Chapter 18 #2
My old room. The one I stayed in for before Leo and I—before everything changed. No one uses it anymore. No one would look for me there.
I practically run down the hallways, trying to look like I’m moving casually.
I swing by the kitchen first, grabbing an unused timer, and the staff ignore me thank god, and I resume my hussle back to my old room.
When I reach the door, I hurry inside and close it, leaning against the wood for a moment while I try to catch my breath.
The room looks exactly the same as it did two months ago, when I was first shut in. The bed is made with sharp edges, the curtains drawn, everything neat and untouched. It feels like a lifetime ago that I slept here, that I hated Leo, that I was planning my escape.
Now I might be carrying his child.
I force myself to run into the attached bathroom. My hands are shaking so badly I drop the test before I can unwrap it. I scoop it up and put it on the counter before I take a few deep breaths.
“Just take the test, Emma,” I tell myself.
“There’s no use panicking until you know.
” With that, I take another breath and unwrap the test. I don’t need the box of instructions to tell me how to take a pregnancy test. Pee on the stick.
Wait three minutes. One line means not pregnant. Two lines means…
I can’t even finish the thought.
I take the test, my hands trembling the entire time, and then I set it carefully on the counter. I can’t look at it yet, so I sink down to the cold tile floor, wrapping my arms around my knees, and I wait.
Three minutes feels like three eternities.
I stare at the grout between the tiles, counting the seconds, trying to breathe. My mind won’t stop spinning and thinking about all the implications if this test is positive.
If I’m pregnant, everything changes. Everything.
If my father somehow manages to get me back, I’ll be pregnant with a Santoro heir.
The ultimate betrayal in his eyes. The living, breathing proof that I didn’t just submit to my captivity but actively participated in it.
That I fell in love with his enemy. He’ll lose his mind. He might disown me. Might—
Nope. Not going down that route.
And Leo—what will Leo think? Will he be happy?
Terrified? Will he see it as another chain binding me to him, more leverage to keep me here?
Or will he understand that this baby—if there is a baby—isn’t about leverage or captivity?
That it’s about love, about the relationship we’ve built together in this impossible situation?
Will he even want to be a father? We’ve never talked about kids. We’ve never discussed the future beyond the immediate crisis of Dad. For all I know, Leo might not want children at all.
The thought makes a spike of fear shoot through me I wasn’t expecting.
But underneath all the terror and panic and confusion, there’s something else. Something warm and fragile and frighteningly intense.
If I’m pregnant, I want this baby.
The realization hits me with stunning clarity. I want this. I want this baby. I want this piece of Leo and me.
I’m out of my fucking mind.
But I can’t help it.
I check the timer. Three minutes have passed. Actually, five minutes have passed because I’ve been sitting here spiraling.
It’s time to look.
I force myself to stand on shaky legs, my mouth dryer than the Sahara desert. My heart is pounding so hard it feels like it might break through my ribs. I take a deep breath, trying to steady myself, and I look down at the test on the counter.
Two pink lines.
Clear as day. Unmistakable. Bold against the white plastic.
I’m pregnant.
My legs give out and I’m back on the floor, my back against the cabinet, staring at those two lines. I can’t seem to look away from them. I can’t process what they mean.
I’m pregnant with Leo Santoro’s baby.
The man my father wants to kill. The man who kidnapped me from my wedding six weeks ago. The man I fell in love with despite every reason not to. The man whose bed I sleep in every night, whose arms I wake up in every morning, whose future I can’t imagine not being part of.
I’m carrying his child.
The emotions hit me all at once—a tidal wave that threatens to drown me.
Terror and joy and panic and wonder all tangled together until I can’t tell which is which.
My hand goes to my stomach automatically, pressing against the flat plane of it even though there’s nothing to feel yet, nothing to see.
But knowing it’s there—knowing there’s a tiny life growing inside me right now, a collection of cells that’s half Leo and half me—changes everything.
I’m going to have a baby.
A baby.
The tears start then, hot and fast, streaming down my face. I press my hand harder against my stomach and I let myself cry for the impossibility of it, the timing, the complications it will cause, for the fierce protective love I already feel for this tiny life.
I want this baby. I want it so much it physically hurts.
I don’t know how long I sit there on the bathroom floor, crying and trying to process this. Eventually the tears slow and I’m left feeling wrung out and exhausted and terrified and weirdly, impossibly happy.
I need to tell Leo.
The thought makes my heart race all over again. He deserves to know. He deserves to hear it from me before everything—before whatever’s coming comes. Because something is coming, I can feel it in my bones. Dad doesn’t give up.
What if something happens to Leo before I can tell him? What if my father succeeds? What if Leo never knows he’s going to be a father?
The thought makes me feel sick all over again.
I force myself to stand up, my legs unsteady. I splash cold water on my face, trying to clean up the evidence of my tears. My eyes are red and swollen, my face blotchy, but there’s nothing I can do about that now.
I pick up the pregnancy test, staring at those two lines one more time. Proof. Evidence. A secret that’s about to become real the moment I share it.
I tuck it into my pocket and head for the bathroom door.
I need to find Leo. Fuck his conference calls. I need to tell him. Now.
But as my hand touches the doorknob, I hear it.
Pop. Pop. Pop.
Gunfire.
Distant but unmistakable. Coming from outside.
Then shouting. Alarms start blaring. The security system Leo installed after the bombing screaming through the house.
More gunfire. Closer now.
No. Not now. Not when I just found out. Not when I need to tell Leo.
I run to the window outside my old room. This area of the house faces the front of the property, and when I look out I can see them.
Men. At least forty of them, maybe more. Armed. Advancing on the house.
And at the front, commanding them with the confidence of someone who owns the world—
My father.
Connor Brennan has come for me.