---- of gentleness and something far more menacing.


    My heart stopped.


    His fingers traced patterns along my back, the soothing motion doing nothing to calm the storm inside me.


    What? My voice was barely a whisper, strangled by panic.


    T found the owner of the scent, he said, each word deliberate and heavy with implication.


    Panic wed at my chest, threatening to consume me.


    No.


    He couldn''t know.


    Not now.


    Not like this.


    He can''t know that I had lied to him and yed with him all this time! He can''t know about Damien.


    Vince, please" But he cut me off, his grip tightening just enough to remind me of the power he held.


    I swallowed hard, dread coiling around my heart like ---- Chapter 506 a vice.


    If he knew the truth, if he told Gerald, everything I had fought for would crumble.


    And there would be no escaping the fallout.


    ---- Chapter 507 Our child.


    The scent belongs to our child, little one.


    He is a boy.


    His words hit me like a stormthoughts crashing and colliding with no resolution.


    The words hung in the air, impossibly loud, yet I couldn''t make sense of them.


    A boy? A son.


    Foreign...


    Woody ...unfamiliar.


    His words suddenly clicked together.


    That was our childs scent? I stared at the dark spot on the tile in front of me, my breath hitching as his lips brushed against my shoulder de.


    The kiss was sofi, tender, and followed by the warmth of his arms wrapping around my belly Lam so happy, little one.


    Thank you...


    ---- His voice cracked, raw and unguarded.


    Thank you for giving me a family, and I am so sorry for doubting you earlier.


    The kisses came again, each one gentle yet reverent His lips lingered on my neck, a nibble sending shivers down my spine.


    I felt his words more than heard them as they spilled against my skin.


    He was back to his usual self.


    He was no longer doubting me.


    I got saved? Lam a protective asshole, I know it, he murmured with a low, self-deprecating chuckle.


    His face pressed into the crook of my neck as if trying to bury himself in me, to crase whatever distance had evere between us.


    But what can I do? My wife is so perfect.


    I really have a hard time believing someone like me found someone like you.


    A warmth stirred in mea flicker of light piercing through the icy dread that had settled in my chest.