Page 6 of Daddy's Accidental Babies

I shut the laptop halfway, heart stuttering. For a second, I thought I might be sick. Then I opened it again and just stared, because no matter how much I wanted to, I couldn’t pretend this away. This wasn’t just work anymore. It hadn’t been from the moment I saw his name on that whiteboard. And tomorrow, everything would change.

My stomach twisted. I reached for my wine glass, but it was empty. I closed the laptop completely this time and just sat there in the silence of my too-small kitchen, heart racing. I heard Thea in her room thumping around and thought about telling her, but I knew what she’d say.“Rip the bandage off and be done with it.”

But if I did that, my heart would need more than a bandage.

I’d need a tourniquet.

4

DOMINIC

Iended the last meeting ten minutes late, cutting off Graham mid-sentence with a quick, “We’ll circle back. Have Marcy send me the projections.”

He nodded, already halfway to the door. I didn’t wait. I grabbed my tablet, adjusted my cufflinks, and headed down the hall. The conference suite on the ninth floor was booked solid today, but this particular session—strategic PR planning—was the only one that mattered to me. Not because of the merger. Because of her.

Vanessa Roarke was already seated when I arrived, tapping at her phone, perfectly composed in a navy suit and red-soled heels. Graham trailed in behind me a second later and dropped into the seat on my right, muttering about overcaffeinated interns. I ignored him.

She wasn’t here yet.

Good. It gave me a second to get my bearings.

I didn’t want to admit how hard it was to concentrate lately. Since she walked back into my orbit, things I thought I’d buried came rushing to the surface. Memory had its own gravity. So did guilt. And desire.

Vanessa glanced at her watch, then exchanged a look with Graham. The meeting should have started five minutes ago, but Savannah still hadn’t shown. Vanessa clicked her pen twice and set it down with a sharp, deliberate sound. Graham leaned back in his chair and let out a slow breath, clearly growing impatient.

Then the door opened.

Savannah walked in without apology. Her expression was calm, unreadable, as if the entire room didn’t shift just by having her in it. She wore a dark green blouse and black slacks, her hair pulled back in a way that exposed the full line of her jaw in a way that made me drool. She didn’t look at me.

She greeted the room with a polite smile, then slid into a chair across the table, already unzipping her tablet case, and set her tablet on the table. She glanced once at Vanessa, then spoke, clear and clipped. “If we’re focusing on regional brand exposure, the launch window needs to align with Fashion Week scheduling. Otherwise, we risk missing international coverage entirely.”

Vanessa gave a tight nod. Graham made a noise like he agreed but hadn’t fully followed.

“Good,” I said, breaking the tension. “Then let’s talk about messaging pillars. And what happens if the press digs.” I liked her spunk, the way she took control. Rhodes did a great job aligning her bold, take-charge attitude to this position, though she could’ve given me the space to start the meeting, which was officially underway.

She was confident and polished, sharper than half the men in the company who had been in this game twice as long. She spoke with certainty, never faltering.

God help me, I couldn’t look away.

Not just because of what we were. Or what we used to be. But because, in a room full of noise, she was the only voice I wanted to hear.

Savannah continued walking them through the brand timing calendar, citing European release dates and aligning them with projected quarterly buzz metrics. Graham asked a question about audience tiering, and she answered before I could jump in with a decisive answer. Vanessa offered a few notes about influencer engagement and staggered rollouts, but Savannah had already anticipated those angles. She pulled up a sample asset schedule on her tablet and passed it across to Graham, who blinked at the clarity.

“You built this yourself?” he asked.

“Late this morning,” she said, not even pretending to downplay it.

Vanessa glanced at me, clearly impressed. I gave a slow nod but said nothing. Watching Savannah command the space without asking permission did something to my chest I didn’t like. Or maybe I liked it too much.

We reviewed projected messaging tiers, updated brand partnership proposals, and handled the looming press leaks like a grenade already midair. She never lost focus. Not when Graham fumbled a detail. Not when Vanessa pushed her on optics. Not even when I leaned in with a question meant to test her.

She didn’t flinch. Just pushed her tablet aside, folded her hands, and told me, “We already planned for that. Check the second page.”

And I did.

Ten minutes later, I dismissed Vanessa and Graham, because from the beginning, this meeting had been planned as a means to get her alone.

As the door shut behind them the atmosphere shifted, enough to notice—like a pressure shift before a storm. Savannah didn’t look up right away. She straightened a page on the table, maybe just to keep her hands busy. I let the moment stretch.

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