Chapter 10 - THE FIRST THING HE COULD NOT BUY
Dominic had a boss.
Her name was Denise Harper.
She was sixty-two, ran a compliance-focused logistics advisory firm, and apparently enjoyed telling Dominic no.
I loved her before meeting her.
Conceptually.
Our first dinner after prison lasted two hours.
No declarations.
We talked about ordinary things.
Mom.
Work.
His supervised release.
My institute.
Elaine’s continuing belief that I had betrayed academia.
Then Dominic said:
“Denise rejected my client proposal.”
I nearly dropped my fork.
“What did you do?”
“Revised it.”
“Immediately?”
“No.”
“Ah.”
“I told her she misunderstood the operational risk.”
“Dangerous.”
“She told me to explain it without behaving like I owned the company.”
I laughed so hard I had to put down my glass.
“You like her.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Everyone does.”
Good.
At the end of dinner, Dominic walked me to the subway.
No car offer.
He had learned.
At the stairs, he asked:
“Can I kiss you?”
I looked at him.
Years of tension.
Marriage.
Forgery.
Prison.
Letters.
No.
Not yet.
“Not tonight.”
His face fell.
Then he nodded.
“Okay.”
No why.
Good.
Second date:
Museum.
He hated medieval religious art.
I told him that was because nobody in the paintings looked impressed by wealth.
Third:
A bookstore.
He bought one book.
For himself.
No gift for me.
Progress.
Fourth:
Mom.
Not planned.
Mom came to New York for transplant follow-up.
She wanted to meet him.
“Why?”
“Because you keep saying his name like punctuation.”
“I do not.”
“You do.”
Terrible woman.
We met at a normal restaurant near her hotel.
Mom looked at Dominic for thirty seconds.
Then:
“You’re less frightening sitting down.”
He looked at me.
“I like her.”
“Wait.”
Mom asked:
“Did you marry Victoria for money?”
I nearly died.
Dominic answered:
“Partly for business advantage.”
Good.
“Did you love her?”
Long pause.
“Yes.”
That surprised me.
Mom nodded.
“Good.”
I stared.
“Why good?”
“Because otherwise he would be even more alarming.”
Fair.
She continued.
“Did you hurt her?”
The table went still.
Dominic did not hide behind legal definitions.
“I controlled too much of our shared life.”
“Yes.”
“I used security concerns to decide things alone.”
“Yes.”
“I made disagreement expensive.”
Mom looked at him.
“Did you hit her?”
“No.”
“Threaten her?”
“Not directly.”
That phrase.
Mom heard it.
“Indirectly?”
Dominic’s face tightened.
“My reputation did work I did not have to say aloud.”
There.
Good.
Mom looked at me.
“He tells ugly truths.”
“Yes.”
“That is not the same as being good.”
“I know.”
Dominic said:
“So do I.”
Mom nodded.
Then:
“Do you love my daughter?”
I choked on water.
“Mom.”
“What?”
Dominic stared at me.
Not her.
Good.
“I am not answering that before I answer Casey.”
My entire body warmed.
Terrible.
Mom smiled.
“Smart.”
After dinner, outside her hotel, I said:
“You handled that well.”
“I wanted to say yes.”
I stopped.
Dominic did too.
Traffic moved.
People passed.
My heart became unreasonable.
“Then say it.”
He looked at me.
“I love you.”
No gala.
No headline.
No courtroom.
No crisis.
Just sidewalk.
I breathed.
I had loved him in pieces for longer than I wanted to admit.
Not the boss.
Not the man everyone feared.
The man who had learned to sit in rooms where no one cared.
The man who wrote ugly truths instead of polished excuses.
The man who still failed sometimes.
“I love you too.”
His eyes closed.
Then opened.
“Can I kiss you?”
“Yes.”
The kiss was gentle.
Not cinematic.
Good.
Mom’s hotel curtain moved three floors up.
I stepped back.
“She is watching.”
Dominic looked up.
Of course.
Mom waved.
I covered my face.
He laughed.
Dating became real after that.
Still slow.
I kept my apartment.
He kept his.
No shared money.
No gifts above a limit we discussed.
That one irritated him.
“Five hundred dollars?”
“Yes.”
“That is not a gift limit. That is office supplies.”
“You are proving why it exists.”
He sighed.
Good.
My career grew.
The institute promoted me to senior research fellow.
More fieldwork.
Geneva.
Trieste.
Berlin.
Sometimes weeks away.
Dominic learned missing someone was not emergency.
I learned independence did not require emotional distance.
We called because we wanted.
Not schedule.
Then he failed again.
Of course.
A reporter contacted him about a story claiming my dissertation had been funded by Russo money.
False.
My consulting had been disclosed separately.
Dominic’s first impulse was to have his public-relations firm threaten litigation.
He authorized a draft letter before telling me.
The firm’s lawyer contacted Maya for factual verification.
Maya called.
I was furious.
Not because the story was harmless.
Because my academic reputation was mine.
I called Dominic.
“You were going to sue a newspaper about my dissertation without asking me.”
“I was going to correct a false claim.”
“You were going to control the response.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because it was false.”
“That does not answer why you get to choose what I do.”
Silence.
Good.
He knew.
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop the letter.”
“Yes.”
I spoke with the institute’s communications counsel.
We issued a simple correction with documentation of funding.
No threat.
The outlet updated.
Done.
Dominic and I spent four days apart.
Then couples counseling.
His idea.
Good.
The counselor asked:
“What happens inside you when Casey is attacked?”
Dominic said:
“I act.”
“How fast?”
“Immediately.”
“What would happen if you waited?”
“Someone could win.”
The counselor said:
“Is a correction a war?”
Silence.
No.
That was the problem.
Dominic’s nervous system still classified criticism as threat.
My own pattern was different.
When conflict appeared, I became hyper-competent.
Research.
Documents.
Fix.
No feelings.
The counselor asked me:
“What do you do when Dominic disappoints you?”
“I make a list.”
Dominic laughed.
I glared.
The counselor smiled.
“Control wears different clothes.”
Annoying.
True.
We created rules.
Public claims about my work:
I decide response.
Threats involving shared physical safety:
Disclose immediately.
His businesses:
His compliance structures.
My career:
Mine.
No using lawyers as emotional artillery.
Maya liked that one.
A year after release, Dominic asked about living together.
Not proposal.
Good.
His apartment?
No.
We chose a new rental in Brooklyn Heights.
Both names.
Proportional expenses.
Separate accounts.
No live-in staff.
Cleaning service we both hired.
Exterior security agreed.
No interior cameras.
No location tracking.
Shared emergency information.
Written because memory becomes creative under fear.
The first month, the boiler failed.
Dominic called the landlord.
Landlord said Tuesday.
It was Saturday.
Dominic stared at the phone.
“Tuesday?”
“Yes.”
“I know people.”
“No.”
“It is thirty-eight degrees outside.”
“We have space heaters.”
“This is barbaric.”
“Normal.”
He suffered.
Waited.
The repair technician came Monday.
Dominic looked almost betrayed by ordinary service timelines.
I loved him more.
Then Mom’s transplant labs worsened briefly.
Possible rejection.
Hospital admitted her in Ohio.
I panicked.
Not visibly.
Internally.
Old Casey opened six tabs.
Flights.
Hotels.
Medical articles.
Drug interactions.
Dominic watched.
Then asked:
“Do you want help?”
“No.”
He nodded.
Ten minutes later, I said:
“Book the flight with me.”
Not for me.
With me.
He sat.
We compared times.
I used my card.
He did not secretly upgrade me.
Good.
Mom had mild acute rejection.
Treatable.
Steroid therapy adjusted.
Kidney function improved.
Not perfect.
Good enough.
I stayed four days.
Dominic did not arrive uninvited.
That mattered.
When I returned, exhausted, he made pasta.
Badly.
I ate it.
Love is sometimes surviving someone’s sauce.
Months later, we discussed marriage.
Not proposal.
Dominic asked:
“Can you imagine it?”
“Yes.”
His face changed.
I lifted one finger.
“Imagine.”
“Yes.”
“Your divorce history does not make me responsible for proving marriage can be good.”
“Yes.”
“No strategic trusts.”
He laughed.
“Agreed.”
“Prenup.”
He stopped.
Then:
“Absolutely.”
Good.
Independent lawyers.
Separate property definitions.
Shared-property rules.
No voting rights transferred through marriage.
No title leverage.
No hidden reversion clauses.
Maya said:
“This is the least romantic document I have ever loved.”
Same.
Dominic’s lawyer and mine negotiated for two months.
No resentment.
That was progress.
Then one evening I came home and found no flowers.
No candles.
No ring.
Dominic was reading my published article with a pencil.
I froze.
“What are you doing?”
“Page fourteen is incomprehensible.”
“Get out.”
He laughed.
Then:
“Casey.”
“Yes?”
“I bought something.”
I narrowed my eyes.
“Over five hundred dollars?”
“Yes.”
“Then return it.”
“Not yet.”
My heart changed.
He smiled.
Not proposal.
Not yet.
“Tomorrow,” he said.
I hated him.
Good.
That night, I called Maya.
“He bought something.”
“How expensive?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you think it is a ring?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want it to be?”
I stared at our kitchen.
Shared rent.
Two sets of books.
His terrible coffee.
My translation files.
A life built slowly enough that no single crisis owned it.
“Yes.”
“Then why do you sound terrified?”
“Because yes is a legal word.”
Maya laughed.
“You are impossible.”
“I mean it.”
“I know.”
Marriage had already been used once in Dominic’s life as business architecture.
It had moved claims.
Trust rights.
Leverage.
If we married, I wanted no confusion about what the act did and did not transfer.
We had the prenup.
Independent counsel.
Clear property.
Still, law was not the whole question.
Did I trust him with ordinary vulnerability?
Not secrets extracted under subpoena.
Sickness.
Failure.
Being wrong.
Being boring.
Could I let him see me tired without becoming a problem he managed?
Could he let me be angry without mobilizing resources?
Mostly.
Not always.
Enough to keep choosing.
Mom answered on the second ring.
“He’s proposing.”
“You sound sure.”
“He said tomorrow.”
“Maybe he bought a toaster.”
“Over five hundred dollars?”
“Fancy toaster.”
“Mom.”
She laughed.
Then:
“Do you want to marry him?”
“Yes.”
“Then don’t spend all night building an argument against your own answer.”
I went quiet.
Again, dialysis had made her unbearable.
“Any other wisdom?”
“Yes.”
“Do not let him choose the cake.”
“Why?”
“Men with that much money make terrible cake decisions.”
Fair.
I slept badly.
May you like
Not because I doubted the answer.
Because some answers matter more when nobody is forcing them.
