“I always have a choice.”
“Not if someone’s targeting my—”
He stopped himself.
But too late.
My child.
The unspoken words hung between them.
Maddie’s chest tightened.
Brandon saw it.
And understanding exploded across his face.
Not suspicion now.
Certainty.
Absolute certainty.
His gaze dropped to her stomach.
Then rose back to her eyes.
“You lied to me.”
Quiet.
Deadly quiet.
Maddie’s pulse roared.
Around them, Manhattan traffic screamed and surged, oblivious.
One of Brandon’s security men approached quickly.
“Boss, we need to move.”
Brandon never looked away from Maddie.
“How far along exactly?”
She said nothing.
“Maddie.”
“Thirty-four weeks.”
The answer changed him.
She saw it happen in real time.
A wall inside him shifted.
Eight months.
His child.
His heir.
Alive.
Brandon inhaled slowly, like a man trying to survive impact.
Then his hand lifted carefully toward her stomach again.
This time Maddie did not move away.
Not because she trusted him.
Because exhaustion finally outweighed resistance.
His palm settled lightly against the curve beneath her coat.
The baby kicked instantly.
Brandon froze.
Every hard line in his face shattered.
For one impossible second, the feared head of the Moretti empire looked simply human.
A father.
Maddie felt tears threaten unexpectedly.
Damn hormones.
Damn memories.
Brandon swallowed once.
“He’s strong.”
Maddie blinked. “You think it’s a boy?”
“I know.”
Typical Brandon.
Certain even when impossible.
The SUV suddenly accelerated toward the curb.
Brandon’s expression transformed instantly back into lethal focus.
“Down.”
Everything exploded at once.
One of the SUV windows lowered.
Gunfire cracked through the street.
People screamed.
Brandon grabbed Maddie violently, twisting his body around hers as his security team drew weapons.
Glass shattered nearby.
A car alarm shrieked.
Brandon shoved Maddie behind a concrete pillar at the subway entrance while bullets sparked against stone.
“Move!” one guard shouted.
The street became chaos.
Pedestrians ran in every direction.
The SUV swerved hard around traffic while Brandon’s men returned fire.
Maddie crouched instinctively, both hands over her stomach.
No.
No no no—
Brandon knelt beside her, gun already drawn.
“Are you hit?”
She shook her head breathlessly.
His hand gripped the back of her neck briefly.
Possessive.
Protective.
Alive.
Another burst of gunfire erupted.
Then tires screamed.
The SUV sped away.
One of Brandon’s men cursed into his radio.
“Lost visual!”
Sirens echoed in the distance now.
Too late.
Always too late.
Brandon turned back to Maddie.
His eyes were murder.
Not directed at her.
At whoever had dared.
“You’re coming with me.”
This time it wasn’t a demand.
It was fact.
Maddie looked at the panic flooding the street around them.
At the shattered glass.
At the blood running from a graze across one security guard’s forehead.
Then at Brandon.
The father of her child.
The man she had run from.
The only person terrifying enough to protect them now.
She hated the truth of it.
But she nodded.
Brandon exhaled once, sharp with relief.
He helped her stand carefully.
Immediately his coat came off and wrapped around her shoulders despite the cold.
Old habits.
Old instincts.
He guided her toward a waiting armored sedan that had appeared seemingly from nowhere.
Before entering, Maddie glanced once toward the crowded street.
Something caught her eye.
Across the avenue, partially hidden beside a newspaper stand, stood Savannah.
Watching.
Perfectly calm.
No fear.
No surprise.
And slowly—very slowly—Savannah lifted a phone to her ear while staring directly at Maddie.
Then she smiled.
Not politely.
Knowingly.
Maddie’s blood went cold.
Because in that instant she understood something horrifying.
Savannah had not been caught in the middle of this.
She had been expecting it.
The sedan door slammed shut.
Brandon climbed in beside her while his convoy surged into motion.
“What is it?” he asked immediately.
Maddie kept staring through the tinted rear window as Savannah disappeared into the crowd.
A terrible feeling settled into her bones.
The kind that arrived before lives changed forever.
Slowly, she turned back toward Brandon.
And for the first time since leaving him, Maddie wondered if she had misunderstood everything.
Because maybe the greatest threat to their child had never been Brandon Moretti.
Maybe it was the woman standing beside him all along.
And somewhere deep in Manhattan, unseen by either of them, a second phone began to ring.
The caller ID displayed only two words.
MORETTI HEIR.
And the man answering it smiled.
…
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