Sophie’s POV
The courthouse smells like old wood and anxiety.
I sit in the gallery, Adrian's hand firm on my knee, watching Lisette Vaughn being led to the stand.
The courtroom is packed—journalists with notebooks, curious spectators, a few faces I recognize from campus who probably came for the spectacle. The air feels thick, heavy with anticipation and something darker.
I barely recognize the woman in front of me.
Gone is the polished, calculating professor who orchestrated my humiliation. Gone is the sharp-eyed predator who cornered me on that rooftop, who smiled while threatening to destroy everything I loved.
The Lisette being guided to her seat looks like a ghost wearing her skin.
Her hair hangs limp around her face, unwashed and tangled. Her eyes dart around the room, never settling, jumping from face to face like a bird trapped in a cage.
Her movements are twitchy, erratic—she keeps adjusting her collar, smoothing her skirt, picking at invisible threads on her sleeve with fingers that won't stop trembling.
She mutters to herself. I can't hear the words from where I'm sitting, but I can see her lips moving constantly, a running monologue no one else is part of.
This is what hatred does, I think. This is what obsession becomes when it consumes everything else.
The hearing proceeds with clinical detachment. The judge's voice is measured, emotionless. The lawyers speak in legal jargon that washes over me like white noise.
I understand maybe half of what's being said, but Adrian's presence beside me keeps me grounded, his thumb tracing small circles on my knee beneath the wooden railing.
The psychiatrists take the stand one by one, their testimony painting a portrait of a mind in ruins.
"Dr. Vaughn presents with severe delusional disorder, characterized by an obsessive fixation on specific individuals she perceives as threats to her romantic attachment."
The first psychiatrist consults his notes, voice dry and clinical.
"Her break from reality appears to have been triggered by years of untreated illness, exacerbated by the termination of a significant relationship approximately five years ago."
"In your professional opinion," the prosecutor asks, "is the defendant capable of understanding the charges against her?"
"The defendant struggles to distinguish between her delusions and objective reality. She maintains beliefs that are demonstrably false and responds to challenges to those beliefs with escalating distress."
Lisette interrupts before he can continue.
"That's not true." Her voice cuts across the courtroom, too loud, too sharp. "I understand everything perfectly. I understand that Adrian loves me—he's always loved me. She's the one who doesn't understand."
Her eyes scan the gallery until they find me, and a smile spreads across her face that makes my blood run cold. "She stole him. Manipulated him. But he'll come back to me. He always comes back."
"Dr. Vaughn, please allow the witness to complete his testimony," the judge interjects.
Lisette laughs. It's an awful sound—high and brittle, cracking at the edges like thin ice.
"Testimony. As if any of this matters. As if you can judge what Adrian and I have. We were perfect together. Perfect. Until she ruined everything."
The hearing continues, but Lisette doesn't stop. She interrupts constantly—laughing at inappropriate moments, muttering corrections to testimony she disagrees with, insisting over and over that Adrian still loves her, that Sophie stole what was rightfully hers.
Her lawyer tries repeatedly to quiet her, leaning close to whisper urgent instructions, but she bats him away like an annoying fly.
I watch her deterioration with a strange mixture of horror and pity. This woman tried to destroy me. Orchestrated my public humiliation, manipulated Cassian into betraying me, threatened my life and my child's life on that rooftop.
I should feel satisfaction watching her unravel in front of a judge. Instead, I feel sick.
Then Lisette's gaze locks onto mine. Everything shifts.
One moment she's seated, twitching and muttering. The next, she's moving—shoving past her lawyer with strength I wouldn't have thought her capable of, lunging toward the gallery with raw, unhinged fury contorting her features.
"Sophie!" My name tears from her throat like a weapon. "You think you've won? You think he'll ever love you the way he loved me? You're nothing! A child playing with things you don't understand!"
Security reacts, but not fast enough. She makes it three steps, four, her eyes wild and fixed on me with murderous intent. I'm on my feet before I realize I've moved, heart slamming against my ribs, hands flying to protect my stomach instinctively.
Adrian is in front of me in an instant, his body a wall between me and the chaos.
Security tackles her before she can reach the gallery railing. She goes down hard, still screaming, clawing at the guards who pin her to the floor.
Her voice fills the courtroom—wordless shrieks interspersed with my name, with Adrian's name, with accusations that blur together into pure sound.
The courtroom erupts. People are standing, shouting, the judge's gavel banging repeatedly as she calls for order. Journalists scramble for their phones. Someone behind me is crying.
Lisette is dragged toward the side door, still fighting, still screaming. Her eyes find mine one last time through the tangle of guards restraining her—and the hatred in them is absolute. Total. The kind of hatred that doesn't end, that just gets buried until it can surface again.
Then she's gone, and the door slams shut behind her.
"Recess!" The judge's voice cuts through the chaos. "This court is in recess. Fifteen minutes."
Adrian's arm wraps around me, guiding me toward the hallway before I can process what just happened. My legs feel wooden, disconnected from my body. The gallery blurs past in a smear of faces and voices.
In the hallway, away from the crowds, he pulls me into his arms.
I'm shaking. I didn't realize it until now, but my whole body is trembling like a leaf in a storm. His arms tighten around me, his voice low in my ear.
"She can't hurt you." The words are steady, certain, a promise and a command rolled into one. "Not anymore. Not after what everyone just witnessed. No judge in the world will let her walk free after that display. It's over, Sophie. This part of it is finally over."
I bury my face in his chest, breathing in the familiar scent of him, letting his heartbeat steady mine.
He's right. I know he's right. Lisette will be locked away somewhere she can't reach me, can't threaten my baby, can't poison everything I'm trying to build.
Then he adds, quieter, his lips brushing my hair: "Cassian will face consequences soon enough too. The trial is scheduled for next month. Justice is coming for both of them."
The words hit me like ice water.
I should feel relief, vindication. Two people who conspired to destroy my life, both facing the consequences of their choices.
This is what justice looks like—what I thought I wanted when I sat in that hospital bed, drowning in comments from strangers who'd decided I was entertainment.
But all I feel is a cold knot in my chest.
Cassian's face surfaces in my memory—the exhaustion carved into his features at the detention center, the crack in his voice when he asked about the baby, the genuine remorse in his eyes when he explained why he'd done what he'd done.
He was wrong. He hurt me. He deserves consequences.
But I'm not happy about his fate. I can't be. Some part of me still cares about the man who held me gently, who offered stability when my world was chaos, who looked at me like I mattered before everything went wrong.
I can't confess that to Adrian. Not now, maybe not ever. He would never understand—his hatred for Cassian runs too deep, too absolute. In Adrian's mind, there are no shades of gray. Cassian betrayed us, and betrayal demands punishment.
So I stay silent.
I let Adrian hold me in the courthouse hallway, let him believe my trembling is only about Lisette.
And I keep my conflicted heart locked away where he can't see it.