Chapter 5

Sephora woke to the sharp smell of antiseptic and the harsh white hospital lights. Her head throbbed, her body ached, and every movement felt like pulling herself through water. Panic flared for a moment, the last thing she could remember was the ambulance ahead of them and the stranger and her entering into the backseat of a van while being attended to by paramedics.

She kept hearing the word President but her vision had already blurred and she could not make sense of much as at that time.

A steady hand pressed on her shoulder. “You’re awake,” a calm voice said.

She turned her head slowly. The stranger sat near the window, composed and unreadable, his dark hair slightly tousled, one hand resting on his knee. Relief flickered in his eyes when he saw her stir.

“Aren’t you also hurt…why are you here beside me instead of being in a bed yourself?” she croaked.

“I’m perfectly fine” he smiled briefly.

Sephora’s eyes watered as she stared at the man who had virtually saved her life.

“Do I have any major injuries?”

She questioned, her mind instantly going to her unborn child

“In a hospital. Minor injuries. You’re lucky.”

“Minor?” she echoed, her voice shaky. Her arms and legs were scratched and bruised, but nothing broken. Her chest tightened as the reality of survival hit her.

Lucian didn’t answer immediately. He just studied her, quiet and steady, like a shield against the chaos she had just endured.

The door opened. A nurse entered with a clipboard. “You’re awake. The doctor will be here shortly.”

Minutes later, Dr. Myers stepped in, tall and precise. “How are you feeling?”

“Awful,” Sephora admitted. Her throat felt raw, her voice unsteady.

The doctor nodded, scanning her chart. “No broken bones, no internal injuries. You’re remarkably unharmed. But there’s one more thing.”

Sephora looked at him, confused. “What?”

“We ran a routine pregnancy test. You’re pregnant.”

Her lips thinned and she nodded courtly. She had imagined this moment in such a different way from this.

This was the news she had been waiting for for years and yet she did not know how to feel about its confirmation.

“Hows the baby?” She asked

“Luckily no harm was done on the fetus. It’s completely fun but you’ll need monitoring, but there’s no immediate concern,” the doctor said kindly. “Everything else is minor.”

Sephora’s mind spun. What was she to do now? Where was she to go? Should she call Dominic?

When the doctor finally left, the soft click of the door seemed deafening in the quiet room. Sephora’s hands trembled as she pressed them against her lap, her fingers curling into the thin hospital blanket. She swallowed hard, as if the words were a weight she had been carrying for years.

“I… I just got divorced,” she whispered, barely audible. Her voice cracked on the last word, and she looked down at the floor, unable to meet his gaze. “He… my ex… he chose someone else. Because I couldn’t get pregnant. Everything we built… it’s gone. And everyone… everyone thinks I’m infertile. That I… that I can’t… that I’ll never….” She trailed off, shaking slightly, the confession lodged somewhere between shame and disbelief.

Her hand instinctively moved to her stomach, caressing the growing life inside her as though it were both a curse and a miracle. Her eyes glistened, threatening to spill over. “This baby…” she continued, her voice barely a whisper. “It’s his. Dominic’s.”

“Dominic Ainsworth….” Lucian whispered

“Yes….do…do you know him?”

Lucian remained silent, his presence steady and imposing near the window. He didn’t respond immediately, instead, he just watched her, as if cataloging the pain etched into her every word and movement.

Sephora’s voice dropped even lower, almost as if the words were too heavy for her to carry aloud. “I don’t… I don’t want anyone to know I survived.” Her gaze flickered up briefly, meeting his eyes for the first time, and then darted away again, ashamed. “Dominic… his family… they’ve already erased me. They’ve celebrated my absence without me even realizing it. Returning… going back… it would only humiliate me further. Let them believe I died.”

Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes, but she blinked rapidly, refusing to let them fall.

Lucian stepped closer, his hand hovering near her shoulder, but he did not touch her. Instead, he tilted his head slightly, studying her with an intensity that made her skin prickle.

Finally, he spoke, low and measured. “You’ve been through more than most people could endure. And yet, you’re still standing.” His voice wasn’t patronizing. It was steady, and it carried a weight that made her heart falter.

Sephora exhaled shakily, pressing her palms to her eyes for a moment, trying to steady the storm inside her. “I… I have no one,” she admitted, her words barely audible. “Dominic made me cut ties with my family. I have not Spoken to any of them for more than five years and I’m sure they’d not accept me back even if I were to beg….i have no one. No one to take care of me or my baby”

“Then let me,” Lucian interrupted softly, stepping closer, his voice calm but unyielding. “I will ensure no one can touch you. You don’t have to go back. Not now. Not ever.”

Her eyes widened slightly, disbelief warring with cautious hope.

“But I don’t even know who you are….you…you wouldn’t “

“I would”

“I don’t know you Mr, I’m eternally grateful that you saved my life but you could be anyone. You’ve done enough already, I have to figure things out by myself from here on out”

Before Lucian could open his mouth again. Alex, his assistant stepped in, professional, crisp, holding a tablet. “President Lucian, the city A board members need your approval for the project. The West Coast acquisition cannot proceed without you. They do not know about the crash and I’ve made sure that the news outlets did not include your name as one of the people who boarded that flight and because of this the meeting scheduled to happen this evening still has to go on”

Sephora froze. City A….President Lucian. Why did that name strike a bell. Was he a big shot CEO?

Sephora tried hard to remember where she had heard the name before till suddenly her eyes bulged in suprise. President Lucian Cole??

The most powerful CEO in the western region of the continent and he had just saved her life. Her stomach flipped. The same man Dominic had sworn to ruin. And now, here he was, standing in front of her, alive and real, and… he had saved her life.

A part of her wanted to back away. This was her ex’s enemy who he had had cursed countless times, someone she had only ever seen in the shadows of news articles and business journals.

“Get the cars ready and make sure to disperse any reporter or paparazzi outside these doors”

“Yes”

After Alex went out of the door, Lucian turned to face Sephora who was visibly stunned and continued the conversation like nothing happened

“My name is Lucian Cole and I own a business. Now, living without an identity is dangerous. Especially for a woman alone and pregnant. You need protection a name and a position. I can make that happen.”

Own a business? Sephora almost chuckled. He was the richest man in the west continent and yet he claimed to just “own a business”.

Her heart skipped. “You… you would help me disappear?”

“Yes. But there’s one condition,” he said. His eyes met hers, unwavering. “You must marry me.”

Sephora’s breath caught. “Marry… you?”

“It’s the only way I can guarantee your safety. You and your child need a shield. Marry me, and I’ll give your child my name, my protection. No one can touch either of you.”

The room was quiet. Her mind raced. She had just survived death, discovered she was carrying Dominic’s child, discovered that the very man who had saved her was the sworn nemesis of her ex husband and now the very man was offering her a chance to vanish from the world entirely. But at the cost of marriage.

“You’re Dominic’s worst enemy. How do I know that you don’t want to marry me just to spite Adrian”

Lucian’s expression softened slightly. “I have nothing to loose by completely abandoning you here in this hospital and I have nothing to gain by marrying you. Like you said. You want to disappear so Dominic would never know that you and I are married. I do not care about him as much as you think. He’s nothing. I’m only doing this because it’s the right thing to do given the circumstances and the decision ultimately lies in your hands”

Sephora’s gaze fell to her hands, trembling. For the first time in years, she felt that she had a choice. Her old life, with its pain and humiliation, had ended. Perhaps, just perhaps, something new could begin.

She was alive, pregnant, and vulnerable. And he had just offered her everything she could need but could she really trust him?

Lucian’s eyes never left hers. “The choice is yours.”