Chapter 1 Callie

"Breathe, Callista. You're doing wonderfully," Dr. Anaya murmured gently from the foot of the examination table.

I stared up at the blank white ceiling, tracing the faint watermarks on the plaster just to give my mind something to hold onto. My bare legs were trembling slightly against the cold metal stirrups, a dull, heavy cramp radiating deep through my lower abdomen, a physical reminder of the procedure I had just endured.

I heard the snap of her gloves being pulled off and tossed into the bin. The doctor stepped into my line of sight, her warm brown eyes carrying a flicker of genuine sympathy that I immediately wanted to look away from. "The embryo has been successfully transferred. Rest here for fifteen minutes, and then you're free to get dressed."

I swallowed hard, my throat feeling dry. "It's done?"

"It's done," Dr. Roth confirmed softly. She placed a warm hand on my knee. "Congratulations. You are officially pregnant."

Pregnant.

The word felt entirely foreign, dropping into the freezing pit of my stomach. I closed my eyes and let out a long, shuddering breath, wrapping my arms tightly around my waist as if I could already feel the alien life taking root inside me.

I hadn't sold my body out of greed. I hadn't done this for a new car, or a luxury vacation, or any of the frivolous things the agency psychologists had probed me about during the screening process. I had sold my body out of sheer terror.

For the last three weeks, my husband, Tristan, had been coming home to our cramped, mold-infested apartment looking like a ghost. He would pace the floor until three in the morning, weeping, pulling at his hair, swearing that his startup had borrowed money from the wrong kind of investors. Ruthless, violent men. Last night, he had fallen to his knees, passing me a flyer to this agency and burying his face in my lap, sobbing that I should help him as they'd only given him exactly forty-eight hours to pay up, or they were going to put a bullet in his head.

I couldn't let my husband die. I couldn't let the man I loved, the man who promised me a beautiful future once his "temporary financial slump" was over, be murdered over a failed app. The half-million-dollar surrogacy contract he made me sign was the only thing keeping him breathing.

"Take it easy today," Dr. Roth advised, pulling me from my dark thoughts as she handed me a stack of post-care instructions. "No heavy lifting, no intense stress. Let your body adjust."

"Understood."

After she was gone, I quickly got dressed, picked up my handbag and stepped onto the bustling pavement. The biting New York wind instantly sliced right through my coat, making me shiver violently. I pulled my collar up, ignoring the dull ache in my pelvis.

My phone buzzed in the pocket of my jeans and I pulled it out with trembling fingers. It was a notification from my banking app. The agency had just wired the fifty-thousand-dollar initial down payment.

I stared at the glowing numbers on the cracked screen, my breath plumbing in the freezing air. It was more money than I had seen in the last three years of my life. It was enough to immediately pay off the loan sharks, clear our eviction notices, and finally give us room to breathe.

I instantly wired thirty thousand to the account Tristian had provided, leaving a balance of twenty thousand.

I could have walked into the nearest department store and bought a coat that actually kept the cold out. Bought a hot meal, or at least a pair of boots without a hole in the sole. Instead, I hailed a cab and gave the driver the address to a high-end luxury watch boutique downtown.

For the past eight months, Tristan had been endlessly stressing over a major tech investor meeting he was trying to secure. He bitterly complained every single night that he couldn't close the deal because the elite venture capitalists didn't take him seriously. He didn't look the part of a successful CEO. He had stared at a silver-faced luxury watch in a magazine for weeks, tracing the bezel with his finger, sighing about how a man in his position needed to project wealth to acquire wealth.

I wanted to give him his pride back. I wanted to see him smile the way he used to before the debt began crushing us. I wanted him to look at me, put that watch on his wrist, and finally feel completely safe.

The sales associates at the boutique looked at my worn clothes with barely concealed disgust, right up until the moment my debit card cleared the astronomical purchase.

I walked out clutching the box inside a glossy shopping bag, feeling a strange sense of triumph. Wincing slightly as the pelvic cramping flared again with every step, I caught another cab and directed it toward Tristan’s downtown startup.

The lobby of the shared tech workspace was dead quiet when I walked in. The receptionist’s desk was entirely empty, her computer screen glowing softly in the dim, late-afternoon light. It was Friday, and most of the independent developers usually left early to hit the bars.

Frowning slightly, I bypassed the front desk and walked down the long hallway toward Tristan’s private corner office at the very back of the building.

His door was pulled halfway shut and as I got closer, a low thudding sound echoed into the hallway.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

A fond smile touched my lips. I figured he was pulling another caffeine-fueled coding session, kicking the edge of his desk in frustration the way he always did when he was stuck on a difficult algorithm.

I reached into the bag and pulled out the box, clutching it in my hands. I didn't bother to knock; I just wanted to wrap my arms around his neck and tell him we were safe.

I turned the knob, pushing the door open.

"Honey, you won't guess..."

The words died instantly in my throat, sucked right out of my lungs.

Tristan was there. He had his back to me, his slacks pooled unceremoniously around his ankles. What made my face pale was that he was aggressively thrusting his hips forward, pinning a stunning, dark-haired woman to the edge of his desk.

She was dressed in a designer silk blouse that had been ripped open, heavy diamond earrings glittering under the harsh lights of the office. Her long, tanned legs were hooked tightly over his hips, her fingernails clawing deep into his bare back as she threw her head back in ecstasy.

“Oh, God...yes, Tristan, harder!” she shrieked, her voice cracking as she threw her head back against his shoulder, her hips bucking up to meet his violent strokes.

“Fuck, Sloane, you’re so tight,” Tristan groaned, his voice rough dripping with pleasure I had never once heard him use with me. He gripped her hips hard enough to leave deep bruises in her pale skin, slamming himself deeper inside her as she let out a long, high-pitched wail of pure ecstasy.

The sound of their heavy panting and the wet, violent slap of skin against skin echoed loudly in the office.

My entire body went completely cold, every single drop of blood draining from my face.

My stomach dropped into a bottomless pit, the nausea hitting me so hard I thought I was going to throw up right there on the carpet.

The watch box slipped from my paralyzed fingers, falling in agonizingly slow motion, before hitting the floor loudly.

The girl gasped at the sudden intrusion, her legs trembling as she snapped her eyes open, looking over his shoulder at me, but Tristan didn't stop. He gave her three more brutal thrusts, his breath hitching violently in his throat before he stiffened, roaring her name as he emptied himself inside her.

Only then, as his chest heaved and he slowly pulled out of her, letting her messy dress fall back down her thighs, did he lazily turn his head over his shoulder, his eyes locking onto mine.