All Chapters of Contract Marriage with the Disabled Billionaire : Chapter 81 - Chapter 90

Darren’s POVThere was something different in the air today.Stillness—but not the kind that follows a storm.This one was steadier. Heavier in the chest, not the throat. It didn’t choke. It grounded.The headlines were out. The media circus was spinning again, Richard’s brother’s name stamped on every outlet, theories cropping up like weeds. But none of it touched me the same way anymore.Because this time, I wasn’t waiting for a verdict.I already had one.And it hadn’t broken me.I spent the morning reviewing reports from the mine—real reports this time, not just using them to pretend I wasn’t unraveling. Production was up again, especially after Alex brought back a few trusted site managers who had left during the worst of the crisis. The books were stable. Payroll had been met. The insurance claims were still tied up in red tape, but we had breathing room.More than I thought we would.And for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t working just to survive the day.I was working

Isadora’s POVIt wasn’t until I heard laughter in the kitchen that I realized how quiet the house had truly been.Not silence.Not absence.But quiet in that strained, held-breath kind of way. The kind where every step felt like it might trigger something. Where every knock on the door could carry news that changed everything.But today, there was laughter.Alex had said something to Darren about the supplier mix-up on new mining equipment, and Darren had actually laughed—head tilted back, the sound rumbling from deep in his chest. I’d nearly dropped the basket of folded clothes in my hands.It was startling.And beautiful.And it made my throat tighten the way it used to when I stood on stage before a solo.Except this wasn’t fear.It was awe.I carried the basket upstairs, humming under my breath, feeling lighter than I had in months.The sun poured into the hallway through the tall windows, warming the walls that had once felt like they were closing in on us. I passed the guest roo

Isadora’s POVThe world didn’t shift on its axis when I found out I was pregnant.There was no dramatic swell of music, no poetic sign from the universe.It was much quieter than that.It was Darren pressing his hand to my lower belly like he could already feel something stirring. It was the way I suddenly noticed time again—measuring things in weeks, symptoms, books I hadn’t had the energy to finish.It was the way I started saying “we” instead of “I,” even when no one else was around.I didn’t tell anyone for the first week. Not because I didn’t want to. But because I wanted to sit in it first—unrushed, unshaped by anyone else’s reaction.I took long walks around the property by myself, one hand always resting on the flat of my stomach, as though I was checking that the feeling hadn’t disappeared.Darren didn’t rush me.He watched.Waited.Stayed close.There were mornings he woke before me just to lie beside me quietly, as if witnessing me breathing was its own kind of reassurance.

Isadora’s POVPregnancy, I’d learned, wasn’t a single feeling.It was a tide that reshaped you slowly—an invisible tide that rearranged not just your body but your sense of time, your breath, your very self.Each morning I woke up a little different.Not obviously so. Not yet. No rounded belly or changed walk.But I felt it in the way my dreams shifted. I felt it in the early hush of morning when I pressed a palm to my stomach before even brushing my teeth. I felt it in how deeply I breathed, as though I were breathing for two.The first time I heard the heartbeat, I was alone.Not because Darren hadn’t offered to come. He had—twice.But I needed that first appointment for myself. I needed to walk into the sterile white room and sit in the paper gown and feel the gel on my skin and hear that flickering, rapid rhythm—alone. Just me and the life inside me.The nurse dimmed the lights.The ultrasound wand found its mark.And then I heard it.That tiny, galloping sound, like rain in a bot

Isadora’s POVThe letter came in the mail without a return address.It was tucked between a Barlowe Foundation newsletter and a gardening catalog I hadn’t subscribed to. I almost threw it out with the rest of the paper, but the handwriting caught my eye—slanted, clean, familiar in a way that stirred something old inside my chest.I stared at it for a long time before opening it.Even after I’d slid a knife along the seam and pulled out the single folded page, I hesitated.Then I unfolded it.The handwriting confirmed what I already suspected.It was from Mrs. Kellerman—my high school literature teacher.Someone I hadn’t thought about in years.Dear Isadora,I don’t know if you’ll read this. I heard through one of the faculty at Trinity that you’re now involved in a scholarship foundation in partnership with the Barlowe estate. When I saw the press release, I recognized your name immediately.I don’t write to pry or pretend to understand the path your life has taken since you left scho