My Husband Defended the Man Who Assaulted Me Chapter 07

My Husband Defended the Man Who Assaulted Me Chapter 07

Shortly after being taken into custody, Celine resorted to her oldest trick: tears. Seated in the interrogation room, she clutched her stomach and put on a delicate, tearful show.

“I don’t know anything! Eden acted on his own.”

“I was just scared the whole thing would blow up.”

“I’m pregnant. How could I do something that cruel?”

It was the same familiar act—fragile, innocent, as if she had never harbored an ounce of malice.

But Eden couldn’t hold.

Spoiled rotten since childhood, he never faced real consequences.

At first he swore I’d come on to him.

Then the full footage and GHB purchase records came out, and he broke.

“It was Celine! All of it!”

“She said if we made Vivian dirty, the Mrs. Evans title would be hers!”

“She said Sully would always believe her!”

“She said Vivian already had that old psychiatric record. Nobody would believe her twice!”

The interrogator asked,

“Why was Celine so sure Sullivan would protect you?”

Eden shivered.

“Because Celine told him she was carrying his kid. And Sully… that guy eats guilt for breakfast.”

“But that baby isn’t even his! Celine doesn’t even know who the father is!”

That confession landed on Sullivan’s desk.

He sat in his office. Immobile.

He read the line again.

[But that baby isn’t even his.]

He’d bent over backward for that “child.”

Celine had cried.

“Sully, I don’t want to ruin you and Vivian. But the baby is innocent.”

She said she was scared. Alone. He was all she had.

Sullivan felt guilty. Softened. He told himself Vivian was his wife. Vivian was strong. Vivian had survived before.

But Celine was different.

Celine was carrying his child.

Celine couldn’t handle the blow.

So he kept pushing Vivian back.

He had pushed her relentlessly, hurt her deeply, and driven her straight to the brink of destruction.

Now he knew. Every single thing had been a lie.

Sullivan went to see Celine.

The moment she saw him, she lunged toward the table in a desperate plea.

“Sully! Save me!”

“I’m carrying your baby! You can’t let our child grow up without a mother!”

Sullivan looked at her. For a long, cold minute.

His stare was so frozen that Celine’s tears stuttered.

He slid a paternity test request across the table.

“The baby isn’t mine. Is it?”

Celine’s face locked.

Then the tears flooded back.

“Sully, who told you that? Was it Eden? He’ll say anything to save himself!”

“Of course it’s yours!”

Sullivan didn’t move.

“Celine. You’re still lying to me?”

She stared at him.

Like a switch flipped, she realized the helpless act was dead.

She sat back slowly. The tears dried up.

And in their place, it was twisted, burning hatred.

“Fine. It’s not yours. So what?”

“Sully, you ate every single lie up without a second thought.”

“All I had to do was cry and say I have nobody but you. And you folded.”

“You thought Vivian was tough. Vivian could take it. Vivian could be dragged through hell and still survive.”

“But not me. I just had to leak a few tears and you’d throw yourself in front of me.”

Sullivan’s fists tightened on the table.

Celine kept going.

“What does Vivian even have? She just jumped in while I was overseas. She stole my spot.”

“A used-up, traumatized, barren piece of trash.”

“And she thought she deserved to be Mrs. Evans?”

Sullivan shot up. His eyes went lethal.

“Shut your mouth.”

Celine laughed unhinged.

“Make me. You know what I wanted most?”

“I wanted to see the man she trusted most, the man who saved her call her a whore. Throw her records in her face. Accuse her of faking rape.”

“And watch, just watch if she could still breathe after that.”

Sullivan’s face went pale.

Celine looked at him, slow and deliberate.

“Sully. How did her wrists look? Covered in blood, wasn’t they?”

Outside the interrogation room, Sullivan couldn’t stand.

An assistant reached for him. He shoved them off and walked out.

The second he hit the parking lot, he called Dave.

“Prep the paperwork. I’m withdrawing from Eden Whitmore’s defense.”

“And I’m testifying… for Vivian. All evidence.”

Dave paused.

“Sir, your own opening statements. You’ll face ethics charges. Possible suspension.”

Sullivan closed his eyes.

“I don’t care. I deserve it.”

That night, he went back to the house we’d shared.

In the back of the walk-in closet, he saw the red dress.

The one Celine gave me.

The one he’d called a streetwalker’s costume in open court.

It hung there silently, like a condemned corpse.

Sullivan reached out and took it down.

He held it to his chest.

Then he sank to his knees in the closet, and sobbed until he couldn’t breathe.

“Vivian. I’m sorry.”

“I’m so sorry…”

But the room gave him nothing back.

Only silence.