LOGINKAEL'S POV Elena Rose Hawthorne was six weeks old and already running my entire house.I was up on a little ladder hanging the mobile Sage bought, the one with the felt stars that played lullabies, and Harlow was in the doorway with Elena on her hip giving me that look."Your daughter is doing it again," she said.I didn't even have to ask what it was. When I left the room, Elena held her breath until I came back. Dramatic. Just like her mother."She learned that trick from you," I said, trying to get the mobile straight. "You can't reward emotional blackmail."Harlow walked in, Elena bright eyed and completely faking it, and then the second Elena saw me she stopped crying and blew a big spit bubble right at me and smiled that gummy, toothless smile."She didn't miss me," I said. "She's conning us both.""She absolutely missed you," Harlow said. "You left for ninety seconds. You texted me twelve times yesterday when I went to buy milk. She gets it from you."I climbed down and took h
HARLOW'S POV Home smelled like lemon cleaner, fresh paint, and panic. Mostly panic. Kael’s panic. “You’re sure this is the right temperature,” he said for the fourth time, hovering over the bottle warmer like it might explode. “The nurse said 98 degrees. This says 97.4. That is point six degrees off, Harlow.” “Kael,” I said, balancing Elena on my shoulder while she made tiny dinosaur noises against my neck. “She is not a NASA launch. She is a baby. Babies have been eating milk at room temperature since the dawn of time.” “Not my baby,” he said, grabbing the bottle and shaking it like it owed him money. “My baby gets exact specifications. My baby gets perfection.” “Your baby gets fed before she chews my collarbone off,” I said. Elena chose that moment to prove my point and let out a wail that could have shattered glass. Three weeks old and she already had her father’s lung capacity. Kael moved faster than I’d seen him move in a boardroom. Bottle in hand, baby from me to
KaelHe is gone.Two words. Three syllables. And my entire world tilted on its axis while my daughter fought for her life behind glass and my wife sat in a wheelchair shaking like a leaf."Say that again," I said to the nurse. My voice did not sound like mine. Too calm. Too cold. The kind of calm that happened right before I put someone in the ground.The nurse flinched. "Mr. Hawthorne, the detective is waiting outside. He said Silas Cole escaped transport. He hurt two officers. They are in surgery now."Harlow's hand found mine on her shoulder and clamped down, nails biting through my shirt. "Kael."I looked down at her. She was pale, lips white, IV taped to her arm, wrapped in blankets that did not hide the fact she had almost died six hours ago. Our daughter was three feet away in an incubator with tubes in her nose. And Silas Cole was loose."Kael," Harlow said again, sharper this time. "Look at me."I did. Her eyes were terrified, but clear. Present. Not panicking. Assessing. Pla
HARLOW'S POV The blood on the sheets was warm and wet and mine, and all I could think was I never got to hold her. I never got to see her face.Hands grabbed my arms, my legs, ripped the blanket away. Kael was shouting my name somewhere far away, but I could not see him through the crowd of blue scrubs."Pressure is dropping," someone yelled. "Sixty over forty.""Placental abruption," another voice snapped. "We are losing the baby."No. No. No.I tried to sit up. A nurse pushed me back down. "Harlow, stay still. We have to get you to the OR now.""Where is Kael," I gasped. "Where is my husband.""I am here," his voice broke through the chaos, rough and wrecked. "Baby, I am right here."I turned my head. He was pressed against the wall by security, his face white, his eyes wild."Let him through," I screamed. "Let him come to me.""Ma'am, he cannot come into surgery," the nurse said. "You are hemorrhaging. We have to go now.""Kael," I sobbed. "Do not let them take her. Promise me you
KAEL'S POV Silas Cole stood behind my father in law with a hospital key card in his hand and a smile on his face like he had already won. I moved before Julian could turn around, putting my body between Harlow and that doorway."Get away from her," I said.Julian spun, saw Silas, went white. "How did you get out.""Your security is very bad at their job, Julian," Silas said pleasantly. "Just like it was twenty five years ago. Rain. Whiskey. Elena begging you not to drive.""Shut your mouth," Julian snarled.Harlow sat up in bed behind me, the sheet clutched to her chest, diamond flashing on her left hand. "Dad. Is it true."Julian did not turn around. "Harlow, baby girl, please—""Did you kill Mom," Harlow asked. Flat. Clear.Julian's shoulders dropped all at once. "Yes."The monitor beeped steady behind us. Thump thump thump."I was drunk," Julian said, voice raw. "Your mother and I fought. About money. About Silas stealing from the company. She grabbed my keys. Tried to leave. I gr
HARLOW'S POV The man who tried to kill my baby called himself Daddy and smiled at me from my wedding night doorway. I did not scream. I grabbed the call button cord off the bedside table and threw it at his face as hard as I could.It bounced off Silas Cole's clerical collar and fell to the floor.Kael moved before I could blink, forearm across Silas's throat, slamming him back into the hallway wall so hard the framed cross rattled."You touch her," Kael snarled, "and I end you right here."Silas smiled, even with Kael choking him. "Hello, son-in-law.""Do not call me that," Kael said."Why not. You married her, did you not." Silas looked past Kael's shoulder right at me, at my stomach. "You look just like your mother did when she carried you.""Do not talk about my mother," I snapped. "You do not get to say her name. You do not get to look at me. You do not get to breathe the same air as my baby."Silas's smile thinned, just for a second, like I had actually hit a nerve. Good.The g
She didn't show him the paper that afternoon.She needed to sit with it first. Turn it over. Look at it from every angle before she handed it to him and watched his face change.Instead she watched him at dinner — how he refilled her glass without being asked, the way his fingers brushed hers longe
She told herself she wasn't going to go.She said it firmly in her head while she got dressed. Said it again while she drank her tea standing at the kitchen window. Said it a third time while she typed a reply she deleted before sending.She went anyway.The café Vanessa named was small and off a s
HARLOW'S POV The drive back to the penthouse was silent.Kael kept his eyes on the road. His hands gripped the steering wheel. I watched the city lights blur past the window and tried to breathe.My father had not thrown us out. He had not screamed. He had not disowned me.But he had looked at me
HARLOW'S POV Moving into Kael's penthouse took three days.Not because I had a lot of things. I did not. A few boxes of clothes. Some books. The stuffed animals from my childhood bed. But every time I tried to pack, I got distracted. By his hands on my waist. By his mouth on my neck. By the way he







