Chapter 4 - The Man on the Bench
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The metallic taste of blood spread quickly across my tongue. I knelt on one knee on the cold floor, gasping for air, clutching my abdomen as panic surged through me.
"Are you insane?" a voice shouted from down the hall.
A clerk scrambled out of a side office, while a bailiff stationed at the far end of the corridor began sprinting toward us.
Bianca stood over me, smoothing her ivory dress, completely unbothered. She leaned down, her expensive floral perfume suffocating me.
"Go ahead and cry, Lydia," Bianca whispered maliciously. "Pregnant women always look so pathetic when they cry."
I lifted my tear-stained face toward the open double doors of Courtroom 304.
Standing just inside the threshold, frozen in place, was the judge. He had just emerged from his private chambers, holding a thick stack of case files.
Judge Benjamin Rowan was legendary in the state legal system. Known for his unflinching adherence to the law, stern demeanor, and absolute refusal to tolerate courtroom theatrics, he was a formidable figure. His dark hair was silvering at the temples, and his face carried the deep lines of a man who had seen the worst of human nature.
His eyes met mine.
In an instant, the stoic, unreadable expression of a veteran judge shattered. His face went deathly pale. For one terrifying second, Judge Rowan forgot how to breathe.
He stared at the bright red welt swelling on my cheek, then down at my hands clutching my pregnant belly, and finally into my eyes—the exact same green-gray eyes he possessed.
The stack of legal folders in his hands slipped, crashing onto the wooden bench beside him. His large hands gripped the edge of the dais so hard his knuckles turned stark white.
"Lydia?"
May you like
The name left his lips as a strained, heartbroken whisper that barely carried across the room.
Adrian’s arrogant smirk instantly vanished. He frowned, looking back and forth between the judge and me in sudden, creeping confusion.
