Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Knox
My hands are steady as I watch her face cycle through shock, denial, and the first creeping edges of recognition. But inside my chest burns a fire that has nothing to do with anger and everything to do with fierce, primitive possession. She's carrying my child. The knowledge hums through my veins like the most potent drug, feeding a part of me I never knew existed until I put the pieces together three weeks ago. The symptoms reported by my security team. The subtle changes in her body that even my long-range surveillance photos captured. My woman, growing my heir. Nothing in my life—not building my empire, not closing my first billion-dollar deal, not anything—has affected me like this certainty that Seraphina Vale is pregnant with my child.
"You're lying," she whispers, but I can see the doubt in her eyes, the mental calculations happening behind those green irises. She's putting it together—the delayed period she's surely noticed, the morning sickness she's probably dismissed as stress, the sensitivity I can see in the way she's unconsciously crossed her arms over her breasts.
"I never lie to you, Seraphina." I keep my voice steady despite the tornado of emotions tearing through me. "Especially about something this important."
I knew something had changed the moment I reviewed the security report from three weeks ago. My team has kept me apprised of her movements, her health, her habits—not to control her, as she seems to believe, but to protect what's mine even from a distance. The operative noted that she'd rushed from a gallery meeting to the bathroom, emerging pale and shaken. Had documented her falling asleep at her desk twice that week, unusual for someone as disciplined as Seraphina. Had photographed her leaving a coffee shop without drinking her usual cappuccino after staring at it with a faintly nauseated expression.
One incident might be nothing. Two could be coincidence. Three made a pattern that sent my mind immediately to the night she'd come to me three months ago.
That night is seared into my memory like a brand. The surprise of seeing her at my door after fifteen months of absence, the hunger in her eyes that matched my own, the way we didn't even make it to the bedroom before I had her pinned against the wall, her legs wrapped around my waist, her dress pushed up to her hips. We'd been animals, devouring each other with a ferocity that made a mockery of her claims that what we had wasn't special.
I'd used protection, but in our frenzy, who knows how effective it was. And if some primal part of me had wanted to mark her as mine in the most permanent way possible? If some ancient instinct had driven me to claim her so completely that she could never truly leave me again? Made me ensure the damned thing slipped off at the perfect moment?
I won't apologize for it.
The moment I suspected, I'd mobilized every resource at my disposal. A discrete employee replaced her regular cleaning service, collecting samples from her bathroom that a private lab analyzed without her knowledge. Unethical? Perhaps. Necessary? Absolutely. I needed to know.
When the results came back positive, something shifted in me. A sensation I'd never experienced before—like the ground beneath my feet had simultaneously solidified and dissolved. Like I'd been waiting my entire life for this moment without realizing it.
My child. My blood. Growing inside the only woman I've ever truly wanted.
It took every ounce of my considerable self-control not to go to her that very moment, not to crush her engagement to that inadequate substitute, not to bring her home where she belongs. But I forced myself to be strategic. To plan. To ensure that when I did reclaim her, it would be permanent.
Then I received that wedding invitation. The thought of Seraphina standing at an altar, promising herself to another man while carrying my child inside her, was the final trigger. No more waiting. No more planning. No more respecting boundaries that shouldn't exist in the first place.
"How did you—" She falters, her hand unconsciously moving to her stomach. "You had no right to?—"
"I have every right," I interrupt, moving closer, my eyes locked on the slight tremor in her fingers. "That's my child you're carrying. Mine, Seraphina. The moment you created a life with me, any notion that we aren't connected for eternity became a fantasy."
She backs away, but there's nowhere to go in the confines of the kitchen. "One night doesn't erase eighteen months apart, Knox. One mistake doesn't negate all the reasons we can't be together."
"Mistake?" The word fuels the fire in my chest. "Is that what you're calling our child now? A mistake?"
Her eyes widen. "That's not what I meant. The night was the mistake, not—not any potential pregnancy, which I still don't fully believe?—"
"Believe it." I close the remaining distance between us, placing my palm flat against her abdomen again, feeling the warmth of her through the silk. "In another month or two, you'll start showing. My child, growing inside you, visible to the world." The image sends a fresh wave of possessiveness through me. "I've already contacted the best obstetrical team in the country. They'll fly here for your appointments."
"You're getting ahead of yourself," she argues, but weakly. "I need a proper test, not your illegal surveillance and assumptions."
"There are three pregnancy tests in the master bathroom," I inform her, enjoying the surprise that flickers across her face. "Along with prenatal vitamins, a selection of teas for morning sickness, and several books on fetal development. I've thought of everything, Seraphina."
"Of course you have," she murmurs, a hint of the old exasperation in her voice. "Always ten steps ahead, always in control."
"When it comes to you and our child? Yes." I don't bother denying it. "I'm going to control everything within my power to keep you both safe, healthy, and mine."
"The baby might be yours biologically," she says carefully, "but that doesn't make me yours."
I laugh, the sound genuine despite the tension between us. "Angel, you've been mine since the moment we met. This—" I press my hand more firmly against her stomach, "—just makes it official. Permanent. Irrevocable."
She shakes her head, but I can see the conflict in her eyes. She wants to deny it—deny us—but she can't. Not when her body remembers how perfectly we fit together. Not when she's carrying physical proof of our connection beneath her heart.
"I've already started the nursery," I tell her, watching her eyes widen again. "The west wing suite, with the morning light and the view of the ocean. Yellow and gray, gender-neutral until we know. Although I'm thinking it's a girl. A little princess with your eyes and my determination."
"You can't possibly know the gender," she says, clinging to the practical in the face of the emotional tsunami I'm unleashing.
"Call it intuition." I've never been one for mystical feelings, but this certainty about our child sits in my chest like an unshakable truth. "She'll be perfect. Beautiful and brilliant and stubborn like her mother."
"Knox..." Her voice cracks slightly. "This is too much. Too fast. Even if I am pregnant?—"
"You are."
"—even if I am, that doesn't mean we should be together. Children don't fix broken relationships."
"Our relationship isn't broken," I counter. "It was interrupted. By your fear. By your inability to accept the intensity of what we have. By your insistence on running when things get deep." My hand moves from her stomach to cup her face, forcing her to meet my eyes. "But you can't run from this, Seraphina. You're carrying my heir. My future. The continuation of everything I've built."
I see the flash of anger in her eyes at the possessive phrasing and press on before she can object.
"Did you think I would let you marry him while pregnant with my child? That I would allow my son or daughter to call another man 'father'? To grow up with some pale imitation of a man instead of me?" The mere thought makes my blood boil. "I'd burn down the world before I let that happen."
"You had no right to decide this unilaterally," she insists. "To crash my wedding, to bring me here, to—to announce my pregnancy to me as if I don't have final say over my own body."
"Your body, yes. Our child, no." I trace my thumb across her cheekbone, feeling the softness of her skin. "That's where your autonomy ends and my responsibility begins."
"That's not how this works," she whispers, but there's less conviction in her voice now.
"It's exactly how this works," I correct her gently. "You created this life with me, Seraphina. Not with safe, boring Richard. Not with anyone else. With me. The universe has a twisted sense of humor, doesn't it? Giving you the perfect reason to run directly back to the man you were so determined to escape."
Her lips press together in a thin line of frustration. "The universe didn't do this. Faulty contraception did."
"Or fate," I suggest, enjoying the way she rolls her eyes despite everything. My practical, rational Seraphina, always uncomfortable with concepts she can't control. "Either way, the result is the same. You're having my baby. You're staying here, where I can ensure you're both protected. And you're never marrying anyone but me."
"I never agreed to?—"
"You will," I interrupt, absolute certainty in my voice. "Because deep down, underneath all that stubborn independence and fear of surrender, you know we belong together. You know no one will ever love you the way I do—completely, obsessively, eternally. No one will ever protect our child the way I will—with every resource, every connection, every ounce of power I possess."
I step back, giving her space to breathe, to process. It's a calculated move—I'm not backing down, just allowing her the illusion of control while she adjusts to this new reality.
"Take the tests," I tell her. "Confirm what we both know is true. Then we'll talk about the future. Our future."
She lifts her chin, that familiar defiance I both admire and anticipate conquering shining in her eyes. "And if I refuse?"
I smile, slow and confident. "You won't. Because whatever lies you tell yourself about me, about us, you've never been a coward, Seraphina. You face truth head-on, even when it terrifies you."
I turn to leave her then, pausing at the doorway. "Our child is a gift," I say without looking back. "A chance to get right what we got wrong before. Don't fight it. Don't fight us. For once in your life, Seraphina, surrender to something bigger than your fear."
I walk away then, leaving her with her thoughts and the knowledge growing inside her. My child. My woman. My future.
Mine.
Plain and simple.