CHAPTER 16

Amanda’s POV

The late-afternoon sun shone low across the schoolyard, warm light spilling over the chain-link fence and casting a shadow across the pavement . It should have been an ordinary pickup just another day collecting Levi, just another day trying to keep our lives normal but nothing felt ordinary anymore.

I gripped the steering wheel a moment longer than necessary before stepping out of the car. I’d been on edge all day, every muscle in my body coiled tight, bracing for whatever new headline or rumor might crawl out from under the rock Selene had overturned. My reputation was bleeding out in the press, the hospital board had a knife to my back, and now even the thought of coming here to Levi’s school, of all places made my skin itch with anxiety.

I just wanted to get my son and go home. No lingering. No unnecessary conversations.

But as soon as I crossed the lot and stepped onto the playground, my plan unraveled.

“Aunty!”

The voice came from somewhere to my left high-pitched, cheerful, utterly unexpected.

A little girl with messy brown pigtails barreled toward me, her small sneakers slapping against the concrete. She was maybe eight or nine, a year or so younger than Levi, and her eyes sparkled with the kind of unfiltered joy kids had before the world taught them caution.

I stopped, blinking down at her. “What… did you just call me?”

She grinned up at me like I was the punchline to her private joke. “Aunty.”

I glanced around, unsure whether she’d mistaken me for someone else. “I think you—”

“Nope,” she cut in, completely certain. “It’s ’cause Levi calls my dad ‘Uncle.’ So I’m calling you Aunty.”

Her explanation was so matter-of-fact, so innocent, that for a moment I couldn’t even form a response. My mind stalled on that one word.

Uncle.

Behind her, Levi jogged up, backpack bouncing against his shoulders, a half-smile tugging at his mouth. “Blair, you’re going to confuse her,” he teased, reaching out to ruffle the girl’s hair.

“I’m not confused!” Blair announced, looking between the two of us like this was a perfectly reasonable arrangement.

Levi chuckled a sound so light and warm that it almost startled me. I hadn’t heard that kind of easy laughter from him in weeks. It hit me in a place I didn’t expect, a sharp twist in my chest.

The way he looked at her comfortable, protective was unmistakable. And she was just as at ease with him, holding his sleeve as if she’d done it a hundred times.

I forced a small smile, though my mind was already buzzing with questions I didn’t want to ask. “Levi, get your things. We’re leaving.”

“Okay, Mom,” he said, but there was a flicker of hesitation before he let Blair’s sleeve go. She waved at me cheerfully as I turned away, and I couldn’t help glancing back once to see Levi grinning at her in return.

That wasn’t just casual friendship. That was closeness. Bond.

The kind that didn’t happen overnight.

I walked faster toward the parking lot, my pulse ticking up. This… this was exactly what I’d been afraid of. Ryan getting close enough to Levi through another angle through his own child.

I was still thinking about it when I rounded the corner of the building and stopped dead.

Ryan was there.

Leaning against a sleek black SUV like he had all the time in the world, arms crossed over his chest, sunglasses hooked on the collar of his shirt. He straightened as soon as our eyes met.

“We need to talk,” he said, his voice low but firm.

I shifted Levi’s backpack higher on my shoulder. “I don’t think we do.”

His jaw tightened. “Amanda, I want to know why the hell you filed a restraining order against me.”

The sound of his voice in that moment sharp, clipped sent a ripple of heat down my spine. Not fear exactly, but a warning.

I kept my face neutral, my words deliberate. “Because I know the Steward family. I know how you operate. You’ll try to take my son away from me. I’m not giving you that chance. So yes you deserved it.”

He stepped forward, the shadow from the SUV cutting across his face. “You think a piece of paper is going to stop me?”

“It’s the law,” I shot back, though my fingers were tightening on the strap of Levi’s bag.

Ryan took another step closer, his gaze locked on mine. “No, Amanda. It’s a formality. And it doesn’t stop me from doing what I’m going to do which is make sure Levi eventually comes home.”

There was no mistaking his meaning. No bluster, no idle threat. Just conviction the kind you didn’t argue with because you knew it wasn’t up for debate.

I felt the air in my lungs turn colder. “He is home,” I said, the words sharper than I intended.

Ryan didn’t blink. “Not yet.”

For a second, I couldn’t move. His voice was calm, but it carried a weight that pressed against my ribs. And behind him, through the haze of my unease, I caught sight of Blair standing by the SUV, watching us with quiet curiosity.

The image burned into me: his daughter and my son, already bound by something I couldn’t untangle.

I called to Levi over my shoulder, my tone brisk. He hurried over, giving Blair a quick wave goodbye. She waved back, her smile unshaken.

Ryan stepped aside as we passed, but I felt his eyes on me the whole way, like a hand at my back pushing me forward but never letting me forget it was there.

I didn’t breathe until Levi was in the car and the door was shut. Even then, my grip on the steering wheel stayed tight, my knuckles pale.

The restraining order had felt like a barrier a line he couldn’t cross. But now, after hearing him, I realized it was just paper. Paper he already planned to tear apart.

And I didn’t know how to stop him.