The Woman with the Scar (Costa Family)

“Judy,” she supplied, giving me a smile.

“Judy. I appreciate it. I think she got spooked today.”

“No wonder.”

“Yeah. She rushed out before we could arrange another… run-in. So thank you for that.”

“Anytime. And if you ever want to get a message to her, I can do that. He’s overbearing, but I do pass her in the hall at least once a day alone.”

“I appreciate that. And you’re in apartment…”

“6D.”

“Judy in 6D. I’ll remember that. Thanks again,” I said, nodding, then making my way out.

I didn’t need another excuse to see the woman again.

She had next to nothing to do with any of Eren’s business.

Yet I went ahead and made sure that my schedule was clear for Wednesday.

Because I suddenly had some urgent shopping to do.

CHAPTER FIVE

Ezmeray

It was probably pathetic to be as excited about grocery shopping as I was every week, three times a week.

What can I say?

It was the only true freedom I knew anymore.

It never occurred to Eren to think he needed to send one of his guys with me to a market down the street, so there were no eyes watching me as I grabbed my reusable bags and made my way to the door.

I’d left a note on the counter just in case Eren forgot the schedule, even though I deliberately made it the exact same every single time I went so he could never accuse me of running off or messing around behind his back.

He was always looking for a fight.

I was always making sure I never gave him a reason.

New York in the spring was only beaten by New York in the fall. The trees budding out. The little dandelions found their way into the cracks in pavement, forever reminding us that if there was a will, there was a way.

Except, of course, when you found yourself married to a wannabe mobster.

Then, no matter how much of a will there might have been, there was really no way.

Shaking my head to knock free those negative thoughts, I made my way down the street, enjoying the slight breeze in my hair, scented heavily with the flowers from the florist half a block up.

As I got to the market, I held the door open for a mom struggling with a toddler and too many bags.

I smiled down at the little girl, feeling that tug in my belly. For a child I would never have. Because I would be damned if I gave that selfish pig a child.

There had been very little I could control in the situation, but that had been one.

Just a “routine” trip to the gynecologist a week before the wedding, and I grit my teeth and endured the pain of getting an IUD punched into my uterus, ensuring that the awful man I had to call my husband would be denied an heir.

It wasn’t much.

But it gave me a small sense of power in an utterly powerless situation.

Even if, in denying him a child, I was also denying myself one.

It was for the greater good, I had to remind myself whenever I got upset about it.

What kind of life would I be bringing that child into? One where it would watch its father beat and humiliate its mother?

If it was a little girl, would it learn that it was okay to be treated that way?

If a boy, would it think it was alright to treat women that way?

And, perhaps worse of all, would that famous temper I felt on my face and body far too many times be subjected onto a child too?

I couldn’t bear the thought.

So this was the only way.

Taking a deep breath, I grabbed one of the carts, silently cursing it as I got into the store for its spastic wheel and high-pitched squeaking.

Not even that was going to ruin my day, though.

Shopping days were sacred.

I took my time on them.

I got fully immersed in the experience.

And, luckily, Eren had never shopped for groceries a day in his life, so he had no idea how long the task was supposed to take.

I had barely made it through the bakery section and into the produce when a figure caught my eye.

A tall and darkly handsome figure.

God, so handsome.

It had been almost off-putting how good-looking he had been sitting there on that exercise bike in the apartment gym. Like he belonged there. Like he worked out there all the time.

He’d even dressed the part in a black tee and black basketball shorts with stripes on the sides.

He had a sort of wiry build, thin yet unmistakably strong. And while I thought I’d gotten a decent enough view of him on the sidewalk looking up at me, he was something else entirely to behold in the daylight where none of his features were in shadow.

I couldn’t say I’d ever really been attracted to a man like him before. There was just something about him that screamed Danger!