CHAPTER ONE — TWO HEARTBEATS
ALESSANDRA
Damon Blackwood had faced gunfire with less panic than he displayed when I leaned over the bathroom sink and told him I was going to be sick again.
He moved before I finished speaking. One hand swept my hair away from my face; the other settled between my shoulder blades, warm and steady while my stomach attempted to turn itself inside out.
When the nausea finally loosened its grip, I stayed bent over the sink, breathing through my nose.
“I’m fine,” I managed.
“You’re throwing up.”
“Yes, Damon. I know.”
“This is the third time since you woke up.”
I lifted my head and found his reflection behind mine.
He wore nothing but dark trousers, his shirt abandoned somewhere between our bed and the bathroom. Every muscle in his body was tense. The rigid line of his shoulders suggested he considered morning sickness a hostile operative who might surrender under sufficient intimidation.
“It’s also the third time you’ve counted,” I said.
“I’m keeping track.”
“Of course you are.”
He reached for the glass beside the sink, filled it, and held it out to me.
I rinsed my mouth, then extended my hand toward the towel. Damon placed it into my palm before my fingers reached it.
“I can still do things myself.”
“I know.”
“You don’t behave as though you know.”
“You almost fainted yesterday.”
“I stood up too quickly.”
“You went white, baby.”
“I’m French. We’re pale.”
“That isn’t a medical explanation.”
“It’s the only one you’re getting before breakfast.”
His mouth threatened to curve, but concern won before the smile could fully appear.
“Sit down.”
“Damon—”
“Please.”
That single word stole the argument from me.
Damon rarely said please when he was frightened. He became quieter instead, as if lowering his voice could keep the world from hearing how much it had the power to take from him.
He had missed my pregnancy with Jacqueline. Every appointment, every frightened night, every flutter beneath my ribs and every fierce kick that had awakened me before dawn had happened without him.
He could never reclaim those months.
Nor the first four years of her life.
This time, he watched everything with the concentration of a man attempting to memorize a miracle before it could disappear.
Sometimes his attention crowded me.
Sometimes it made me want to cry.
Most of the time, it did both.
“All right,” I murmured.
Relief flickered across his face before he concealed it.
He guided me to the upholstered bench beneath the window. Morning spilled across the marble in ribbons of pale gold, but the floor remained cold beneath my bare feet. Beyond the glass, Beijing stretched into the distance, hazy and restless.
I had once come to this city because it was far enough away from Damon to let me breathe.
Now he crouched in front of me, one hand resting on my knee as though touching me was the only thing keeping him anchored.
“How dizzy are you?”
“Not very.”
His eyes narrowed.
“A little,” I amended.
“Nauseous?”
“Less than five minutes ago.”
“Pain?”
“No.”
“Cramping?”
“No.”
“Any bleeding?”
“No, Damon.”
Some of the tension left his shoulders, although none of it disappeared from his eyes.
I laid my palm against his cheek. His stubble rasped gently against my skin.
“Mon amour, je suis enceinte. Je ne suis pas en train de mourir.”
My love, I’m pregnant. I’m not dying.
His gaze lifted to mine.
“I know the difference.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“You’re looking at me as though you’re deciding whether to summon an emergency medical team.”
“I already considered it.”
I stared at him. “You considered it?”
“The doctor said to call if anything changed.”
“Nothing has changed. Your sons or daughters simply object to breakfast.”
“You haven’t eaten breakfast.”
“They’re objecting in advance.”
His thumb moved over my knee, slow and absent, betraying the tenderness his expression tried to hide.
“I could call her,” he said.
“You could also resist the urge.”
“I don’t see the benefit.”
“The benefit is remaining married to me.”
That finally drew the smallest curve from his mouth.
“There are easier ways to threaten me.”
“I know. But this one works.”
A soft knock came from the bathroom door.
Before either of us answered, it opened several centimeters and one gray eye appeared in the gap.
“Maman?”
“I’m here, sweetheart.”
The door opened fully.
Jacqueline entered wearing pale pink pajamas, one sock, and the solemn expression of someone arriving to assume command of an emergency. Monsieur Lapin dangled from one hand by an ear. In the other, she carried a sleeve of crackers almost as long as her forearm.
Her dark hair had escaped its braid during the night and curled around her face in wild strands.
She walked directly to me.
“Papa said these help.”
I looked at Damon.
He didn’t possess the grace to appear guilty.
“When did Papa tell you that?”
“Yesterday.” Jacqueline held out the crackers. “He put them beside my bed in case the babies made you sick before I woke up.”
Of course he had.
I accepted one with the seriousness her offering deserved.
“Merci, mon cœur.”
Thank you, my heart.
She climbed onto the bench beside me and tucked Monsieur Lapin between us. Then she placed one small hand carefully against my stomach.
At almost twelve weeks, the curve beneath my nightdress remained subtle. A stranger might not have noticed it.
Jacqueline noticed everything.
“Are they making you sick again?”
“Yes.”
Her brows drew together. “Both of them?”
“Possibly.”
“That isn’t nice.”
“I’m sure they’ll apologize after they’re born.”
She considered this, visibly unconvinced. “What if they can’t talk yet?”
“Then we’ll give them time.”
“How much?”
“A year, perhaps. Maybe two.”
“That’s very generous.”
“I thought so.”
She leaned closer to my stomach.
“You have to be nicer to Maman,” she instructed. “And today you have to move so we can see you.”
Damon rose and disappeared into the bedroom. He returned carrying water for me and the shirt he had apparently remembered he needed.
As he pulled it on, Jacqueline watched him with narrowed eyes.
“What?” he asked.
“You forgot your shirt.”
“I knew where it was.”
“You weren’t wearing it.”
“That isn’t the same as forgetting it.”
She turned to me. “He forgot it.”
“He did.”
Damon gave me a look while fastening his cuffs.
I bit into the cracker to hide my smile.
“Do we see the babies today?” Jacqueline asked.
“We do.”
Her entire face brightened. “And hear them?”
“If they cooperate.”
“They will. I told them to.”
Damon paused over his cuff link. “When?”
“Last night.”
“You were supposed to be sleeping.”
“I was talking quietly.”
“To your brothers or sisters?”
“Yes.”
He waited.
Jacqueline blinked innocently.
I pressed my lips together.
Technically, she had answered his question.
Damon looked at me over her head. The sternness lasted approximately two seconds before it dissolved.
There was a softness in his eyes I still wasn’t accustomed to seeing it so openly.
Five years ago, his tenderness had appeared only in fragments—a touch held too long, a truth almost spoken, a look he concealed before I could trust it.
Now it lived in our home.
It was in the crackers beside Jacqueline’s bed. In the glass of water waiting before I asked. In the hand Damon kept near my waist whenever I stood. In the way he spoke to two babies too small to hear him whenever he thought I was asleep.
My husband.
The word still settled something deep inside me.
My phone vibrated against the counter.
Damon reached it first. The ease in his expression vanished when he read the screen.
“Mei.”
I held out my hand.
He gave me the phone but didn’t move away.
“Good morning,” I said.
“Am I interrupting?”
I looked at Jacqueline, who now had her ear pressed against my stomach, and at Damon, who was watching both of us as though we might disappear if he glanced away.
“Not exactly.”
Mei heard something in my voice. She always did.
“You’re sick again?”
“Does everyone in this family report to Damon now?”
“No. Some of us simply possess eyes.”
“You’re on the other side of a telephone.”
“And yet I still know.”
Damon’s mouth twitched.
Traitor.
“What happened?” I asked.
The faint humor left Mei’s voice.
“The court issued its decision this morning.”
The warmth seemed to drain from the room.
Damon went still.
I didn’t need to ask which court.
Or whose decision.
Jacqueline lifted her head, sensing the change even if she couldn’t understand it. Damon extended his hand to her.
“Come on, sweetheart. Let’s find your other sock.”
“It’s under my bed.”
“I’m shocked.”
“I put it there so I could find it.”
“That plan needs work.”
She slipped her hand into his but looked back at me as he led her toward the bedroom.
I gave her a reassuring smile.
The moment the door closed, it disappeared.
“How long?” I asked.
Mei drew a breath.
“Twenty-two years.”
The number struck with no sound at all.
I looked toward the closed door.
Twenty-two years.
Long enough for Jacqueline to become a woman. Long enough for the two lives inside me to grow into adults. Long enough for them to know Liang Wei only as a name spoken carefully by people who remembered what he had done.
Not forever.
But long enough that I could breathe.
“The court accepted the conspiracy and corruption charges,” Mei continued. “The financial evidence held. So did the intimidation, unlawful detention, and the payments connecting his network to the operation.”
“And the warehouse?”
“His attorneys created enough distance between Wei and the violence committed there. The court acknowledged the connection but wouldn’t assign him direct responsibility for every act.”
Of course they wouldn’t.
Men like Liang Wei built their empires from distance. They gave orders in elegant rooms and allowed other hands to become bloody.
“He ordered it,” I said.
“I know.”
“He sent those men.”
“I know, Alessandra.”
The quiet sympathy in Mei’s voice cut more deeply than anger would have.
For an instant, the bathroom disappeared.
I smelled dust and blood. Heard Damon’s voice calling while fear ripped through me—not fear for myself, but for the daughter waiting at home and the man who had finally returned to us.
My free hand covered my stomach.
Two new lives rested beneath it.
I forced air into my lungs.
“He’ll appeal,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Will it succeed?”
“Not if the evidence survives scrutiny. It will.”
Certainty sharpened her final words.
I closed my eyes.
Mei had stood beside me when Beijing was still a place I used as armor. She had watched me build my company while carrying secrets beneath tailored dresses. She had never asked me to be less difficult, less ambitious, or less wounded.
Now she held the other end of the silence until I was ready to speak.
“Let him appeal,” I said at last. “Let him spend his money and exhaust every favor he has left. He’ll still wake up behind the same walls.”
“That’s the plan.”
A tremulous laugh escaped me. “You sound almost disappointed that I didn’t ask for another thirty-eight-page report.”
“It’s forty-one now.”
“Mei.”
“The sentencing analysis required an appendix.”
“Of course it did.”
“Are you all right?”
I looked at my reflection.
Nearly six years ago, I had arrived in Beijing pregnant, heartbroken, and determined never to need anyone again. I had built a home here. Raised Jacqueline here. Expanded an empire here.
Wei had tried to turn every achievement into proof that I was still an intruder.
Now he would spend twenty-two years watching that life continue without him.
“I don’t know what I feel,” I admitted. “Relieved, perhaps. Angry that relieved is the best they could give us.”
“That sounds reasonable.”
“It doesn’t feel reasonable.”
“It rarely does.”
I let my breath leave slowly. “Send me the report after the appointment.”
“After?”
“Not before. Today belongs to my babies.”
Mei was quiet for a moment.
Then warmth returned to her voice. “Call me when you know.”
“You’ll be the first.”
“I had better be.”
The call ended.
I lowered the phone into my lap and stared at the darkened screen.
The bedroom door opened.
Damon returned alone, fully dressed now except for the tie hanging loose around his neck. He closed the door carefully behind him.
“How long?”
“Twenty-two years.”
Something dangerous moved through his expression.
It did not frighten me.
There had been a time when I mistook the darkness inside Damon for cruelty. I understood it now. It appeared whenever someone threatened the people he loved and he discovered that even all his strength could not undo what had already happened.
“The court convicted him of conspiracy, corruption, financial crimes, intimidation, and unlawful detention,” I said. “His lawyers separated him from some of the violence at the warehouse.”
“He ordered it.”
“We know.”
“They should have proved it.”
“They proved what they could.”
“That isn’t justice.”
“No.” I watched anger gather in his jaw, his shoulders, the fist he hadn’t realized he had made. “But it is a consequence.”
“Not enough of one.”
“Would any number feel like enough?”
His silence answered me.
I reached for his hand.
He looked down at it as if returning from somewhere distant, then opened his fist and threaded his fingers through mine.
“Twenty-two years, Damon.”
“He doesn’t come near you again.”
“Or Jacqueline.”
“No.”
“Or these two.”
His gaze dropped to my stomach.
The fury in his face fractured.
I drew his hand toward me and placed it over the slight curve beneath my nightdress. His palm covered almost all of it.
“For the first time since I met him, Wei is exactly where he belongs,” I said. “I won’t let him take this morning from us too.”
Damon’s thumb moved once across the soft fabric.
“What if he appeals?”
“He will.”
“And if—”
“Then we face it together.”
His eyes met mine.
Together had not come easily to us. Once, it had been a promise neither of us knew how to keep. Now it existed in the ordinary things: shared mornings, one missing sock, his hand over our children.
He brought my knuckles to his lips.
“Together,” he said.
I smiled and reached for his tie.
“Come here.”
He stepped between my knees and bent his head so I could straighten it.
“You know,” I said, tightening the knot, “most husbands bring flowers to celebrate good news.”
“I bring security assessments.”
“Yes. Nothing says romance like a threat matrix.”
“I brought you flowers yesterday.”
“You had them inspected first.”
“They came from an unknown courier.”
“They came from my father.”
“Exactly.”
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it.
Damon’s expression softened at the sound. His hand curved around the back of my neck, and he rested his forehead against mine.
“Can you manage the appointment?” he asked.
“I’m pregnant, not incapacitated.”
“Yo know that wasn’t my question.”
The difference mattered.
Once, Damon would have decided for me. He would have wrapped control in the language of protection and expected gratitude.
Now he asked.
I touched the knot of his tie, allowing my fingers to linger.
“Yes,” I said. “I can manage it.”
He searched my face. “You’ll tell me if that changes?”
“I promise.”
“Before you faint?”
“I did not faint.”
“Before you nearly faint.”
“Damon.”
“Before?”
I sighed dramatically. “Before.”
He kissed my forehead.
“Good.”
“Because otherwise you would carry me into the clinic?”
“If necessary.”
“In front of everyone?”
“I don’t care who sees.”
“I know.” I smiled against his mouth when he bent to kiss me. “That’s the problem.”
“No,” he murmured. “That’s one of the reasons you married me.”
“Your confidence remains extraordinary.”
His quiet satisfaction made me laugh again.
“Go find our daughter’s sock.”
“I already did.”
“Then why isn’t she wearing it?”
“She’s negotiating.”
“That sounds like your problem.”
“It became ours when she asked for legal representation.”
“That is absolutely your daughter.”
His gray eyes warmed.
“Ours,” he corrected.
The word wrapped itself around my heart.
“Ours,” I agreed.
⸻
The examination room smelled faintly of antiseptic and lavender air freshener.
Jacqueline sat between Damon and me, her legs swinging beneath the chair. She held Monsieur Lapin tightly against her chest and watched the ultrasound screen with such intense concentration that she barely blinked.
Damon stood beside me.
Close.
Not crowding me, but close enough that his thigh touched mine and I could feel the restrained energy moving through him.
The doctor dimmed the lights. Cool gel touched my skin, and I flinched.
Damon’s hand immediately closed around mine.
“It’s cold,” I told him.
His gaze remained fixed on my face. “Only cold?”
“Yes.”
The doctor concealed a smile as she moved the transducer slowly across my stomach.
Shadows shifted on the monitor.
I knew what I was supposed to see. Shapes. Limbs. Profiles.
Instead, I saw flickering shades of gray and felt fear creep quietly beneath my ribs.
The doctor’s expression remained calm, but every second stretched until I could hear the blood rushing in my ears.
Damon’s fingers tightened around mine.
Then the doctor smiled.
“There.”
A heartbeat filled the room.
Fast.
Strong.
The sound struck something inside me that no amount of preparation could protect.
My eyes burned.
Jacqueline’s lips parted. “That’s one?”
“That’s Baby A,” the doctor said.
“One,” Jacqueline repeated softly, as though counting treasure.
Damon didn’t move.
I turned my head.
He stared at the screen with a nakedness in his expression I had seen only a handful of times. Wonder was there. So was fear.
And grief.
Not for these babies.
For everything he had missed before them.
The first time he heard Jacqueline’s heartbeat, she had already been four years old and sitting across from him at a dinner table, unaware that the stranger watching her was her father.
I squeezed his hand.
His gaze shifted to mine.
For a moment, the room held only the two of us and the weight of all those lost years.
Then another rhythm joined the first.
Damon’s breath caught.
Two heartbeats filled the room.
Not perfectly synchronized.
Each fast and insistent, claiming its own place in the silence.
Jacqueline looked from the screen to me, her gray eyes enormous.
“They’re both there.”
A tear escaped before I could stop it.
“They are,” I whispered.
Damon lifted my hand and pressed it against his mouth. His lips remained against my knuckles while the two heartbeats rushed around us.
“They sound like horses,” Jacqueline announced.
The doctor laughed softly. “Very tiny horses.”
“Are they racing?”
“It certainly sounds that way.”
Jacqueline leaned forward. “Which one is winning?”
“We’ll call it a tie.”
“No,” she said gravely. “One is always winning.”
Damon recovered enough to speak. “She gets that from you.”
I looked at him. “From me?”
“Entirely.”
“You own a private security company.”
“That isn’t relevant.”
“You turned choosing a breakfast table into a negotiation.”
“The lighting was wrong.”
The doctor’s shoulders shook with suppressed laughter.
Jacqueline pointed at the monitor. “That one has Papa’s nose.”
“They barely have noses,” I said.
“It does.”
Damon leaned toward the screen, studying the image with absurd seriousness. “She might be right.”
“You cannot possibly see that.”
“I have excellent observational skills.”
“You’re both impossible.”
The doctor continued taking measurements, explaining each one while Damon absorbed every number as if he would be examined on them later.
“Both babies are developing appropriately,” she said. “Their heart rates are strong, and their measurements are reassuring. Because they’re identical twins, we’ll continue monitoring the pregnancy more closely.”
“How closely?” Damon asked.
She explained the appointment schedule.
He asked about growth, placental development, warning signs, travel, diet, hydration, and the exact point at which nausea stopped being considered normal.
I watched him interrogate her with impeccable politeness.
“Do you have a list?” I asked.
He glanced at me. “Yes.”
“Of course you do.” I said, shaking my head.
“It’s on his phone,” Jacqueline contributed.
The doctor smiled. “Most of his questions are sensible.”
“Most?”
Damon focused on the word as though she had just identified a breach in security.
I covered my face with one hand.
The doctor rescued herself by reaching for her tablet.
“We also received the results of your blood screening.”
Every trace of humor disappeared.
Damon’s hand tightened around mine again.
“And?” I asked.
“Everything included in the screening came back low risk.”
Relief moved through me so forcefully that I closed my eyes.
Low risk.
Two ordinary words.
They felt like a door opening.
Damon bent and pressed his lips to my temple. I felt the breath he released against my skin.
When I opened my eyes, Jacqueline was watching us anxiously.
“The babies are all right,” I told her.
“Both?”
“Both.”
Her shoulders relaxed.
The doctor’s smile deepened. “There is one other result, if you still want to know.”
Jacqueline straightened immediately. “The babies?”
“Their sex.”
Damon looked at me.
Before we knew there were two, we had agreed we wanted to find out. I had never possessed the patience required for surprises. Damon claimed he could wait, but I had caught him studying neutral nursery designs at two in the morning.
“Tell us,” I said.
“We want to know,” Jacqueline added, leaving no room for uncertainty.
The doctor turned the tablet slightly.
“You’re expecting two boys.”
The words seemed to hover in the air.
For one suspended second, none of us moved.
“Both?” Jacqueline asked.
“Because they’re identical, yes. Both boys.”
Her gray eyes widened. “Two brothers?”
“Two brothers,” Damon said.
His voice broke around the words.
I turned toward him.
He was still staring at the monitor, but the disciplined control had left his face. His eyes shone in the dim light.
Damon Blackwood—who had survived war, loss, and the worst parts of himself—looked undone by two blurred shapes on a screen.
I reached up and touched his cheek.
He leaned into my palm for the briefest moment.
“Two sons,” I whispered.
His gaze found mine.
“I’m here,” he said.
The words were quiet enough that only I heard them.
They contained no grand promise. No apology.
Only the truth he needed me to know.
He was here for this.
For every appointment. Every frightened night. Every first movement. Every ordinary morning that followed.
“Yes,” I said, my throat tight. “You are.”
Jacqueline studied the screen, apparently absorbing the scale of what had happened to her life.
Then she turned to Damon.
“You’ll need help.”
The doctor coughed delicately to conceal a laugh.
I didn’t bother hiding mine.
Damon looked at his daughter. “With what?”
“Taking care of them.”
“I probably will.”
“I can help,” she offered. “But I’m not changing diapers.”
“That seems unfair.”
“I’ll teach them things.”
His brows rose. “That sounds more dangerous.”
“I’ll teach them French.”
“I speak French.”
Jacqueline looked at me. “He doesn’t sound like you.”
“No one sounds like Maman,” Damon said.
I narrowed my eyes. “Was that a compliment?”
“Yes, of course.”
“It needs work.”
Jacqueline ignored us and slid carefully from her chair. She approached the examination table and placed her hand against my stomach.
“Bonjour, mes petits frères.”
Hello, my little brothers.
My throat closed.
Damon’s arm came around my shoulders. I leaned into him while Jacqueline spoke quietly to the brothers who could not yet hear her.
Two boys.
Two sons Damon would know from their first breath.
Two little brothers for the daughter who had made room for him in her heart before either of us understood how to do the same.
I looked at their blurred shapes on the monitor.
For once, happiness didn’t feel borrowed.
It didn’t feel fragile or conditional.
It felt like ours.
⸻
Jacqueline lasted less than five minutes in the car before falling asleep.
Cho drove while the city moved past the darkened windows. In the back seat, our daughter stretched between Damon and me, her head on his thigh and her feet across mine. Monsieur Lapin was trapped beneath one arm.
“She’ll wake up with a terrible pain in her neck,” I whispered.
Damon folded his jacket and eased it beneath her head without waking her.
“She refused the child seat.”
“You allowed yourself to be defeated by a five-year-old?”
“I chose my battle.”
“She inherited your stubbornness.”
His eyes moved to me. “Mine?”
“Yes.”
“Interesting.”
“Don’t start.”
His mouth curved, but the amusement faded quickly.
He looked down at Jacqueline, smoothing a loose curl away from her cheek.
“I want to ask you something.”
The careful tone made me study him.
“What have you done?”
“Nothing.”
“That answer has never reassured anyone.”
“How would you feel about going to New York?”
The question settled between us.
“For how long?”
“Until after the babies are born.” He paused. “Perhaps longer, depending on what you want.”
I watched his face.
This wasn’t spontaneous. Damon did not propose moving his family across the world without examining every risk, benefit, flight path, hospital, and security concern first.
“How long have you been thinking about it?”
“Since you nearly fainted yesterday.”
“I did not—”
“I know. You stood too quickly.”
“You are becoming irritatingly trainable.”
“I’ve had an excellent teacher.”
The answer was soft enough to disarm me.
He continued before I could recover.
“You’d have Sebastian close. Vivienne and Theo too. The doctors here are excellent, but New York has everything you need. BLKW’s headquarters are there, so I wouldn’t have to travel while you’re pregnant.”
There it was.
During the months following Wei’s arrest, Damon had divided himself between Beijing and New York. Cole and Elias managed most of BLKW’s daily operations, but some decisions still required Damon’s presence.
Every trip took him away from us.
Lately, he had begun refusing to go.
“You think I need supervision,” I said.
“No.”
“Support?”
“Yes.”
“And what happens to my company?”
“Whatever you decide.”
No instant solution.
No attempt to take the decision out of my hands.
That was deliberate.
Once, Damon would have arrived with arrangements already made and called it protection. Now he presented a possibility and waited for me to determine whether it could become our life. I know, I should stop comparing today’s Damon with the old one, but sometimes, I just can’t help it.
I turned toward the window.
Beijing passed around us in flashes of steel, glass, bicycles, buses, and early sunlight reflected in a thousand windows. The city had once given me somewhere to hide. Then it had become the place where I learned I no longer needed to.
I had built a home here.
Raised Jacqueline here.
Expanded my father’s legacy into something that belonged unmistakably to me.
Leaving—even temporarily—felt like loosening my fingers from the woman I had fought to become.
“Mei can manage daily operations,” I said slowly.
Damon remained silent.
“She already handles more than most managing directors. The project is stable. I can approve major decisions remotely and conduct meetings by video.”
“You can.”
“I would need to return occasionally.”
“We would.”
I looked at him.
Not I’ll arrange it.
Not My team will bring you.
We would.
“I’m not abandoning Beijing.”
“I would never ask you to.”
“And Mei reports directly to me.”
“She already does.”
“I’m establishing conditions.”
“You’re repeating facts.”
A reluctant smile pulled at my mouth.
I looked down at Jacqueline. Her cheek rested against Damon’s dark trousers, her small body completely relaxed because she trusted the two people surrounding her to keep the world from reaching her while she slept.
“My father will be insufferable,” I said.
“He already is.”
“He’ll attempt to move us into his house.”
“We’ll say no.”
“He won’t listen.”
“Neither will we.”
“Vivienne will reorganize everything.”
“I’ll change the locks.”
“She’ll have new keys made.” I said, laughing quietly.
“I know.”
“And Theo will encourage her.”
“Then I’ll change his locks too.”
“You can’t change the locks on someone else’s home.”
Damon looked almost offended. “Of course I can.”
I laughed softly, careful not to wake Jacqueline.
The idea began settling inside me.
New York.
Not the city I had fled.
Not the house where Damon had left me.
A different home. A marriage. Our daughter and our sons. My father near enough to interfere every day. My friends close enough to make certain I never carried anything alone.
Returning didn’t have to mean going backward.
Perhaps it could mean walking into the city that had watched us break and showing it what we had created from the wreckage.
“When?” I asked.
Hope sharpened Damon’s expression before he managed to hide it.
“The doctor said travel would be safer before the pregnancy advances further.”
“You asked her privately?”
“Yes.”
“Of course you did.” I said, rolling my eyes.
“She said the next few weeks would be ideal.”
I studied him for another moment.
Then I opened my handbag and touched the two ultrasound photographs resting inside. The images were indistinct, but I could still hear the heartbeats they contained.
Fast.
Strong.
Two different rhythms.
“All right,” I said.
Damon didn’t move. “All right?”
“We’ll go to New York.”
His hand closed around mine.
“Temporarily,” I added.
“For as long as you want.”
“And I retain full control of Beijing.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything else.”
“Mei speaks to me directly. No decisions go through you.”
“I value my life too much to interfere.”
“And if I want to return—”
“We return.”
The simplicity of it silenced me.
I threaded my fingers through his.
“We’ll need a larger house.”
“I’ve found three.”
I stared at him. “Three houses?”
“To view.”
“You planned this before asking me.”
“I prepared options before asking you.”
“That sounds suspiciously like the same thing.”
“It isn’t.”
“Did you purchase any of them?”
“No.”
I continued staring.
His gaze shifted almost imperceptibly.
“Damon.”
“One is being held temporarily.”
“You put a house on hold before speaking to me?”
“It has excellent security.”
“Of course it does.”
“And enough bedrooms.”
“For two babies?”
“For everyone.”
Something in the way he said it quieted me.
Everyone.
Jacqueline.
Our sons.
Us.
A family returning to the place where it had almost begun years ago—and beginning properly this time.
I rested my head against his shoulder.
His hand tightened around mine before he kissed my hair.
“You’re happy,” I whispered.
“Yes.”
The honesty warmed me more than any dramatic declaration could have.
“So am I.”
Beneath my free hand, my stomach remained still.
It was too early for movement, but I could hear those heartbeats in my memory.
Fast.
Strong.
Insistent.
New York was waiting.
And this time, none of us would arrive there alone.
