You know what it feels like to lose a child. Imagine it, Mara. Feel it."
And Mara did. The memories rose unbidden, the tiny fingers, the lullabies hummed into the night, the moment they told her Andrew was gone. Her heart howled for vengeance, her hands itched to strike, to scream, to shred Lucy’s lies to ribbons before the court.