Chapter 18
Chapter eighteen
~EMMA~
Thursday morning—the day after I watched Donovan exit a restaurant with a beautiful blonde who looked at him like she owned him—I arrive at Titan with one goal…
Survive.
Not thrive. Not excel. Just survive.
The July heat is oppressive, the streets of Manhattan smelling vaguely of hot garbage and broken dreams. My linen blouse is already sticking to my back by the time I reach the thirty-seventh floor of Titan Industries, my stomach doing that thing where it can't decide if it wants food or wants to rebel against the concept of food entirely.
I'm also showing.
Not obviously. Not enough that strangers would notice. But enough that my work pants are getting tight, and I had to safety pin the waistband this morning because the button won't close anymore.
Twelve weeks pregnant. Nearly three months.
And the father of my child was holding hands with another woman on a public sidewalk yesterday.
"Morning, Emma." Carmen appears at my desk with coffee—decaf, because she's thoughtful like that. "You okay? You look pale."
"I'm fine."
"You said that yesterday. Right before you saw Donovan with that woman and looked like you were about to throw up."
"I didn't throw up."
"Only because I steered you into that bodega for chicken noodle.” Carmen sits on the edge of my desk. "Want to talk about it?"
"Not really."
"Want me to slash his tires?"
I nearly smile. “I don’t think that’ll help.”
"Might make you feel better though." She stands. "Seriously, Emma. If you need anything—time off, a different assignment, someone to choke Donovan with one of his expensive ties—just say the word."
"I'm fine," I repeat, because it's easier than admitting I'm falling apart.
After Carmen leaves, I stare at my computer screen, trying to focus on the Asia-Pacific expansion analysis that's due tomorrow.
My phone buzzes.
DONOVAN (7:47 AM): We need to talk.
I delete the message without responding.
It buzzes again.
DONOVAN (8:15 AM): I know you're reading these.
Delete.
DONOVAN (8:43 AM): I'm coming down there.
I’m halfway through pretending to understand a spreadsheet when the air on the thirty-seventh floor changes.
It’s subtle, not something you can point to. More like a pressure shift—the way the room inhales collectively.
It’s him. Donovan. Stepping off the private elevator and into the open floor like he owns every molecule of oxygen in the building.
Dressed to kill—or visually maim—in a deep gray suit that matches his intense eyes. He’s wearing no tie, his white shirt open at the collar exposing sculpted, tanned skin.
The dominant calm in his posture is unmistakable.
The long strides, broad shoulders rolling with unhurried confidence, jaw set in that way that usually precedes boardrooms falling into line.
Every conversation dies around him.
He isn’t smiling, his stormy gaze cutting across the floor—skimming, assessing—until they land on me.
I don’t look away. I should. But today I’m running on rage, hormones, and the residual humiliation of watching him walk down a Manhattan sidewalk yesterday with a blonde who fit seamlessly into his world.
So I stay seated.
Ice.
“Miss Sinclair.” His voice is calm, deep enough that it vibrates straight through me. “Do you have a moment to discuss the Chicago projections?”
Ah. So we’re doing this the hard way.
“Yes, Mr. Titan.” I stand, lifting my tablet. “Conference room A is open.”
The formal address earns me exactly the reaction I expect. A muscle jumps in his cheek.
We walk side by side, close enough that I feel the heat of him through the thin fabric of my blouse. People watch. They always do. Whispers ripple through the open floor.
At the power walking CEO and his strategist.
Nothing to see here.
Conference Room A is all glass and steel—no privacy, no mercy. He closes the door behind us and immediately turns, mask dropping.
“Emma—”
“There’s nothing to explain,” I say, cutting him off. “If this meeting is about projections, I’m happy to review them. Otherwise, I have deliverables due by end of day.”
His glare darkens. “You don’t get to dismiss me like that.”
“I do if this is not about work. Or have professional boundaries suddenly become optional again?”
He steps closer—not crowding me, not touching—but close enough that my body remembers him far better than my mind wants to.
“You’re angry.”
I laugh, the sound sharp and high. “What gave it away?”
“I want you to look at me.”
“Why? So you can tell me again why it didn’t mean anything? Or why I shouldn’t care what I saw yesterday?”
His jaw grinds. “I didn’t let her touch me.”
“You didn’t stop her.”
Silence blankets the room, and for the first time since he walked in, I see the crack in Donovan’s usually impenetrable armor.
“At work,” I say quietly, forcing distance back between us, “you don’t get to explain your personal life to me anymore. And I don’t get to react to it.”
“So this is punishment?” he asks, voice dangerously calm.
“No. It’s not. It’s survival.”
His gray eyes hold mine, unapologetically intense. “You don’t get to run from me, Sinclair.”
“Watch me.”
And for a long, razor-edged moment, neither of us budges an inch.
The hottest man in Manhattan. And the woman standing her ground in front of him.
Finally, he exhales and straightens his cuffs. “Very well,” he says coolly. “We’ll discuss Chicago.”
Donovan moves to the head of the table but doesn’t sit. He never does when he’s asserting control.
He plants one hand on the back of a chair instead, posture relaxed, watch glinting under the LEDs as if we’re not standing on emotional fault lines.
“Chicago,” he says evenly. “Walk me through your revised market assumptions.”
I tap my tablet awake. Professional mask back in place.
Now this? This, I can do. Probably because I’ve been doing this my whole life—excelling while bleeding internally.
I talk about the original model for the Titan Industries expansion—the six-month stabilization that I’ve shortened down to four. I carry on about the updated labor cost data. The municipal incentives finalized last week. The revenue, which is down in the short-term and up in the long.
When I finally glance up, Donovan’s heated gaze is on me, unmoving.
I clear my throat. “Chicago isn’t the fast win everyone wants it to be. But it’s solid. Predictable. Scalable.”
“Predictable,” he echoes.
“Yes.”
Something flashes in his eyes—irritation, acknowledgment—but he lets it pass.
“Continue.”
I swipe through projections, explaining margins, overhead, regulatory risk. My voice is steady. Confident. Exactly how I sound when I’m not unraveling.
But he keeps watching me.
Like he’s trying to understand a code he once cracked and is now locked out of.
“You’re factoring attrition conservatively,” he says after a moment.
“I’m factoring reality.”
“You expect turnover to spike?”
“I expect people to react when leadership changes. Chicago isn’t New York. They won’t fall in line just because Titan’s name is on the building.”
A beat. “You don’t trust them,” he says.
“I trust data,” I correct.
“And if the board pushes back?”
“They won’t.”
“And if I push back?”
I meet his eyes, my voice surprisingly steadier than before.
“Then,” I say slowly, “I’ll defend my analysis. Like I would with any executive.”
His jaw tightens a fraction. “But I’m not just any executive. I’m the CEO and founder. And that’s not what you would be doing if you defended your analysis to me.”
“What would I be doing, then?”
He steps closer to the table, lowering his voice. “It would be another one of your attempts to put distance between us and pretend it’s about projections.”
My pulse kicks hard. “Donovan—”
“You rewrote an entire model overnight,” he continues, intensity rising. “You reassigned priorities without looping me in. You shut me down in front of the team—with my own company’s strategy.”
“So you don’t like being challenged?”
“I don’t like being iced out.”
“And I don’t like being whispered about. So congratulations, we’re both uncomfortable.”
Silence—thick and pressurized—pushes the air from my lungs as Donovan’s heated gaze drills into me, making me shiver.
“You think I don’t see what this is?” he asks. “Don’t patronize me, Emma. I’m not in the mood.”
“Neither am I. I’m tired, Donovan. I'm so tired. And I can't—" My voice cracks. "I can't keep doing this. Wanting you. Hating that I want you. Wondering if you're going to decide this is too hard and walk away."
"I'm not going to walk away."
"You already did. On that terrace. When I told you I was pregnant.”
"I explained that—"
"I know. You were scared. You needed time to process." I wipe my eyes angrily. "But Donovan, I was scared too. I am scared. Every single day. And I didn't get the luxury of checking out because this—" I gesture to my stomach "—doesn't wait for me to be ready."
He's quiet for a long moment.
"What do you want from me?" he asks finally.
"I don't know." The admission feels like defeat. "I don't know what I want anymore."
"Do you want me to leave you alone? To stop trying?"
"Maybe. I don't know."
"Emma—"
"I think I need to look for another job."
The words detonate between us like a bomb.
Donovan goes very still, gray eyes turning to slits. "What?"
"I can't work here anymore. Not like this. Not pregnant with your baby while trying to prove I’m supposed to be here, that I'm not sleeping my way to the top. It's destroying me."
"You're not sleeping your way anywhere. You earned this position—"
"Did I? Or did you hire me because we slept together in Miami and you felt guilty?"
"What?! That's not—Emma, you know that's not goddamned true."
"Do I?" I'm crying now, which is humiliating but unstoppable. "Because from where I'm standing, it looks like I got pregnant by my boss and now I'm trapped in a job where everyone thinks I'm a cliché."
"No one thinks that."