Anthony’s expression flickers, something protective, something harsh flashing. “You won’t be.” He says it like a promise he’s already prepared to kill for.
I pat the cushion beside me before I can overthink it. “Come sit.”
He hesitates. It’s small, but I see it — the instinct to stay standing, to keep distance, to keep control.
But he exhales and sits, heavy and precise, like he’s placing himself where I asked without letting it look like he’s yielding.
I shift closer slowly, careful, like approaching a skittish animal. “I’m not going anywhere,” I say, voice low. “Okay? Whatever games they’re playing, whatever Karen’s doing, you don’t have to worry about my loyalty.”
His hand moves, finding mine over the blanket. His fingers close around it, firm and warm, and he doesn’t let go.
Then he moves, and I slide into his chest like he’s rearranging the world to fit us together. His arm comes around me, sure and gentle, his hand pushing into my hair and tucking me into him. It’s protective in the way a locked door is protective.
My cheek presses against his shirt. I can hear his heartbeat, steady but heavy, like it’s carrying more than it wants anyone to see.
“Good,” he murmurs, and the single word is rough, like he’s swallowing something sharp. His thumb strokes once over the back of my head, a tiny motion that feels like restraint and need tangled together.
Chapter 24
Anthony
The last few days have been a quiet kind of ruin.
April in my bed, in my kitchen, in myhome,hair in a messy knot, wearing one of my shirts like she owns the place. April curled against my side on the sofa while the city flickers beyond the glass, my arm around her without thinking, my hand finding the swell that isn’t there yet and still feeling protective like it’s instinct.
I’ve spent forty-eight years perfecting distance, and she’s undone it in less than a week. I tell myself it’s temporary. I tell myself it’s pragmatic—security, safety, optics, the baby. But then she’ll laugh at something stupid on the television and lean her head on my shoulder like she belongs there, and the truth is sharp enough to make my chest tighten.
I want her.
Not as an arrangement. Not as a clause. Not as a solution.
As my own.
We ride downtown in the back of the car, the partition up, the city sliding by in silver streaks. She’s wrapped in a sweater, scarf tucked neatly, hair brushed, glasses on, trying to look like the woman who walks into my office every day and never cracks, but I see the softness under it. The lingering fragility from the phonecall with Aidan Snow. The quiet watchfulness that says she’s still waiting for the ground to shift under her feet.
“Seatbelt,” I tell her, automatically.
“I know,” she says, and rolls her eyes with just enough bite to remind me who she is. “You’re not my father, Anthony.”
I glance at her, raising one brow. “No. But you’re carrying my child, and I might as well start practicing.”
Her mouth twitches. “We’re in stop and go traffic. There’s practically zero danger.”
“Put it on anyway, princess.”
She clicks it into place with exaggerated annoyance. When she’s done, she turns to me, eyes bright with that smart, defiant humor I’ve been addicted to since the first day she talked back to me in a meeting. “There,” she says. “Satisfied?”
“Immensely.”
It’s a small moment, nothing at all, but it warms something in me that has been cold for a long time. My hand drifts to her knee without thinking, just wanting to hold something, holdher.She looks down at my hand like it surprises her it’s there. But she lets it stay.
A few blocks from the building, I pull my hand back, straighten my cuffs, put my work face on like a mask. She notices—of course she does. Those light green eyes watch me for half a second before she follows suit. Her posture changes, shoulders back, expression composed. A professional woman stepping into a professional world.
We exit the car together and the air bites. The entrance to Voss & Bartley is all glass and steel and curated intimidation. People move through it like they’re part of a machine I built and maintain with sheer will.
The moment we cross the threshold, I don’t touch her. I don’t look at her too long. I become her boss again.
“Good morning, Mr. Voss,” the security guard says.
