Claiming Lily

Chapter 6 Walls

Lily’s POV

He closed the door behind him and the soft click felt louder than thunder. My office had never seemed so small, or so dangerous.

Rain rattled against the window like claws. The smell of sea salt floated in through the cracked pane. My refuge, the one room in the clinic where I could breathe, was now filled with the man I’d run from for three years.

He didn’t sit. He simply stood there, tall, dark eyes sweeping the shelves, the framed awards, the tiny drawings Noah had taped to the cabinet. His appearance was a storm I had been waiting for and fearing all at once.

“I asked you to schedule an appointment, not barge in,” I said, keeping my voice steady.

He shut the door harder this time. “We’re past appointments.”

“What do you want?”

His eyes cut through me. “Everything you’ve denied me.”

My stomach tightened. “This clinic isn’t yours to take apart.”

“I’m not here for the clinic,” he said.

I turned toward my desk, hiding and shaking hands. “Then leave.”

“I won’t.”

Lightning flashed over the bay, painting his face in silver and dark. Water dripped from his coat onto the wooden floor, each drop a small echo of the rain hitting the roof. My office, usually warm with patients’ laughter, felt like a cage.

“You think you can just appear after three years and make demands?” I asked.

“You think you can hide my son from me?” His voice was low but it cracked like a whip.

I spun back to face him. “He’s not” The word caught in my mouth.

He stepped closer. “Don’t lie. I saw him.”

“You don’t know anything,” I whispered.

“I know enough,” he said. “Same eyes. Same hair. Same stubborn mouth.”

I pressed my palms to the desk. “You weren’t there. You didn’t answer. You believed lies instead of me.”

“I tried to find you.” His voice relaxed for a heartbeat. “You vanished.”

“Because Caitlyn intercepted every message I sent,” I said. “Because you believed her over me.”

He went still. “You’re saying she”

“Yes,” I cut in. “She made sure you would hate me.”

His jaw clenched. “She told me you sold the story of our night to the press. That you wanted a payout.”

My knees weakened. “I never touched a penny of yours. I was pregnant and alone.”

He exhaled sharply and for a moment the anger drained from his eyes, replaced by something rawer, hungrier. “Pregnant,” he repeated, almost to himself.

I folded my arms. “Noah is my life. He’s safe here. Don’t ruin that.”

The storm outside deepened. Thunder rolled over the water, shaking the window glass. In the flash of lightning, his reflection overlapped mine in the pane of two ghosts chained by the same past.

“You should have told me,” he said.

“I tried,” I answered. “Every day. Until it broke me.”

He reached for the back of the chair but didn’t sit. “Do you really think I would have walked away from my child?”

“I don’t know what to think anymore,” I said. “All I know is that Noah deserves peace.”

“And I deserve my son.”

“You’re a billionaire who lives in a world of sharks,” I said. “He’s a child. I won’t let you drag him into that.”

“I’m not the same man you left,” he said.

“I can’t take that risk.”

His eyes searched mine. “You still don’t trust me.”

I almost whispered No, I still love you, but I bit my tongue.

A shadow moved under the door. Someone was standing in the hallway, listening. The faint smell of Caitlyn’s perfume or was it my imagination? drifted in.

I pushed the thought aside. “Please leave.”

He didn’t. “We’re not done.”

“You bought this clinic just to corner me?” I asked.

“I invested in it,” he said, voice steady now. “It’s already growing under my hand. Like it or not, we’re bound together again.”

I shook my head. “Money doesn’t give you the right to walk back into my life.”

He leaned closer. “No. But being his father does.”

The words punched the air from my lungs.

We stood inches apart, the storm lighting our faces. His breath was warm, his eyes dark with a mix of rage and desire. I could feel the tremble of my own heartbeat in my hands.

“You don’t get to take him from me,” I said.

“I don’t want to take him,” he mumbled. “I want to be with him. With you.”

My throat tightened. “It’s too late.”

He brushed a wet piece of hair from my cheek. “It isn’t.”

I stepped back quickly. “Don’t touch me.”

His hand dropped. “You still feel it. I see it in your eyes.”

I grabbed a file from my desk just to have something between us. “You’re imagining things.”

“Then look at me and tell me you don’t,” he said.

I couldn’t.

His eyes moved past me to the bookshelf. “What’s that?”

I followed his eyes. On the shelf sat a small framed photo Noah had insisted on showing him at the beach, squinting into the sun, grinning with a paper boat.

Adrian walked to it slowly, fingers touching the frame. His shoulders stiffened. “Those eyes,” he whispered. “Mine.”

I felt my knees go weak.

He turned back to me, holding the photo like proof, a storm building behind his eyes. “Tell me everything,” he said, voice low and scary. “Or I swear I’ll tear down every wall you’ve built.”

The room spun, my heartbeat loud in my ears.

I opened my mouth to answer and the doorknob rattled. Someone else was outside.