Chapter 1

Madeline’s POV

“Seven months,” I whispered to my reflection. “Seven months, and I still haven’t told him.”

I’d stared at my stomach so many times over the last three days that I’d basically memorized every little curve of it. I was seven months pregnant, and I still hadn’t found the courage to tell Alexander that the baby growing inside me was his.

That was the truth I kept swallowing every morning, along with my coffee and my pride. Two years married to the man, bonded as his mate, and I still couldn't walk into a room and just say the words out loud. “I'm having your baby.” Just six words. I'd practiced them in the mirror so many times that it started to sound like a recording.

Tonight was going to be different. I told myself that while I pulled on the blue dress he'd once said looked nice on me back when he still said things like that occasionally. I smoothed it down over my stomach, then pressed my hand there for a moment.

"Okay," I said to my reflection. "You can do this."

My reflection didn't look convinced, and honestly, neither was I. I thought about all the reasons this could go wrong, and there were a lot of them. 

Alexander hadn't touched me with anything like affection in a very long time. He barely looked at me over dinner anymore, if he even bothered showing up for dinner itself. But there was still a small, dumb part of me that believed a baby might fix our broken relationship. That maybe hearing those six words out loud would make his eyes soften the way they used to before the wedding, back when he still pretended to like me.

I walked down the hallway toward his study anyway, because hope was a stupid, stubborn thing that didn’t care how many times it had been wrong before.

The door was slightly open, light spilling out in a thin gold line across the floor. I heard Harper laugh before I even saw anything. That low, pleased laughter always made the hair on the back of my neck rise.

I pushed the door open another inch.

Alexander had her pinned against his desk.

At first, my mind refused to understand what I was seeing. Maybe Harper was too close to him. Maybe I’d walked in at the wrong moment and misunderstood.

Then his mouth moved against hers, and his hand tightened in her hair.

My whole body stopped working immediately.

I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move. I stood there in my blue dress with my hand still pressed to my stomach, watching my husband of two years cheat on me right in front of me.

Harper saw me first. Of course she did. She always saw everything before I did.

"Get the fuck out," she said calmly. Her voice was bored, almost as if I was the one who'd wandered into the wrong room.

Alexander didn't correct her. He didn't even say a word. He just looked at me over her shoulder with an expression I couldn't quite read, and his silence hurt more than anything he could have said.

Something inside me broke just then.

I grabbed the wine glass off the side table and threw it hard, aiming for Harper's smug little face. I missed. It shattered against the wall behind her, and for one moment, nobody moved.

Then Alexander crossed the room in two strides and grabbed my wrist roughly enough that I already knew there'd be a bruise there tomorrow—purple fingerprints I'd have to cover with makeup or long sleeves.

"You're an embarrassment," he said.

He said it loud enough that I knew he wanted the staff outside to hear it.

"Alexander—" I paused then blurted out, “I’m pregnant.”

His eyes moved down to my stomach for barely a second before returning to my face.

There was no happiness. No surprise. Nothing.

"Go to your room, Madeline."

My name in his mouth used to mean something. Now it just sounded like an order.

I yanked my wrist from his grip and left, because what else was there to do? I walked down that same hallway, past the same staff who suddenly found the floor very interesting. Nobody looked at me. Nobody said a word either. 

That was almost worse than if they had, because it meant this wasn't new information to them. They already knew what my marriage looked like behind closed doors. Maybe they'd even known longer than I had.

I didn't stop shaking even when I stepped inside my room. I just sat on the edge of my bed for a very long time. My hand found my stomach again. It was just like an old habit now, as if I could keep my baby safe just by holding onto it hard enough. 

The baby kicked just then, and I let myself cry for a while before I wiped my face and told myself to stop.

Crying never fixed anything in my life, and I'd learned that a long time ago.

I was still sitting there, shaking a little, when I heard the sound of boots pounding heavily on the stairs.

Immediately, I could tell there were a lot of them, moving quickly with purpose, and something about the sound made every hair on my arms stand straight up.

I stood, my heart suddenly slamming against my ribs. Nobody sent that many guards up a staircase at this hour for nothing. Nobody sent that many guards up a staircase for a wife who'd thrown a wine glass, either.

"Alexander?" I called out, even though I already knew it wasn't him coming.

The boots got louder and closer. I backed toward the window without even deciding to, my brain already looking for a way out that didn't exist, because I was seven months pregnant on the third floor of a house I no longer felt safe in.

"Alexander, this isn't funny," I said.

My back hit the wall by the window. I could feel my heart beating really loud and fast, drowning out every other sound in the room.

I thought about the baby. I thought about the blue dress I’d stupidly worn, still smelling like the perfume I'd put on for a conversation that never happened the way I planned it. I thought about how fast a night could go from being hopeful to terrifying, and how I hadn't even seen it coming.

The footsteps stopped right outside my door.

Nobody knocked.