Redemption (Sempre 2)

“That’s it,” Haven confirmed, still staring at the canvas. “Are you sure this is okay? Does it make sense?”

“It’s abstract. It’s not supposed to make sense.” Kelsey snorted. “I don’t get why you and Gavin can’t be friends. So there’s no spark, but you were totally friends before, right? What changed?”

Haven sighed. She didn’t want to talk about it anymore. They had been talking about it for weeks. “I guess it was all or nothing with him.”

“Nonsense,” Kelsey argued. “He’s not that kind of man.”

Haven rolled her eyes. “You hardly knew him.”

“But you did.”

Silence permeated the studio. Did she know him? He worked at the construction site. Family business, he had said, but Haven knew nothing about his family. In fact, she knew little more than his name: Gavin something-or-other. She had heard his last name before, but she couldn’t recall it.

“It doesn’t matter,” Haven said finally. “It wasn’t meant to happen. People come into our lives for a reason, so I have to believe there was a point to it somewhere, but it wasn’t for us to be friends, I guess.”

Setting down her paintbrush, Haven stepped back from the canvas. The spring Novak Gala was fast approaching, their submissions due by the end of the week, and Haven was struggling to create something she felt worthy of turning in.

“I’m going to miss seeing his face around,” Kelsey said. “Talk about good looking!”

Haven laughed. “If you like him so much, go ask him out.”

Eyes wide, Kelsey fervently shook her head. “No way. I couldn’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because of you, duh,” she said. “It’s breaking the friendship code.”

“Don’t be silly. He’s a really great guy. Funny. Nice. You could definitely do worse. Actually, you have done worse.”

“You really liked him.” A statement, not a question.

“Yes.”

“Then why? Really?”

Haven half shrugged, half shook her head. “There was nothing there.”

Kelsey’s expression softened. “Your ex.”

Carmine. “What about him?”

“That’s why you felt no spark with Gavin. You had it with someone else.”

Haven thought that over, remembering the chemistry she had felt with Carmine. There had been electricity, so much he made her glow. The thought of never having that again, having to live her life with nothing but the memory of the way she had felt, troubled her. “Do you think it’s possible to feel it more than once?”

“Absolutely,” Kelsey said. “I feel it every time a guy so much as looks at me these days.”

Haven laughed.

“Or . . .” Kelsey took a few steps toward her, scanning the colorful painting. “Or maybe I’ve never really felt it at all, and you’re just one of the lucky ones.”

* * *

“Corrado Moretti is notorious. They call him the Kevlar Killer on the streets, insinuating he’s bulletproof, untouchable, and maybe out there he is, but not in here. Here we seek the truth. Here we get justice. And justice, today, would be a guilty verdict. The defendant is a murderer, a liar, and a thief. Nobody is safe with him roaming free. We have proven he belongs to an organization that prides itself on killing, an organization that advances people for hurting others. What kind of organization does that? An immoral one. An illegal one. A dangerous one.”

The prosecutor babbled on and on as Corrado sat still in the hard chair, waiting. The eight-week trial was finally coming to an end with closing statements. It would soon be over and time to move on.

Or so he hoped.