“You think he paid them off?”
“He had to have done something to get this outcome,” Nash leaned over the desk toward Mena. “The ruling is bizarre, to say the least.”
“What’s my next move then? How do I get out of this marriage?” Mena raised a shaky hand to her throbbing hand.
“One of you has to be a resident of Florida for at least six months before you can file for divorce. Michael moved to New York almost a year ago. You haven’t lived in the States for four years.”
“To be free of Michael, I need to move back to Florida? Pause the life I have here. Walk away from my career, my …” Mena took a deep breath. She couldn’t let Julian find out about this. Not when their relationship was already on shaky ground since she didn’t answer his marriage proposal.
“Florida is a no fault state. He’d have a hard time finding a legitimate reason to contest the divorce. You could be free in six months. It’s not that long of a time period,” Nash explained.
“If Michael doesn’t do something else to manipulate a judge or create some stall tactic, right?”
“Right.”
Mena’s cell phone rang. Reaching into her purse, she glanced at the screen. It was Julian.
“Nash, I have to go. But please check and see if there are any other options that don’t involve me moving from St. Basil,” Mena said.
“I’m sorry. There are no other options, Mena. You have to move back to Florida.” Nash held the door open for her.
Resigned to the truth she hadn’t wanted to accept, Mena rushed out of the Iverson Law Office and answered the phone.
“Where are you?” Curiosity simmered in Julian’s smooth baritone.
“I should ask you the same thing.” Mena secured the cell phone between her ear and shoulder. Julian had left the condo early this morning while she was still sleeping. Instead of waking up in his arms, she’d been alone. Panic had gripped her for a moment as guilt washed over her. Two months had passed, and she still hadn’t explained to Julian why she’d freaked out when he proposed to her. Why she couldn’t marry him. She’d thought that was going to be the end of their relationship, but he’d surprised her once again. Everything had returned to normal almost immediately. Julian kept being the amazing man she loved, and she kept being the woman who was lying to him.
“You skipped breakfast, I see,” Julian said, laughing slightly under his breath.
Mena stepped inside the elevator within the Heritage Center and pressed the button for the third floor, where the Office of the District Attorney was housed. “What does breakfast have to do with why you left me this morning without saying goodbye?”
The elevator door closed, and she leaned against the wall, waiting for his explanation.
“I left the note on the milk carton, so you’d see it when you ate your cocoa puffs,” Julian said.
“So, if I had indulged in my normal sugar laden breakfast, I would have found out exactly where my man had disappeared to. That’s what you’re saying?”
“I like that.”
“You like what?” Mena stepped forward as the elevator door opened.
“You said, ‘my man.’ I am yours, completely forever. You know that right?”
Heat flushed against Mena’s cheeks. Would he still say that if he knew he came home every night to a married woman? “Yeah, I know.”
“Good. I’m in the Aerie Islands. Broman’s treatment starts at nine each morning, so I wanted to get here before then to see him,” Julian explained.
Mena heard the soft rustling of waves crashing in the background. “I’m glad you finally visited him. How was it?”
“Hard as hell and easier than I expected. This treatment protocol has him looking healthier than ever. For a minute, I thought he’d wake up and want to go dirtboarding,” Julian said.
“One day the two of you will do that again,” Mena said. The clinical trial was supposed to be groundbreaking and Broman had a good chance of waking up within the next year.
“Ferry is here. I have to go through security,” Julian said, then paused. “Where did you say you were?”
“I didn’t,” Mena teased as she strolled down the wide hallway toward the door at the end of the hall.
“Keeping secrets from me?” Julian asked, a playful hint in his tone.
