The Judas Kiss

Chapter 2

Isabella's POV

The courtroom didn't smell like justice. It smelled like floor wax, old paper, and the expensive, suffocating cologne Antonio wore, the scent I had picked out for him for our third anniversary.

Back then, I had leaned into his neck, inhaling that woody aroma, thinking I was the luckiest woman alive. Now, that same scent made my stomach churn with bile.

I sat at the defendant's table, my hands trembling beneath the heavy oak wood. My fingernails, once perfectly manicured for the gala, were now chipped and ragged from clawing at the cold walls of my holding cell.

I was no longer wearing emerald silk. Gone was the woman who commanded boardrooms from the shadows. In her place sat a ghost in a cheap, grey polyester suit provided by the state, her hair matted and her spirit frayed.

Across the aisle, the Rossi family sat like royalty in the front row. They occupied the benches as if they were thrones, their presence a silent proclamation of my guilt.

Sophia, my mother-in-law, wore a black lace veil pinned to a pillbox hat, looking as though she were mourning a tragedy. She dabbed at her eyes with a silk handkerchief, but I knew those eyes were as dry as a desert and twice as deadly. Beside her, Antonio sat tall, his shoulders broad and confident.

He didn't look like a man whose wife was on trial; he looked like a man who had finally pruned a dead branch from his family tree. His hand was possessively intertwined with Clara’s. Clara, the secretary, was now wearing my favorite Cartier watch, the one Antonio told me was being sent for repairs a month ago.

"The prosecution calls its next witness," the District Attorney announced. His voice was a rhythmic boom that echoed against the high ceilings. "Mia Rossi."

My heart didn't just stop; it shattered. A cold, paralyzing numbness spread from my chest to my fingertips.

No. Not Mia. Please, dear God, not my baby.

The heavy oak doors at the back of the courtroom creaked open. The sound was like a groan from a dying beast. My seven-year-old daughter walked in, her hand gripped tightly by Beatrice, my step-sister-in-law.

Mia looked so small in that vast room, her porcelain skin pale and her eyes red-rimmed and puffy. She looked like a doll that had been broken and glued back together.

When she looked toward the defense table, I didn't see the love that used to light up my world every morning. I didn't see the girl who used to hide under my covers during thunderstorms. I saw terror. I saw confusion. I saw a child who had been taught to fear the person she once worshipped.

"Mia," I breathed, my voice a broken rasp. I started to rise, my hands reaching out instinctively. "Mama is here, baby…"

"Order!" the judge barked, the gavel hitting the bench with a sound like a gunshot. "The defendant will remain seated!"

I collapsed back into the chair, the metal shackles on my ankles clinking mockingly.

Beatrice leaned down, her lips brushing Mia’s ear. She looked like a poisonous snake pouring venom into a pristine flower. I saw Beatrice’s hand give Mia’s shoulder a sharp, hidden squeeze, a warning disguised as a comfort. Then, she nudged the little girl toward the witness stand.

The prosecutor stepped forward, his smile sickeningly sweet, the kind of smile used to lure animals into traps. "Mia, sweetheart, you don't have to be afraid. No one is going to hurt you here. Just tell the judge what you told the police. What did you see your mommy doing in the home office late at night?"

Mia looked at Antonio. My husband didn't look at me. He looked at his daughter and gave her a slow, encouraging nod.

It was the same nod he used to give her when she was learning to ride her bike, the nod that meant 'I’ve got you, you’re doing great.'Now, he was using that same paternal warmth to guide her toward my execution.

Mia’s voice was a tiny, broken whisper that barely carried to the microphone. "I saw... I saw Mommy putting papers in the shredder. The ones with the big red stamps."

The gallery gasped. I felt the air leave the room.

"And what did she tell you, Mia?" the prosecutor urged.

Mia’s lower lip trembled. She looked like she wanted to run, but Beatrice was standing right there, watching her like a hawk. "She told me... she told me if I told Daddy, she would leave me and never come back. She said she was going to take all the money and find a new daughter who was better than me."

"I didn't! Mia, baby, look at me!" I screamed, the agony finally ripping through my throat. I didn't care about the judge. I didn't care about the trial. "I never said that! I love you more than life! They’re lying to you!"

"Silence! Bailiff, restrain the defendant!"

A heavy hand slammed onto my shoulder, forcing me down, but I couldn't stop looking at my daughter. The betrayal was a physical weight, a crushing pressure that made it hard to breathe. I looked at Beatrice, and for a split second, she let the mask slip. She smirking.

I realized then the depth of their cruelty. Beatrice had used the blackmail to convince my daughter that I was the one planning to abandon her when I never ever thought of that. They had taken a seven-year-old's greatest fear and turned it into a weapon against her mother.

"And Mia," the prosecutor continued, leaning in for the kill. "What did Mommy say about Daddy?"

Mia began to cry, fat, silent tears rolling down her cheeks. "She said... she said Daddy was stupid. That she was the one who made the money and he was just a... a placeholder. She said we were going to move to a big castle where Daddy could never find us."

The gallery was in an uproar. The reporters were scribbling so fast their pens squeaked. The "Wallflower Wife" was actually a scheming, hateful genius. That was the headline they wanted. That was the story Antonio had sold them.

"No further questions," the prosecutor said, his voice dripping with triumph.

As Mia was led off the stand, the bailiff steered her right past the defense table. For a split second, the world narrowed down to just the two of us.

Our eyes met. I saw the hesitation in her, the little girl who used to snuggle into my chest. Her eyes searched mine, looking for the monster Beatrice said I was.

"Mia, please," I sobbed, the tears finally breaking through. "I'm your Mama. You know me."

"I hate you!" she screamed suddenly. The sound was high, shrill, and perfectly coached. It was a scream meant for the cameras. "You’re a bad person! I don't want you! I want Clara to be my mommy now! She loves Daddy, and you only love money!"

The gavel fell like a guillotine. The sound echoed in my skull, vibrating through my very bones.

"Isabella Rossi," the judge said. His face was a mask of pure, unadulterated disgust. He looked at me as if I were something he had stepped in on the sidewalk.

"In all my years on the bench, I have rarely seen such calculated, cold-hearted greed. You didn't just steal from a company that gave you everything; you attempted to destroy a father's reputation and traumatize a child for your own gain."

He didn't even look at the character letters my court-appointed lawyer had tried to present. Why would he? The "King of Business" was the victim here.

"I hereby sentence you to ten years in the Blackwood Women’s Maximum Security Penitentiary. No possibility of parole for the first five."

Ten years.

Ten years of Mia growing up calling Clara Mommy. Ten years of Antonio spending my hard-earned billions on his mistress. Ten years of the Rossi family laughing at my grave.

I looked at Antonio one last time. He didn't look away. He stood up, towering over the room. As the bailiffs grabbed my arms, he didn't offer a look of pity or even a flicker of regret.

He leaned over, right there in the front row, and kissed Clara deeply. It wasn't a kiss of love; it was a victory lap.

As I was dragged toward the side door, Sophia Rossi stood up. She walked to the wooden railing, her face inches from mine. She pushed back her veil, revealing eyes that burned with a demonic, ancient triumph.

"I told you, you common little slut," she hissed, her voice a low vibration that only I could hear. "I told you I would burn you out of our lives. You thought your brain made you one of us? Your brain just made it easier for us to frame you. Enjoy the rats, Isabella. They’re the only family you have left."

My legs went limp. The bailiffs practically had to carry me. As the heavy metal door to the prisoner transport area slammed shut, the last thing I saw through the small wired window was the "King" I had created, walking out into the bright afternoon sun, my daughter in one hand and his mistress in the other.

The Architect was gone. The wife was dead. As the darkness of the transport van swallowed me, I realized that ghosts don't cry. They don't bleed.

And ghosts have all the time in the world to plan a haunting.