Voices roar my name.
A fleet of black SUVs swings to a halt just metres away. My brothers barrel out—James, Caelon, Killian, and Rian—all of them wide-eyed, horrified, frozen for one heartbeat as they take in the sight.
Cole Hartmann.
The man they love to hate.
Carrying their baby sister out of a burning building.
While the flames rage behind him.
James’s usually tanned face drains of colour.
Killian’s eyes are positively murderous.
Rian curses.
Caelon looks like he’s been stabbed—again. He steps forward first, his eyes roaming wildly over me from head to toe. ‘Zara?’ His voice shakes with emotion.
I cling to Cole’s shirt with trembling fingers, breath hitching, tears streaking my smoky cheeks.
‘I’m okay,’ I croak. ‘I—think I’m okay.’
But Cole isn’t letting me go. His arms lock even tighter around me, like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he loosens his grip even an inch.
And in that single frozen moment—in Cole’s arms, with the building burning with light behind us, and my brothers staring like their entire world is collapsing, I realise one thing.
Everything in our lives just changed.
Forever.
The feud with my boyfriend and my brothers ends tonight.
Because the man they swore was their enemy is the only reason I’m alive—and the father of the child who will change everything.
Our daughter won’t inherit their war.
She’ll inherit the empire Becketts and Hartmann will build together from its ashes.
Chapter Forty-Nine
ZARA
A week after the fire, I’m finally home.
Home.
The word hits differently now.
Not my penthouse in Ballsbridge.
Not the Beckett mansion where I grew up.
Cole’s house in Skerries. Or, our house, I should say.
Sunlight spills through the glass as the sea crashes below the cliffs, and for the first time in seven days, I finally feel like I can breathe again.
The private hospital discharged me two days ago, after they gave me enough oxygen to float a hot-air balloon. I had daily ultrasounds. A small army of nurses checked my vitals every hour, while one very unimpressed baby girl kicked every time the monitors beeped.
