Page 149 of Filthy Promises

“I don’t know.” My eyes sting with unshed tears. “Maybe never. Ideally speaking.”

“Never,” he repeats.

“You’re getting engaged, Vince!” The words burst out of me. “You’re marrying Anastasia. What was I supposed to do? Show up at your wedding with a baby bump and say ‘Congratulations, by the way here’s your bastard’?”

“That’s not—” He stops, takes a breath like he’s barely keeping a lid on a thousand different emotions. His eyes drop to my stomach, still flat beneath my blouse.

Slowly, almost reverently, he reaches out—then stops, his hand hovering inches from my body.

“May I?” he asks.

The gentleness in his voice undoes me. I nod, tears finally spilling over.

His palm settles against my abdomen, warm through the thin fabric of my blouse. It shouldn’t mean anything—there’s nothingto feel yet, just my regular stomach with a cluster of cells the size of a kidney bean hidden inside.

But the look on his face…

In all our twisted history, I’ve never seen Vincent Akopov look so utterly destroyed. So nakedly vulnerable. Like someone reached inside his chest and ripped away every carefully constructed wall.

“A baby,” he says softly, almost to himself.

“I haven’t decided…” I swallow hard. “I mean, I don’t know if I’m going to?—”

“You’re keeping it.”

My spine stiffens at his commanding tone. “Excuse me?”

“The baby,” he clarifies, a jagged edge creeping into his voice. “My child. You’re keeping it.”

“That’s not your decision to make.”

His eyes lock with mine, suddenly ferocious in a way that makes my breath catch. I brace myself for fury, for the infamous Akopov rage. He opens his mouth, and…

“You’re right.”

I pause.

“But I’m asking you to,” he continues. “Keep our child, Rowan. Please.”

Please. There’s that word again. So strange coming from him.

“Why?” I ask, confused by his reaction. I expected anger. Denial. Cold calculation of how to minimize the scandal. Not thisdesperate, pleading intensity. “You’re about to marry someone else. Why would you want?—”

“Because it’s ours,” he interrupts. “Yours and mine.”

His free hand clamps down on my shivering fingers as he says that. It’s why I believe he means it—you can’t fake the hopeful anguish there.

“I don’t understand,” I admit. “I thought you’d be upset.”

“Upset?” He looks genuinely bewildered. “Why would I be upset?”

“Because it complicates things! It’s not part of your plan. Again, lest I continue to repeat myself, you’reliterallyabout to announce your engagement to another woman!”

He flinches at that, but doesn’t move his hand from my stomach.

“This changes everything,” he murmurs.

“Does it?” I step back, breaking contact with him. “Does it really? Or am I just supposed to follow the same plan you’ve always had for me: staying out of sight, the mother of your illegitimate child who watches from the shadows while you build your perfect life with Anastasia?”

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