In the lobby, heads turned.
People knew Adrian Whitmore.
They knew the woman beside him had once been his wife in every way except legally final.
And they could see I was very pregnant.
The whispers began before we reached the doors.
Adrian ignored them.
For once, so did I.
In the car, he sat across from me rather than beside me.
“You worked at a diner?” he asked suddenly.
I frowned.
“How do you know that?”
“You smell like coffee.”
I almost smiled.
Then I realized he was studying my shoes.
Cheap flats.
Worn soles.
One side splitting near the toe.
His expression darkened.
“How much money did you have when you left?”
“Enough.”
“Lena.”
“Two hundred dollars.”
He turned his face toward the window.
The silence afterward was worse than shouting.
“You could have taken anything,” he finally said.
“I didn’t want anything.”
“You were entitled to half a dozen accounts.”
“I didn’t want your money.”
“You were pregnant.”
“I know.”
“You were carrying my daughter and counting tips in Queens while I—”
He stopped.
“While you what?”
His eyes met mine.
“While I thought you had decided life without me was simply better.”
I had never considered what my disappearance looked like from his side.
I had imagined anger.
Control.
Men searching for me.
I had not imagined hurt.
“Your attorney contacted me about the divorce,” I said.
“After months of nothing from you.”
“You signed.”
“I thought that was what you wanted.”
The answer sat between us.
It didn’t repair anything.
But it broke one assumption I had carried alone.
At the hospital, Adrian became visibly uncomfortable for the first time in his adult life.
He could command executives and frighten men twice his size, but when a nurse asked him whether he was the father, he hesitated.
I answered before he could.
“Yes.”
His head turned toward me.
The nurse continued writing as though I had not just changed the atmosphere in the room.
The contractions were real, but the doctor soon explained that labor had not fully established.
The baby was being monitored.
I needed rest, hydration, and observation.
