Chapter Twenty—Liam
There's a soft, measured knock at my door.
I open it.
She stands in the hallway in an inside-out sweater, the tag sticking up at the back of her neck like a flag she forgot to lower. Hair messy. Eyes that have clearly been awake for hours. She looks like someone who ran out of time and knocked anyway.
She actually came to me.
That lands somewhere deep in my chest before she even speaks.
“I don't know how to tell you this,” she says. “Or where to start.”
“You could start,” I say, leaning one shoulder against the doorframe, “by fixing your sweater.”
She blinks at me.
“What?”
“It's inside out.”
Her hand flies behind her neck, fingers brushing the tag. She swears under her breath.
“Oh my god.”
I shrug. “Bold fashion choice. Very avant-garde. Very… distressed emotional spiral chic.”
She lets out a small, strangled huff of laughter that sounds like it surprised her.
“You're an ass.”
“Not wrong,” I say. “Still cold out there?”
She hesitates.
Just stands in the hallway.
Like she's deciding whether stepping inside changes something she can't undo.
That hesitation hits harder than anything she's said.
“Relax,” I tell her more quietly this time. “Come in.”
I step back.
She crosses the threshold slowly, shoulders tight, like she's bracing for impact.
For a second she just stands in the middle of the room like she hadn't planned past the knock.
I know that feeling—the edge of a decision with nothing but runway behind you.
“You want to sit?” I ask.
She shakes her head.
Then nods.
Then gives up and drags both hands through her hair.
“I'm doing great so far,” she mutters.
“You're doing fine,” I say.
Her mouth presses into a tight line.
“That's debatable.”
I step closer.
“You're not alone in this,” I say. “Not in any of it.”
That breaks something.
She makes a raw, wordless sound and her fingers twist into my shirt like she's holding on to the only stable thing in the room.
I pull her in.
One hand at the back of her head.
The other flat between her shoulder blades.
She shakes once. Twice.
“I'm sorry,” she says, muffled against my chest.
“Don't.”
“I should have told you. I should have—”
“Riley.”
I pull back just enough to see her face.
“You were protecting yourself. That's not something you apologize for.”
She looks up at me with red-rimmed eyes that feel more honest than anything else in this penthouse. Still bracing. Still waiting to see which way I'll break.
“I expected you to look at me like everyone else eventually does. Like I’m something they have to figure out what to do with.”
That stops me cold.
I shake my head once.
“You think that little of me?”
“No,” she says quickly. “I just—”
She cuts herself off.
Her fingers tighten against my sides.
“I didn't know if you'd still want me,” she finishes.
That cracks something open in my chest.
I slide my hands up her arms.
Tilt her chin up.
“Come here,” I murmur.
She meets me halfway.
That's the part I'll remember later.
After all the locked-down control, she moved first.
The second our mouths meet, she's kissing me back like she's been starving for it. Hands sliding up my chest, body pressing into mine with no hesitation.
I walk her backward until her knees hit the bed.
She drops onto it with a soft bounce.
I stay standing over her for one long second, letting her look up at me.
Giving her the choice again.
Her eyes stay locked on mine.
No hesitation now.
I drop to one knee and take her face in both hands, thumbs tracing the line of her jaw.
“I've got you,” I tell her.
Not comfort.
A promise.
She exhales slowly through her nose.
Her hands come up to my wrists.
Holding on.
I kiss her again—slower this time, deeper—letting her feel exactly how much I've been holding back.
She tugs at my shirt.
Impatient.
“Greedy this morning,” I murmur.
“Shut up,” she says, breathless. “You've been impossible to ignore for weeks.”
“High praise.”
I laugh against her mouth as she yanks the sweater over her head herself, the inside-out tag finally disappearing. Shorts next. Her hands are already working at my jeans, efficient and urgent, like she’s afraid the moment might slip away if she slows down.
I ease her back onto the mattress and take my time anyway.
Hands dragging down her ribs, learning every inch before she can put the wall back up.
I map the rest of her with my mouth—the hollow of her throat, the soft weight of her breasts, one nipple and then the other until she's arching off the sheets, then lower, over the flat of her stomach, until her fingers are already twisting in my hair.
I settle between her thighs and spread her open with my thumbs.
She's slick and flushed and swollen, and the sound she makes when I drag my tongue up the length of her nearly finishes me right there.
She tastes like salt and need and something that's only ever been hers.
I work her slow at first, then filthy—circling her clit with the flat of my tongue while I slide two fingers deep and curl them until I find the spot that jerks her hips clean off the bed.
Her thighs clamp around my shoulders. She's not quiet—never was, under all that control—and feeling her come apart against my mouth loud, shameless, one hand fisted tight in my hair is the best thing I've heard in years.
She's still trembling when her hands find me, reaching, pulling me up her body. She doesn't wait. She wraps a hand around me and guides me to her, and the heat of her against me drags a groan out of my chest I don't bother swallowing.
When I push inside her we both go still. She's tight and soaked and perfect, and for one heartbeat the weight of everything—the pregnancy, the secrets, the weeks of distance—settles over us both.
Her fingers tighten around my shoulders like she's bracing for something to break.
Not the sex. Everything that comes after.
Then she rolls her hips, and thinking stops being an option.
I start to move—slow, deep, dragging almost all the way out before sinking back into her and swallowing the sound she makes.
She pulls me closer, arms tight around my back, heels digging in, urging me faster, and I give her exactly what she wants.
The headboard taps the wall. Her nails rake down my spine.
I feel her start to tighten around me, clenching hard enough to wreck my rhythm.
“Right there,” she gasps against my jaw.
“Don't stop.” So I don't. I drive into her, chasing the edge with her, until she breaks apart a second time with a raw sound against my shoulder and takes me over with her.
I bury myself deep, face pressed into her neck, and let go as everything else in the world goes quiet. Both of us unmistakably present.
We lie there afterward, her head on my chest, my hand moving slowly through her hair.
I keep stroking her hair, steady and slow, like stopping would let her start thinking again. Neither of us moves for a long time.
“Who else have you told?” I ask eventually.
The quiet holds the words for a few seconds.
“Just Ethan,” she says.
Her hand covers mine on top of the duvet and holds on.
Tomorrow we tell Andrew.
And whatever breaks after that—we face it together.