Chapter 2 - THE HEARTBEAT
I had always imagined learning I was pregnant would happen in our bathroom at home.
Dorian would be barefoot.
I would be holding a plastic test with shaking hands.
Maybe I would cry.
Maybe he would laugh.
Maybe he would lift me off the floor the way he did when he proposed.
Instead, I learned about our baby beneath fluorescent hospital lights while someone somewhere apparently wanted me dead.
Life had a cruel sense of humor.
The ultrasound room was dim.
Dorian stood beside the examination table while the technician moved the probe carefully.
Neither of us spoke.
Then a sound filled the room.
Fast.
Tiny.
Impossible.
A heartbeat.
My hand flew to my mouth.
The technician smiled.
“There.”
On the screen was a shape so small I could barely understand what I was looking at.
But it was there.
Our baby.
Alive.
Dorian stared at the monitor.
He didn’t blink.
“Heart rate is strong,” the technician said.
I started crying.
Quietly.
Dorian reached for my hand instinctively.
His fingers touched mine.
I pulled away.
The hurt in his face made me immediately regret it.
But regret wasn’t forgiveness.
Nine weeks pregnant didn’t erase six months of loneliness.
When we left the hospital, security had doubled.
Two SUVs waited outside.
Caleb stood beside the rear door, scanning the sidewalk.
Dorian removed his coat and placed it around my shoulders.
“I have a coat.”
“You’re cold.”
I wanted to argue.
Instead, I climbed into the vehicle.
The penthouse looked exactly as I remembered.
And completely different.
The massive windows.
The gray stone fireplace.
The piano I never learned to play.
The photographs Dorian pretended not to care about.
Nothing had changed.
Except me.
A woman named Maria hurried from the kitchen and stopped when she saw me.
She had worked for Dorian for fourteen years and treated me like a stubborn younger sister.
Her eyes filled instantly.
“Mrs. Cross.”
“Hi, Maria.”
She hugged me.
Behind her, Dorian looked away.
That evening, I discovered my bedroom was untouched.
My perfume remained beside the mirror.
My novels sat on the nightstand.
Even the sweater I had accidentally left behind was folded over the chair.
I turned.
Dorian stood in the doorway.
“You kept everything.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He didn’t answer.
“Were you expecting me back?”
His expression tightened.
“No.”
That hurt more than it should have.
“Then why keep it?”
“Because throwing it away felt worse.”
The honesty caught me off guard.
I looked toward the windows.
“Tell me what happened six months ago.”
Silence.
“Dorian.”
He stepped inside.
“I found information about someone close to me.”
“What kind of information?”
“The kind that made you dangerous to know.”
A bitter laugh escaped me.
“You married me knowing who you were.”
“I thought I could control the risks.”
“And then?”
“Then I discovered I couldn’t.”
“So you abandoned me?”
His jaw tightened.
“I pushed you away.”
“That’s a prettier sentence for the same thing.”
“Yes.”
That stopped me.
Dorian rarely admitted when someone had landed a blow.
I crossed my arms.
“Why divorce?”
His gaze moved toward the floor.
“To remove my name from yours.”
I stared at him.
“That makes no sense.”
“It would if someone were tracking legal assets, inheritance rights and family leverage.”
My anger faded slightly.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I know part of it.”
He looked at me.
“My father’s old organization didn’t disappear when he died. It fractured. Some men went legitimate. Some didn’t.”
Dorian’s father, Vincent Cross, had died twelve years earlier.
Officially, he had been a businessman.
Unofficially, half of Chicago had attended the funeral because they were terrified not to.
“One faction recently resurfaced,” Dorian said. “They’ve been trying to force me into partnerships.”
“And this has something to do with me?”
“They obtained private photographs of you. Your schedule. Your charity work. Addresses.”
My stomach tightened.
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
Everything inside me stopped.
“You knew somebody was watching me for six months?”
“Yes.”
“And you said nothing?”
“I increased your security.”
“I thought those men were watching you.”
“They were watching you.”
My eyes burned.
“So instead of telling your wife she was in danger, you became cruel enough that she would leave?”
His expression broke.
“For a while, I believed distance would protect you.”
“You made me think you stopped loving me.”
“I know.”
“You let me spend nights wondering what I did wrong.”
“I know.”
“You served me divorce papers.”
“Yes.”
I slapped him.
The sound cracked through the room.
Dorian didn’t move.
I immediately stared at my hand.
I had never hit anyone in my life.
He slowly looked back at me.
“I deserved that.”
“No. You deserved honesty.”
“Yes.”
Tears blurred my vision.
“You don’t get to decide what pain I can survive.”
“I know that now.”
“Do you?”
His voice lowered.
“Every morning for six months I woke up wanting to walk into your room.”
My chest tightened.
“Then why didn’t you?”
“Because every night I received photographs proving someone was still watching you.”
Silence.
I felt cold.
“Photographs?”
He pulled his phone out.
Opened a protected folder.
Then handed it to me.
There were dozens.
Me outside bookstores.
Me leaving my office.
Me eating lunch.
Me walking through a grocery store.
One from outside the apartment I rented after leaving him.
Someone had been watching me constantly.
My hands began trembling.
“Why didn’t you go to the police?”
“I did.”
“What?”
“Federal investigators have been involved for four months.”
That was not what I expected.
“You’re cooperating with the FBI?”
“Against certain people, yes.”
“Does anyone know?”
“A very small number.”
I looked at the images again.
Then froze.
One photograph had been taken inside the penthouse.
Not outside.
Inside.
It showed me sleeping on our sofa.
The date was seven months earlier.
Before Dorian pushed me away.
“Dorian.”
He saw which photograph I had opened.
His face changed.
“That was the one.”
“The one what?”
“The one that convinced me the threat was inside my house.”
My skin prickled.
“Someone who worked here?”
“Or someone who had access.”
My thoughts jumped immediately to staff, security, maintenance workers, friends.
Family.
Then I remembered something.
Three days before Dorian began distancing himself, his younger half brother had stayed with us.
Julian.
Charming, irresponsible Julian Cross.
The person Dorian had spent half his life rescuing.
I looked at him.
“You’re thinking about Julian.”
Dorian’s eyes became unreadable.
“Why?”
“Because he was here that week.”
“So were twenty employees.”
“But you didn’t push me away because of an employee.”
He said nothing.
That silence answered me.
“You suspect your brother.”
“I suspect everyone.”
Before I could respond, Caleb appeared at the doorway.
“Boss.”
Dorian turned.
“What?”
“We found something in Mrs. Cross’s apartment.”
Caleb hesitated when he saw me.
I stepped forward.
“It’s my apartment. Tell me.”
He looked at Dorian.
Then back at me.
“A listening device.”
My stomach dropped.
“Where?”
“Inside your bedroom smoke detector.”
I gripped the chair.
Dorian’s face became stone.
Caleb continued.
“And that wasn’t all.”
He held out a clear evidence bag.
Inside was a tiny folded note.
Dorian opened it.
Three words were written across the paper.
CONGRATULATIONS, UNCLE DORIAN.
Nobody moved.
My blood turned to ice.
The pregnancy had been confirmed only hours earlier.
May you like
Which meant whoever was threatening us either had access to hospital information...
or already knew before we did.
