Chapter 20
Anthony
We barely make it through dinner. That’s the absurd part.
The white tablecloths, the crystal glasses, the careful choreography of waiters gliding in and out as if nothing had happened.
It was as if we hadn’t just detonated something in the private quiet of that bathroom before returning to our seats with flushed cheeks and bright eyes.
April sits across from me and tries to look composed and her usual sharp-tongued self, but her pupils keep catching the candlelight in a way that makes my chest tighten.
She giggles at every little thing, and I can’t stop watching her mouth.
I can’t stop thinking about how she said, “I’m pregnant. ”
The first time was a confession. The second was a requested challenge.
When we finally leave, the cold outside air hits us, and she exhales like she’s been holding her breath for hours, I don’t let the moment cool.
I take her back to my penthouse like it’s the only logical next step, like I’m still in control of this, like the world hasn’t just shifted under my feet.
Only this time, I don’t create distance.
I don’t walk her to her door and turn away.
I don’t set rules or put space between our bodies and pretend it’s discipline.
The second the elevator doors close, I’m kissing her, my hand at the back of her neck, hers fisting in my coat, and it’s like something inside me has snapped clean in half.
Every careful boundary I built over the last several weeks splinters because none of it makes sense anymore.
She’s pregnant. She’s carrying my child. The truth of it hits me in waves: relief so intense it’s almost dizzying. It’s triumph that feels primal, ugly, and honest. It is warm and aching and has nothing to do with winning.
By the time we reach my bedroom, it’s not even about urgency anymore. It’s about proximity. Possession. The need to keep her close enough that my hands can reassure me she’s real. I need to bury myself in her over and over and over again until I can’t take it anymore.
In my bed, her loose hair splays across my pillows, and her flushed skin is slick and warm.
I’m propped on one elbow beside her, tracing slow patterns along her shoulder with my fingers as she breathes against my mouth.
How she even has the energy to keep her eyes open after nearly four rounds, five if you include the restaurant, I have no idea.
She tastes like salt and the virgin cocktail she had at that restaurant, and of a sweetness I shouldn’t be allowed to have.
In my arms she’s soft in a way she rarely is at the office.
No armor or sharp edges, just April. She looks up at me like she’s still trying to decide if this is a dream she’ll wake up from.
I kiss her slowly. Not taking. Not punishing.
Just wanting. Enjoying the quiet little sounds she makes like they belong to me now.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she says, voice muffled against my lips.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re about to…I don’t know,” she says, eyes full of suspicion, even though her body stays curled into mine. “Eat me. Or build me a shrine.”
I huff a laugh before I can stop it. It’s too easy tonight. Everything is too easy. “Maybe I want to keep worshipping you.”
Her mouth curves. “You’re in a weird mood.”
I should deny it and make a joke, pulling the conversation back to something shallow and safe. Instead, I press my forehead to hers and let the honesty slip out in a quiet breath. “I’m happy.”
She stills. The shift is subtle, her body becoming a fraction more alert as her gaze searches mine like she’s checking for the trap. “Happy?”
“Yeah,” I say, and it feels strange in my mouth, like a language I haven’t spoken in years. “I’m going to have an heir.”
April rolls her eyes. “How very … you.”
I pinch her hip lightly, a warning disguised as affection. “Don’t ruin it.”
She smiles anyway, but I see the softness under it, the complicated flicker of emotion she doesn’t fully trust. I understand it. I don’t trust it either.
My arm tightens around her waist, drawing her closer until her cheek rests against my chest. I feel her breathe, slow and warm, feel the weight of her in my bed, in my space, in my life.
The sensation is so familiar, yet so unfamiliar it borders on frightening.
It shouldn’t feel this good. I kiss the top of her head without thinking.
When did I start doing that? When did that become instinct?
April shifts, tilting her face up. “You’re being nice. It’s weird.”
“I can stop.”
Her eyes turn to daggers. “No.”
I should. I should stop. This isn’t how I operate.
This isn’t the point of the arrangement.
This isn’t the deal. But the word pregnant has rewired something in me.
It’s as if my body has decided she’s not just a woman I want, she’s a woman I need to keep, protect, and anchor.
I stare at her for a long moment, then make the decision before I can talk myself out of it.
“You should move in,” I say.
April looks at me in utter confusion and says, “What?”
“With me.” My voice is steady, but something inside is too tight. “Here.”
Her eyebrows shoot up. “Anthony—”
“It’s practical,” I cut in immediately, reflexive.
“You’re pregnant. You’re going to be tired.
Sick. You’ll have appointments. Your apartment…
” I pause, irritation rising at the image I’ve created of her small place.
Thinking of her alone in the middle of the night if something happens makes me uneasy. “It’s not ideal.”
She props herself up on her elbow, staring at me like I’ve sprouted a second head. “So, you want me to live in your penthouse because my apartment is ‘not ideal’?”
“Yes.”
“Do you hear yourself?”
I drag my hand down my face, exhale slowly. “April.”
She studies me, then looks around the room as though she’s seeing it for the first time realizing it’s too much. I can see it hit her.
“This place is a man cave,” she says finally, voice faintly accusatory. “It’s all glass and steel and, I don’t know, billionaire sadness.”
“Billionaire sadness?” I repeat, unimpressed.
“Yes,” she says, warming to it because she’s a brat. “It’s like if a luxury watch were an apartment.”
I pinch the side of her waist again, sharper this time. She squeals in delight and swats at me. “Then change it,” I say, and the words come out before I’ve fully processed them. “Decorate. Buy things. Fill it with whatever you want.”
She pauses. “Whatever I want?”
“Yes.”
“Like throw pillows?”
“If you must.”
“Mismatched thrifted trinkets?”
“God, I’m going to regret this, but yes.”
“A nursery?”
The word lands between us like a stone in water. I don’t flinch. Not this time. “The baby will obviously need somewhere to sleep,” I say simply. “We can design it however you want.”
She stares at me, lips parted, as if she’s waiting for me to laugh and reveal it’s a joke. When I don’t, her expression turns into something quieter. Unsteady. “You’re serious,” she whispers.
“I’m serious.” I reach out and tuck her hair behind her ear, thumb lingering against her cheek in a way I can’t seem to stop doing tonight.
“It makes sense. It’s close to work. It’s secure.
There’s staff if you need anything. There’s a home office you can use when you don’t feel like commuting.
You won’t have to…” I stop myself, but it’s too late.
The thought is already there, sharp as glass.
“You won’t have to be alone when you’re sick. ”
Her throat works on a swallow. “I’m not going to die of morning sickness.”
“I know,” I say, voice rougher now. “That’s not the point.”
“And what is the point?” she asks, quieter.
My jaw tightens. Because if I answer honestly, I don’t know what doors it opens.
I don’t know where it leads if I admit I’ll probably like the sound of her laugh in my house, the idea of her walking barefoot across my floors, and the thought of her curled against me when she feels like hell.
I slide my arm around her again, pulling her down onto my chest until she can’t see my face as clearly. Cowardly and Practical.
“The point,” I say carefully, “is that you shouldn’t have to do any of this alone. Not the pregnancy. Not the appointments. Not the bad days. Not any of it.”
She goes still in my arms. I feel her inhale then exhale. Her fingers touch my side, hesitant, then firmer, like she’s anchoring herself. It’s a simple gesture, but it hits me like a punch.
For years, the only person who touched me without wanting something was Natalie.
Even though that ended with lies and betrayal, I told myself that meant love was a weakness I’d outgrown.
Wanting anyone that much was just setting myself up to be gutted again.
But this feels different. It’s fast, for one.
Too fast. Like stepping on ice you haven’t tested.
It shouldn’t hold, but somehow it does. Maybe it’s because she’s pregnant, and there’s a life between us now.
The stakes have changed in a way I can’t pretend are just contractual.
I stare out at the dark skyline through the windows and listen to April breath against my chest. I begin to wonder if I’ve always been doomed to feel like this the moment I let myself touch her.
I’ve felt something like it before once, with Natalie.
It’s that slow, inevitable slide into thinking someone is your home.
But this isn’t the same, and Natalie never gave me this. Natalie never became this.
April lifts her head slightly. “Are you okay?” The concern in her voice makes my throat tighten.
I don’t answer it directly. I can’t. Instead, I kiss her, softly, and she melts into it like she’s been waiting for permission.
For a while, I’m not the CEO with an heir-producing problem and she isn’t my assistant I’ve contracted to help me with my problem.
We’re just two people in a bed, tangled together, trading quiet jokes and half-murmured stories, laughing softly into each other’s mouths like it’s normal. Like it’s real.
A thought creeps in, dangerous and heavy: I think I want us to be a family. It scares the hell out of me because I still haven’t told her about the trust clause. I forgot that part and it could turn this from “move in” to something much heavier, much more binding.
A wife.
The word tastes like panic.
How the fuck do I tell April that right now, when she’s curled against me and I’m holding her like she belongs here?
How do I tell her I need more than her body, more than her womb?
I need her name on a legal document that binds us together by law?
I could frame it as practicality. Security.
A legal shield. I could offer her money.
Real money. Enough to take care of Angela and Ava forever.
Enough to give her an out in a few years if she hates me, if this collapses, if I turn out to be exactly what she fears.
I’m digging a hole. I know I am, but with her warm in my arms, with my hand splayed protectively over her stomach like I can already feel the future there, I find myself doing it anyway.
I’m laying the groundwork, warming her to the idea without naming it, and hoping the softness I’m allowing myself tonight will make the truth less sharp when it finally comes.
For the first time in years, the thought of tomorrow doesn’t feel like punishment. It feels like possibility.