Chapter 14
Chapter fourteen
~DONOVAN~
The pavement pummels back, unforgiving and wet beneath my running shoes.
Saturday morning in the Upper East Side of Manhattan brings a haze of humidity that hangs in the air like a warning. As I turn the corner around the Park, I realize that my shirt is soaked through, my chest heaving like I’m being chased.
In a way, I am being chased. By two words, ten letters, and one woman.
“I’m pregnant.”
And I know without a doubt in my mind that if I don’t keep running, I’ll end up at Emma’s apartment.
No phone call. No apology. Just breaking down the damn door.
And then Logan and Thane would have to bail me out, which isn’t exactly ideal PR, days before Titan’s biggest launch in five years.
My feet slap the concrete harder, until my heartbeat threatens to thunder from beneath my ribs.
Only then do I return to my penthouse apartment.
Sweat-soaked head to toe, I march into the apartment, the sound of the heavy front door echoing across the room’s floor-to-ceiling windows, the stainless steel fixtures, the marble countertops.
I inhale the scent of eucalyptus and jasmine—the scent of the place where I sleep, eat, think. A place that’s never really felt like home no matter how many interior decorators walk inside these walls.
But at least the place is blessedly quiet.
Or it seems to be until the second I cross the threshold into my kitchen.
I brace as soon as I see the legs dangling against the island countertop.
“Fuck.” I blink, eyes narrowing. “Margaret?”
My sixty year old secretary barely flinches as she twists around, producing a brown bag.
“You missed your seven a.m. breakfast burrito window. I was about to declare you dead.”
Looking criminally unbothered in a crisp blouse and oversized sunglasses like some unholy cross between Diane Keaton and MI6, I glance at the bag of Russ & Daughters sitting on the counter beside her, along with my backup phone.
“I didn’t buzz you in,” I mutter.
She lifts her brow. “You gave me a key. For emergencies. And judging by the haunted corpse routine you’ve got going on, this qualifies.”
Jaw ticking, I head for the fridge, reaching for a bottle of water inside. “Well, now that you can verify my living status, you can proceed with your day, Marge. As you can see, I’m fine.”
“Of course you are. Nothing screams ‘fine’ like a soaked shirt, hollow cheekbones, and rage jogging through Midtown.”
I take a swig from the bottle, but don’t answer.
“Long night?” she asks, too casually.
“Margaret.”
She hums. “That’s not a denial.”
I keep my back to her.
Because if I face her, she’ll read everything on my face, and my longtime secretary is known for her supernatural ability not to miss a damn thing.
Especially when it comes to me.
“I’m not here to judge,” she adds after a pause. “Just here to tell you that if you are sleeping with Emma Sinclair, you might consider doing a better job keeping it away from the press.”
Slowly, I turn. “Excuse me?”
She crosses her legs and takes a bite of bagel. “Oh, don’t look so shocked, Donovan. I’ve known you for fifteen years. You get twitchy around women who matter. And she matters.”
My jaw clenches. “You’re reading too much into things.”
“I’m reading exactly what’s on the page. You returned to your own pre-launch celebration looking like your soul had been drop-kicked into traffic. And Emma rushed out looking like someone had stolen her heartbeat.”
I say nothing. Because there’s nothing to say.
“And,” she adds, “you’ve spent the last month orbiting her like she’s your own personal sun. So either you’re completely oblivious, or you’re trying to hide something that’s already written all over your face.”
“For fuck’s sake, Marge, have you ever heard of personal boundaries?”
She continues chewing. “What are those?”
“Christ. I’m not discussing this with you,” I say, going back to the fridge. It’s devoid of food. Of course it is.
That’s why Margaret is here. She knows me better than I know myself.
Her smile is thin as she watches me shut the fridge again. “Oh, I know. You don’t discuss feelings. You bury them under five AM workouts and a quarterly forecast.”
“Marge—”
“That girl is something special.” Her gaze thins. “You know that, don’t you?”
I do. Which makes all this even harder. Which makes my reaction last night at the pre-launch celebration even worse.
After a long silence, Margaret finally gets the hint, standing and smoothing her blouse. She collects her things.
“Just one more thing,” she says lightly, already halfway to the door.
I raise a brow. “God, please don’t.”
She glances over her shoulder. “If you’re going to continue to screw up when it comes to Miss Sinclair, Donovan… try not to do it where the photographers can see. The launch budget doesn’t account for CEO screw ups.”
The door clicks shut behind her, and I stare at the space where she stood, throat tight, one unbearable truth staring me in the face.
I can run all I want, but I’m not escaping this.
Not Emma. Not the baby.
Not myself.
Which is why twelve hours later, I’m standing in front of Emma’s apartment building, with enough sense to not come empty-handed.
The buzzer for her building on the westside is an impassive little bastard, blinking back at me like it knows how badly I fucked up. Bags of food in hand, I press it once, twice, and then a third time.
Leaning in closer to the intercom, I lay a palm against the wall like I might somehow absorb her silence through osmosis.
"You can ignore me tomorrow,” I say into the speaker. “Hell, ignore me next week. But not tonight. Not when I'm trying."
I wait. Then a click. The buzzer buzzes, the door unlocking, and I blink, halfway convinced it’s some sort of a trick.
Then I move. Fast. Up three flights of stairs, taking them two at a time because I can't wait for the elevator and I don’t trust myself not to explode if I stop.
I reach her door and knock immediately.
No answer.
I knock again, slower, and a second later, the door opens. Emma stands there, barefoot in leggings and an oversized NYU sweatshirt, her dark silky hair piled on top of her head, hazel eyes wary.
My pulse kicks like a starting gun.
"I told myself I wasn’t going to let you in," she says, arms crossed.
"And yet…" I glance at the open door.
"And yet.”
I swallow a thousand things I want to say.
But what comes out is: “You look like hell."
Her eyes narrow. "Excuse me?"
"You haven’t slept. Your eyes are red. And I’m guessing you haven’t eaten anything, except maybe rage."
She exhales through her nose. “And I’m guessing you know exactly where that rage comes from.”
"I can take a guess.” I step closer. “I’m not good at being…speechless. That was a new experience for me.”
"Congratulations." Her chin lifts. "How’d the existential crisis go?"
"Enlightening. Humbling. Required a significant amount of swearing and self-loathing. I’d rate it a six out of ten."
Her mouth twitches again, but she doesn’t back down. "Why are you here, Don?"
"I could give you ten reasons," I say honestly. "But most of them are noise. The truth is simple: I want to be."
Emma studies me like she’s trying to find the trap door in my logic, and I let her look, standing there in my dark suit, jaw unshaven.
"Say something," I say. "Even if it’s just to tell me to go to hell."
She opens the door wider.
"Get in here before my neighbors call the cops on the hot silver fox loitering in the hallway."
I step inside and shut the door behind me. "Did you just call me hot?"
"I called you loitering."
"You called me both."
She heads to the couch, and I follow—like a man who hasn’t stopped following her since the night we met.
She sits. I don’t.
I can’t.
I set the Thai food I brought in bags on her kitchen counter, careful not to overstep—metaphorically or otherwise. Clearing my throat, I start to unpack. “I come bearing Thai. Also known as a full bribe menu from Lotus Thai and a lemon San Pellegrino you once said was ‘like citrus crack.’”
Her lips twitch, but she doesn’t smile. “That’s shameless.”
“I call it being effective.” I set a rice container down, gaze locked on Emma’s. “Also stubborn. And apparently prone to acts of emotional terrorism when I think I’ve lost something that matters.”
Emma crosses her arms. “Is that what this is? Emotional terrorism?”
“This is my way of saying I don’t like how we left things.”
“That’s rich. Considering you’re the one who froze like a statue in ice the second I said I was…”
She trails off, and I leave the bag alone, resting my palms on the countertop edge, emotion sitting in the back of my throat as I look at the pinched expression on Emma’s beautiful face.
I exhale. “I panicked. That’s not an excuse, but it’s the truth.
” I inhale again, feeling my chest expand, my teeth grinding hard enough to crack.
“I’ve never done this before, Emma. I’ve never had to think about what it means to become someone’s father.
I never had a father to model it after. Hell, mine taught me more about absences than presence. ”
Emma watches me, quiet. Unreadable.
“But I’m not him,” I continue. “I need you to know that. I’m not going to run from this forever. I just needed to get my head straight so I could come back and look you in the eye and say I’m not going anywhere.”
She exhales, slow and shaky, and we sit there in that charged stillness for a beat too long.
I turn back to the bag, continuing to unload its contents. “Also, you didn’t text me today. I figured you were either asleep or punishing me. And if it was the second one, I was hoping to trade a little penance for pad see ew.”
That earns me the faintest laugh. “Donovan—”
“Let me feed you. I can just leave the food here. No pressure. No expectations. Just… leaving you with Thai food and your questionable taste in Hulu documentaries.”
“Excuse you, ‘Cult Cuisine’ is a masterpiece.”
“I stand corrected.”
Her arms loosen, her jaw easing.
“Fine,” she says, voice still cool but with a thread of warmth. “But you better have brought the rice pudding.”
“I brought two.” I hold up the plastic containers. “One for each of your personalities.”
As I lift out each container one by one, I do my best not to stare, but it’s hard not to notice everything about my Emma.
The exhaustion behind her eyes. The remnants of tears she doesn’t want me to notice. The strength it takes for her to let me back into her space without knowing whether I deserve it yet.
Once I’m done unpacking the food, I gaze over at her again, resisting the urge to rub the tension from the back of my neck. Resisting the urge to cross the room and pull my beautiful little brunette in my arms.
Not when I don’t deserve it…
Not yet.
Finally, I break the silence.
“I’m not here to fix it all tonight,” I tell her quietly. “I’m not even sure I know how. I just… wanted you to know I’m trying. I meant it when I said I’m not disappearing.”
Her gaze swings to mine, at last. She exhales soundly. “You look like shit, too, by the way.”
I fight back a smirk. “I also haven’t slept.”
“Because of the baby?”
“Some. But mostly because of you.”
Her expression falters, just slightly, then sharpens again. “Donovan, I meant what I said when I responded to your texts earlier. I need time to figure out what this means for me. What I want. I don’t get to just fall back into your arms because you remembered I like extra peanut sauce.”
“I wasn’t expecting that,” I lie.
“Maybe not. But you do always expect to win. You walk into a room assuming it’ll bend to you.”
“I walk into a room prepared to fight for what matters.”
Her gaze drops for a second before flicking back to mine. “And if I tell you this isn’t a fight you can win in a night?”
“I’d say I’m not going anywhere.” A pause. “And I’d ask what time you’re eating tomorrow so I can drop off round two.”
She lets out an almost-laugh. “You’re relentless.”
“I’m something.” My pulse pounds. “Relentless. Exhausted. Inappropriately turned on by your hair in a messy bun…”
A flicker of heat flashes through her molten hazel eyes, and instantly, I’m back in that hotel suite with her again, my lips at her neck, my hand between her thighs.
And I know she’s there, too.
A beat passes before I notice Emma swallow.
“You should go,” she says after a moment, voice low.
“I know.”
We stare at each other.
“I’m sorry,” I say again. “I hate that I hurt you.”
“I know.”
“I’ll keep showing up. Until you tell me to stop.”
Her jaw tenses. “That’s not fair.”
“No, but I never promised fair. I just promised real.”
She doesn’t reply, and I take a step back.
“The food’s still hot,” I say. “I’m sure each of your personalities will enjoy the selection.”
“I’m sure they will.”
I glance over my shoulder once before I leave, waiting, hoping for more.
Nothing.
The second I’m in the hallway, I stare at Emma’s closed door, wondering if I should push. Should ask her how she's feeling. Should tell her I'm trying to figure things out.
But I don't.
Because Emma needs certainty, not my confusion.
And until I can give her that, the least I can do is give her space.
Even if space is the last thing I want.
Even if all I want is to be back in that Chicago hotel with Emma in my arms, before everything got complicated.
Before I had to figure out if I'm capable of being a father.
Or if I'm just another man who's going to fail the people who need him most.