Semua Bab The Baby Clause: Bab 11 - Bab 20

By the time I got back to the bakery, the weight of the entire day had settled in my shoulders like wet sand. I didn’t remember walking the last two blocks from the train station. Didn’t remember crossing at the lights. My body moved on autopilot, but my brain hadn’t caught up.Damian Sterling’s words still clung to the walls of my skull. “Move in with me.” Like he was offering to board a stray.I didn’t know what was worse. The proposition itself, or the fact that, for a split second I’d considered it.The bell above the bakery door jingled as I stepped inside, the sound warm and familiar.It smelled like cinnamon and melted chocolate. Like sugar-crusted nostalgia and early mornings. Like mine.This space...this crooked little building with its paint-chipped windows and scuffed wood counters...was the only place that ever felt like it belonged to me.And tonight, I needed it more than air.“Wow,” came Rosa’s voice from behind the display case. “You look like a mood that filed for ban

The thing no one tells you about losing everything is how quiet it is the morning after.There are no violins.No dramatic music.No slow-motion montage of tears and ashes.Just... silence.And the weight of smoke in your hair.The kind that clings like guilt.Like memory.And the metallic and thick taste of failure in your throat, no matter how many times you swallow.I stood in Rosa’s bathroom, one hand braced on the chipped porcelain sink, staring into the only mirror I had left. The lighting was harsh, fluorescent, unforgiving. It didn’t blur the damage. It highlighted it.My reflection looked like a ghost that hadn’t figured out it was dead yet.Eyes red, not from crying, not yet.But from heat. From smoke.From the kind of night that strips something permanent from your bones.My skin was tight with soot. My curls hung limp and smelled like melted wires and grief. I looked like the kind of girl people whisper about when they pass her on the sidewalk.That poor thing.She must’ve

There’s nothing like wearing your only decent outfit to remind you how broke you are.The black slacks were too tight around the waist now. Pregnancy bloat. Or stress. Probably both. The white blouse had a faint coffee stain near the hem, but I tucked it in and pretended it was part of the design. The charcoal gray blazer I bought on clearance at a thrift store two years ago still held its shape. Barely.I’d added a coat of mascara. Concealer under the eyes. Lip balm. Not lipstick. Lipstick felt like a lie I couldn’t keep up.Standing in front of the mirrored elevator doors at SterlingTech, I looked like a woman in control. Sharp. Capable. Almost put together.Almost.But inside?Inside I was cracked open and leaking everything I’d tried to bury since the fire.The building was all glass and steel and soft-footed silence. Receptionists with teeth-whitened smiles and headsets that looked surgically attached. The air smelled like lemon-polished ambition and filtered money.I gave my nam

The second I stepped back into Rosa’s apartment, I realized just how small everything felt.The couch was still there. Still lumpy. Still pressed against that same crooked bookshelf that smelled like cinnamon and old wood glue. The throw blanket lay folded neatly at the edge, like it had been waiting for me.And Rosa was standing in the kitchen, one socked foot tapping nervously on the tile as the microwave beeped behind her.She turned the second the door clicked shut.“Jesus, B,” she whispered, eyes scanning me like I was a wounded animal. “Are you okay? Where the hell did you go? You scared the absolute shit out of me.”I opened my mouth. Closed it. Then shrugged out of the blazer Damian had wrapped around my shoulders.“I fainted.”“You what?”“Collapsed,” I corrected. “In his office.”Her eyes went wide. “He...Damian Sterling? You fainted in his...holy shit, are you okay?”“I’m fine,” I muttered, which was the biggest lie I’d told all day and that was saying something.She rushed

Damian's POVThe whiskey burned where it hadn’t even touched my lips.It mocked me from the edge of the desk, gold and cruel in the glass, catching the overhead light like it had something important to say. Something final. I ignored it. Just like I ignored the time blinking past midnight, the ache building between my eyes, and the pressure stacking behind the pixelated faces staring back at me through the screen.“Damian.” My mother’s voice, crisp as cut crystal, sliced through the static. “You can’t keep stalling. This alliance was your idea.”I leaned back slowly in my chair, stretching the tension out of my spine like it would help. It didn’t.Richard Belcourt adjusted his tie and didn’t bother pretending to be patient. “If we miss the quarter-end cycle, we lose control of the narrative. Sabrina starts looking like she’s chasing you. Investors panic. Shareholders start asking questions. Questions we don’t want to answer.”“Optics, Damian,” my mother said, tone flatter than her smi