Nick
Without Mum, he used to take me to the pub and park me beside the table like an inconvenience he couldn’t be bothered to hide.
The verbal whipping boy became the actual one soon enough.
He blamed me for everything—from Mum leaving to the table being uneven.
If his pint spilled, it was my fault. If the night dragged on, my fault.
The more he abused me, the angrier I got. Even as a kid, I could see the rotten core in him. The way he spoke of others. The hate in him.
My mother didn’t have that in her.
Neither did Ella.
But that didn’t mean—didn’t guarantee—that I wanted to have a child with her.
She was a nurse.
Not a drinker.
Not stupid.
Not tied to a man like my father.
And still—I’d heard her beatings.
The shouting.
The rest of it.
I glanced at Alec.
He gave me a small shrug. Judas-like. Noncommittal. As if to say it’s already in motion.
How could Rowan leap from a trial period to heirs and family like it was nothing?
With Ella.
I’d be thirty soon.
One kid now meant fifty before they were grown.
Old.
Sophie had never been permanent. None of them were meant to be. That had been the rule.
But trusting another woman—really trusting her with something that couldn’t be undone?
I wasn’t so sure.
I liked Ella.
She was soft-spoken, and no matter how hard I pushed her buttons, she never mouthed off to me. Then again, she’d seen what I was capable of. She knew better.
And in our bedroom?
She was perfect.
Not just for me—for all of us.
A baby.
I glanced at my brothers.
Alec looked eager. I could feel the excitement radiating from him.
I smiled despite myself and shook my head. Rowan, as always, was calm. Controlled. To him, babies, torture, or profit margins all lived on the same spectrum.
Variables and outcomes.
Trial and error.
“And if things don’t work out with Ella?” I asked, my voice steady—far steadier than what churned beneath it. “What then?”
Rowan’s eyes flared, brief but unmistakable.
“These would be our children,” he said. “No one would take them from us. Not even her.”
I grunted softly.
No.
We wouldn’t need courts to make our decisions.
“You two have already decided, haven’t you?” I sighed.
They exchanged a look—quick, silent, absolute.
And just like that, I knew.
This was what they wanted.
What unsettled me most wasn’t that realisation.
It was the fact that I wasn’t as opposed as I’d thought I would be.
Strange.
?
?
?
The shower was still running when we reached the bedroom. Alec had given her a placebo instead of birth control. No condoms. No pills. Nothing standing between us and her womb.
We undressed without a word. Each of us inside our own head while the water continued to pound against tile. The silence wasn’t calm—it was loaded. Anticipation pressed into the room, thick and restless.
The shower cut off.
A moment later, the door opened.
Ella stepped out with both hands in her hair, towel draped over her shoulders as she dried it. She stopped short when she saw Alec and Rowan stretched out on the bed. I stood at the foot, blocking the exit.
“What?” she asked, nerves threading through the word when none of us moved.
Alec patted the mattress once. Slow. Expectant.
“Just waiting for you, Ella. Why do you think we came home early tonight?”
“Oh.” Her hands resumed their motion automatically.
She wore the nightdress Rowan had chosen for her—long, but deliberately revealing.
Soft grey fabric clung to her thighs and hips, stretched thin where her body demanded it.
Sheer lace cinched her waist, skin visible before the pattern darkened to obscure her breasts.
The straps were wide. Supportive. Designed with intent.
And suddenly I saw it.
Milk.
Weight.
Fullness.
Breasts made heavier by purpose.
I glanced at Alec. Then Rowan.
Fuck.
They’d already been there. Already run the calculation I’d missed.
Ella finished combing and blow-drying her hair, then climbed onto the bed and sat back on her heels, waiting.
The look in our eyes was the same.
Hungry.
Sharp.
Heated.
Her eggs wouldn’t stand a chance.