My lawyer laid every single piece of evidence on the table: the text message from Florida, the marriage certificate with Melanie, the fraudulent charges on my credit cards, the chat logs where they made fun of my career, the video of the back door, and the forged housing document.
The judge, an older man with gray hair and a tired look, peered over his glasses.
“Mr. Mark, is it true that you married another woman while you were still legally married to Mrs. Jessica?”
Mark bowed his head in defeat.
“It was just a big misunderstanding, your honor.”
The judge slammed his file shut with a heavy thud.
“A misunderstanding is accidentally walking into the wrong conference room,” he declared. “This is something entirely different.”
Martha began to cry loudly.
“My son is a good man, he only made a mistake because he was blinded by love!”
Then Melanie stood up slowly.
Her voice was broken, but it was firm.
“No, that is not true, ma’am,” she said to the room. “Your son did not make a mistake out of love, because he used both of us as pawns for his own ego.”
The silence in the courtroom was brutal and heavy.
Mark tried to interrupt her, but Melanie kept speaking.
