Page 172 of Pregnant By A Rich Demon 2

I stared at her, her words sinking in slowly.

“You hear me?” Mama asked, her voice softer now.

“I hear you,” I said, my voice steadier than it had been.

“Good.” Mama released my hands and stood, smoothing down her house dress. “Now. You staying here today. You need rest. You need to think. And tomorrow, you start getting answers.”

“Mama—”

“No arguments,” Mama said firmly. “This house is paid for. It’s mine. And as long as I’m breathing, you got a place to come home to. You understand?”

I nodded, fresh tears spilling over.

“Good,” Mama said again. Then she looked at Raven. “You staying too?”

“Yeah,” Raven said, her voice quiet. “I’m staying.”

Mama nodded, satisfied. “Then I’ll make up the couch for you. Truth, you take your old room.”

She turned and walked toward the kitchen, her movements brisk and purposeful.

I sat there on the sagging couch, surrounded by the familiar clutter of my childhood home, and felt something shift inside me.

Mama was right.

I’d been moving through this blind, letting Amai and Kaisen and everyone else make decisions for me. Letting them control the narrative.

But I was done with that.

I was done being a pawn.

If I was going to survive this—if I was going to protect my baby and myself—I needed to stop reacting and start acting.

I needed answers.

And I was going to get them.

I woke up the next morning with clarity I hadn’t felt in weeks.

The sun was already streaming through the thin curtains of my old bedroom, casting familiar shadows across the walls. I could hear Mama moving around in the kitchen, the smell of coffee drifting through the house. Raven was still asleep on the couch in the living room, her arm thrown over her face.

I sat up slowly, my hand instinctively moving to my stomach. The nausea was there, lurking beneath the surface, but it wasn’t overwhelming yet. I had a window of time before it hit.

And I was going to use it.

I grabbed my phone from the nightstand and opened my banking app. The balance stared back at me: $57,832.

It was the money Amai had given me. The $10K Kaisen handed me at the salon. Money I’d been too scared to touch because I didn’t know what it meant or what strings were attached.

But now I knew exactly what it meant.

It meant leverage. It meant options. It meant I didn’t have to depend on anyone.

I opened a new browser tab and started searching for rental properties in New Orleans. Not apartments—I was done with apartments. I needed something with space. Something with a yard. Something that felt like mine.

I scrolled through listings, my thumb moving quickly across the screen. Too expensive. Too small. Too far from Mama’s house. Too close to the Garden District where Amai’s world operated.

Then, I saw it.