Chapter 4
* * *
Sloane woke to soft gray light filtering through the curtains and a stomach already lurching before her eyes had fully opened.
She reached blindly across the mattress, finding it empty and cool, and felt a flicker of disappointment cut through the nausea before she shoved both feelings aside and scrambled out of bed, barely making it through the bathroom door before her body took over entirely.
She was on her knees in front of the toilet, braids falling forward over her shoulders, when she heard footsteps cross the bedroom behind her.
A moment later Draven was there, crouching beside her without a word, gathering her braids back from her face with one careful hand while the other rubbed slow, steady circles against her back.
He’d pulled on just his pants, his chest bare, his hair still mussed from sleep, and somehow none of that registered as strange to her, not while she was busy being thoroughly miserable.
“I went down to get tea,” he said quietly, once she’d finally stilled enough to breathe.
“The kettle’s just finishing. I came back up when I heard you get sick.
” He kept his hand moving against her back, unhurried, like there was nowhere else in the world he needed to be at this exact moment.
“I should have stayed up here this morning instead of going down at all.”
“You don’t have to apologize for going to make tea.” She managed a weak laugh, wiping at her mouth with the back of her hand, embarrassed despite the gentleness of him crouched beside her. “This is just what mornings look like now, apparently.”
He helped her up when she was steady enough, one arm braced around her waist, and walked her to the sink so she could rinse her mouth and splash water on her face.
She caught his reflection in the mirror behind her, still watching her with that same unbroken attention he’d had since the rooftop, and something in her chest loosened slightly at the sight of it.
He disappeared downstairs again briefly and returned with a steaming mug of ginger tea, pressing it carefully into her hands once she’d settled back against the pillows.
“Small sips,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed beside her, his hand resting warm against her knee through the blanket. “Crackers are downstairs whenever your stomach can handle them.”
She wrapped both hands around the mug and breathed in the sharp, clean scent of it, watching him over the rim.
“I have a doctor’s appointment I need to make.
I should probably get that done today, now that we actually know for certain.
” She reached for her phone on the nightstand, already scrolling for her primary care office’s number, half expecting some reaction from him at the casual mention of it.
“Perfect.” He said it instantly, no hesitation at all. “When do we leave?”
She paused with her thumb hovering over the call button, looking up at him properly.
She’d braced herself, somewhere in the back of her mind, for him to make this complicated, to insist on his own specialist or take over the appointment entirely the way he seemed to take over everything else he touched.
Instead he just sat there waiting for an answer like accompanying her was the most obvious thing in the world, like there had never been a question of him doing anything else.
She felt herself smile before she’d decided to, something warm spreading through her chest that had nothing to do with the tea. “I haven’t even called yet. Let me see what they have available.”
“Take your time.” He settled back against the headboard beside her, in no apparent hurry to be anywhere else, his hand finding hers on top of the blanket and staying there while she dialed.
She made the appointment for that afternoon, the receptionist fitting her in as a new pregnancy consult, and when she hung up she found herself studying him again, the easy way he occupied space beside her like he belonged there.
She still didn’t know nearly enough about him, not really, not the parts that mattered beyond the suits and the building and the unsettling efficiency with which he’d rearranged her entire life.
She didn’t know what his mother had been like, or whether he’d always been this certain about everything, or what had made him the kind of man who pulled strings on a stranger’s job offer without blinking.
There was so much left to learn, and some part of her still hadn’t fully forgiven him for the way he’d gotten her here.
But he was sitting beside her with ginger tea cooling in her hands and his fingers laced through hers, asking when they were leaving instead of whether he should bother coming at all, and for the first time since she’d stood in that freezer doorway months ago, she didn’t feel like she was carrying all of this on her own.
* * *
Sloane sat on the exam table with the thin paper gown crinkling beneath her, her knees bouncing slightly while the nurse prepped the ultrasound machine.
Draven stood near her shoulder rather than the chair offered against the wall, his hand resting steady against her back the entire time the doctor moved the wand across her abdomen, both of them watching the grainy black and white image flicker into focus on the screen.
“There it is,” the doctor said, pointing to a small flickering shape on the monitor.
“Heartbeat looks strong. Based on measurements, I’d put you right around eight weeks, which lines up with everything you told me.
” She printed a strip of images and handed them over, already talking through prenatal vitamins and follow-up scheduling, but Sloane barely processed any of it, her eyes fixed on the screen until the image disappeared.
She got dressed slowly once the doctor stepped out, her hands a little unsteady as she pulled her shirt back over her head, the confirmation settling into her chest with a weight that felt different now that she’d actually seen it, actually heard it.
Draven waited by the door, watching her with the same quiet attention he always gave her, saying nothing until she was ready to move.
They walked out into the hallway together, and she stopped just past the exam room door, her arms wrapping around herself despite the warmth of the building.
“I’m scared,” she said quietly, the words slipping out before she could decide whether to dress them up into something less honest. “I don’t care if that sounds weak.
I just heard a heartbeat that exists because of one reckless night, and I have no idea how to do any of this. ”
“It doesn’t sound weak.” He turned to face her fully, his hand coming up to rest against her shoulder, grounding instead of demanding.
“You’re allowed to be scared. Anyone would be.
” He held her gaze, steady, certain in the way he always was.
“You’re not doing it alone, Sloane. Not a single part of it.
I’ll be standing in every room you have to walk into from here on out, and so will everyone else who ends up in this baby’s corner. ”
She nodded slowly, some of the tightness in her chest easing at the simple certainty of him.
“I still want to work. I know everyone’s going to tell me to slow down, take it easy, but I need something that’s mine right now, something that isn’t just waiting around for my body to do the next thing it’s going to do. ”
“I already thought about that.” He said it like he’d been waiting for the opening to bring it up, sliding his hand from her shoulder down to settle warm at her waist instead.
“I run a nonprofit on the side, mostly funding educational programs in underserved districts here in Miami. The data’s a mess.
No real strategy behind any of it, no clear metrics on what’s actually working.
” He held her gaze, serious now. “I want you to take it over. Build a real strategy, analyze what we’ve got, tell us where the money’s actually making a difference and where it isn’t.
It’s real work, Sloane, not something I’m inventing to keep you occupied.
It’s fully remote. You could do it from home most days, whatever your body needs.
” He paused, his thumb tracing once along her hip.
“And I’ll be there to help. However you need me. ”
She tilted her head, something cautious creeping back into her expression. “What does that mean, exactly? You’ll be there to help.”
He didn’t look away from her, his voice steady, no hedging in it at all.
“It means I want to be in this with you, Sloane. Not just the baby. You.” He said it plainly, like the words had been sitting in his chest for a while waiting for the right moment to come out.
“I know how this looks from the outside, a man who orchestrated his way into your life suddenly saying he wants more of it. But that’s the truth. I want you.”
Something warm rose up in her chest before she caught herself, the old instinct to temper it kicking in fast. She felt her own expression shutting down around the edges, her mouth flattening, her eyes dropping briefly to the floor as she nodded. “Okay. I appreciate that. I’ll take the job.”
He didn’t let it pass. His hand left her waist only long enough to catch her chin, tilting her face back up before she could finish retreating behind whatever calm she was trying to construct.
“Don’t do that.” His voice was low, certain, no room in it for her to argue her way out. “Don’t hide it from me.”
“I’m not hiding anything.” The protest came out weaker than she meant it to, her eyes still locked on his despite the urge to look away.