CHAPTER 2: “THE WOMAN HE THOUGHT HE BROKE”
The crowd didn’t disperse right away.
Even after Nathan Cross disappeared down King Street, the silence lingered like smoke after a fire—thick, uneasy, impossible to ignore.
Claire stood frozen.
Dominic’s hand was still at her lower back, steadying her without pressure, like he understood that if he let go too quickly, she might fall apart in public.
“I can walk,” she whispered finally.
“I know,” he said. “But you’re not walking alone.”
That sentence did something dangerous inside her chest. Something soft. Something she had spent years convincing herself she didn’t deserve.
Claire forced herself to breathe again.
A woman from the flower stall finally stepped forward. “Are you okay, dear?”
Claire almost laughed at the question. Okay was a word that belonged to other people’s lives.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically.
Dominic glanced at her—just a look, not pressure, not correction—but it was enough to make her realize she didn’t have to perform strength anymore.
“You don’t have to answer for them,” he said quietly.
Her throat tightened. “He recorded it. Didn’t he?”
Dominic didn’t deny it.
That was answer enough.
Claire’s stomach turned.
“Then it’s going to be everywhere,” she said.
“Yes,” Dominic replied. “But not in the way he thinks.”
That night, Claire didn’t go home.
She sat in a quiet room above one of Dominic’s private properties on the waterfront—glass windows, soft lights, the kind of place that felt more like a pause in reality than a location.
A doctor had already come.
Routine check. Twins confirmed again. Healthy heartbeat.
Each sound of the ultrasound still echoed in her ears like a secret trying to become real.
Dominic stood near the window while she sat on the edge of the sofa, hands folded over her stomach.
“You didn’t have to say what you said,” she told him.
“I did,” he replied.
“You called them your children.”
A pause.
“Yes.”
Claire looked down. “They’re not a negotiation tactic.”
His gaze sharpened slightly. “I didn’t say it to win. I said it because it’s true.”
The room went quiet again.
Claire had known Dominic Vail was powerful. Everyone in Charleston knew that.
What she hadn’t known was this version of him—controlled, precise, dangerous in silence, but careful with her in a way that felt almost unfamiliar.
“You shouldn’t get involved in my life like that,” she said.
“I already am,” he answered.
That should have frightened her.
Instead, it didn’t.
A phone buzzed on the table.
Dominic looked at it once.
His expression changed slightly.
Not surprise.
Confirmation.
He turned the screen toward Claire.
A video thumbnail.
Her.
Nathan Cross.
The market.
The title already spreading online:
“Ex-husband humiliates pregnant woman in public—gets unexpected karma.”
Claire’s fingers went cold.
“It’s already viral,” she whispered.
Dominic nodded. “Yes.”
“And people will think I’m—what? A pity story? A scandal?”
“No,” he said calmly. “They’ll think he made a mistake.”
Claire looked at him sharply. “That’s not how the internet works.”
May you like
Dominic’s eyes didn’t move.
“No,” he agreed. “That’s how I work.”
