Page 113 of Discretion at Its Finest

And in the hollow echo of the dead phone line, Reid’s words lingered:

“I won’t let you follow me to the end of the earth, Genevieve. Not when you’d leave your world behind.”

I ran my hands through Eugene’s curls, swallowing the sobs that wanted to escape my chest.

And late into the night, I stayed on the floor with him like that, holding the one thing I couldn’t lose, even as the man I loved would disappear into a future I wasn’t allowed to follow.

Chapter forty-four

Genevieve

The time had passed, but I’d stopped counting the days, weeks, months. They blurred all over again. I didn’t look at calendars anymore or bother marking doctor appointments. I didn’t have enough brain power to track feedings or sleep cycles the way new mothers were supposed to after giving birth.

I just… moved. Like a shadow in the home I used to call mine.

Because it wasn’t mine anymore.

Somewhere between Reid disappearing, Gregory’s threats, and the birth, I’d slipped into another role entirely, not a fiancée or a partner, certainly not the face of the Newman family.

I’d become something else. The woman reputable husbands hid behind closed doors while they publicized their wives. A mistress, if you could even call me that. Though mistresses were usually wanted, cherished. Hidden but adored.

I was just tolerated.

Only Jamie had come to the birth. She held my hand while I screamed through the pain and terror of it, whispering that she was right there, that I wasn’t alone, even when everything in my life said otherwise.

She did what she could in those first days. Showed me how to cradle a newborn again, how to breathe through the postpartum stress onset, how to rest when I needed it.

You forget so much after almost four years.

You forget how heavy a baby feels, how constant their needs are, how hard, how taxing it is to take care of such a fragile little thing.

But I was grateful for her.

I still am.

Unfortunately, Jamie was back in the hospital, growing weaker again and placed under full medical supervision. As a result… I hadn’t heard from her in days. Hadn’t heard from Reid either.

Every call went unanswered. Alexander’s line stayed busy or silent.

So it was just me. Well—me and Eugene.

And Cara, who stopped by when she could after she realized what a wreck I’d become. And the baby sleeping against my chest now, her tiny breaths warm on my skin.

I smoothed a hand over her back.

My daughter.

My littleBrielle.

She was my mistake and salvation all at once, both her and my son. They were the only things in this world keeping me whole, or at least partially.

My gaze drifted toward the doorway when I heard a knock on the door. Too adult to be Eugene but too hesitant to be Cara.

I straightened a little, tightening my hold on the baby as the door eased open.

It was Raymond.

He stepped inside slowly, gazing gently around the nursery Cheryl had so “graciously” designed and decorated at the expense of my…herfiancé.