Chapter Thirty-Three—Riley
Idon't sleep.
I try. I lie there with my eyes closed, counting breaths, counting seconds, counting anything that isn't the conversation I know is coming. The penthouse is quiet in that late-night way where every sound feels louder than it should.
I roll onto my side. Then onto my back. Then onto my side again.
It's useless.
Connor saw enough last night. Not everything. Not the full shape of it. But enough to know something didn't line up. Enough to look at me the way he did at the valet, quiet and focused, already working through possibilities he didn't like.
He didn't say anything then. That's what worries me.
Connor doesn't push until he's sure. He watches. He waits. He lets you hang yourself with whatever version of the truth you're trying to sell him until it stops making sense.
And then he asks.
I stare at the ceiling until the numbers on the clock blur. Two-thirty. Three-ten. Three-forty-five.
By four, I stop pretending sleep is still an option.
I sit up slowly, careful not to make noise, like that matters. The guys have been checking on me all night, quiet knocks and voices through the door, but right now I just want to be alone.
The hoodie is on the back of the chair where I left it last night. I pull it on without thinking, pushing my arms through the sleeves, dragging it down over my hands. It smells faintly like detergent.
Andrew.
I notice it. I don't take it off.
I grab my coffee on the way out, made out of habit more than anything, and step onto the balcony.
The air is cooler than I expect. The city below is quieter, stripped down to its overnight version. I rest my hands on the glass railing and watch the Strip in that in-between state, not quite night, not quite morning.
By the time the sky shifts from black to that bruised purple-pink, I've been out here for over an hour.
My coffee sits untouched behind me. My hands grip the railing harder than I realize.
The sliding door opens.
I don't turn around. I already know who it is.
Connor steps out in yesterday's shirt, hair messy, eyes carrying the exhaustion of someone who also didn't sleep. He stops a few feet away.
He doesn't wait for an invitation. He never has.
“Talk to me, Riley.”
He starts listing things, calm and precise, almost clinical.
“You didn't touch the raw fish. You didn't drink alcohol. And you laughed half a second too late at every story Sarah told.”
Each one lands clean.
“I know you, Riley. Better than anyone. So don't do that thing where you tell me everything's fine and expect me to believe it.”
My hands tighten on the railing.
“I just wasn't in the mood for raw fish.” My voice comes out steadier than I feel. “You're being weird about this, Connor. It's been a long few weeks. That's all.”
He doesn't move or raise his voice. He just watches me with that relentless focus.
“I'm not being weird,” he says. “I'm being your brother.”
He takes one step closer.
“Don't do that. Not with me.” His voice drops, still controlled but firmer. “I sat with you every night for months after Mom and Dad's accident while you swore you were okay. I know what you look like when you're scared and trying to carry something alone. So whatever this is—talk to me.”
The pink edge of the sky is widening behind him as the city wakes up below.
I run through every deflection I've rehearsed for weeks. None of them work when he looks at me like this.
My throat tightens.
“I'm pregnant.”
The words come out smaller than they should. Saying them doesn't make it feel more real. It just makes it harder to take back. One of my hands drifts unconsciously toward my stomach before I catch myself and put it back on the railing.
Connor goes very still.
Then he crouches down so we're eye-level, the same move he's made since we were kids. Getting on my level so I can't hide.
His eyes search mine. Shock flickers across his face, then fear, then something else entirely. He locks it all down fast, but I still see it.
He exhales once through his nose.
“Who's the father?”
The question stays there.
I don't answer. I can't.
The silence stretches. The sky behind him has gone fully pink now, orange pushing in at the edges.
Connor doesn't move. He doesn't press. He just waits, patient and exhausted, completely certain that the answer isn't simple.
“Riley.”
My name, quieter this time. Not a demand. Not even a question.
A warning.
I swallow against a dry throat, my hands still locked on the railing, fingers stiff against the glass like if I let go I might tip forward and not stop.
He waits me out.
He's always been better at that than I am.
I open my mouth but nothing comes out.
There isn't one answer. There isn't a version of this that fits into a single word, a single name, something clean he can understand and react to and move on from.
I watch the moment it clicks: the shift in his eyes, how something tightens along his jaw, how his attention sharpens instead of breaking.
Not confusion. Understanding. Not the full picture yet, but enough.
His gaze flicks, just briefly, past me toward the sliding door, toward the penthouse behind me. Then back.
“Riley,” he says again, and there's something new in his voice now. Not anger. Not even disbelief. “Don't make me guess.”
The words land harder than anything he's said so far.
Connor doesn't guess. He knows.
And if he starts putting it together himself, I won't get to control how he hears it.
The silence stretches again, thinner now. I feel it closing in.
And I still don't say anything.