Sinfully Yours StepDaddy

Chapter.15

Chapter 15

Her mother stopped in the kitchen doorway and looked at the two of them sitting at the table. The silence that followed was heavier than anything that had come before.

“Well?” she said.

Dominic didn’t look away. He reached over, took Aria’s hand in full view of her mother, and held it.

“I’m in love with her,” he said.

The words landed like a stone dropped into still water.

Aria’s mother stared at him, then at their joined hands, then at Aria. The color drained from her face.

“You…” Her voice cracked. “You’re her stepfather.”

“I know what I am,” Dominic said. His voice stayed steady even though his grip on Aria’s hand was tight. “I know how wrong this looks. I fought it. We both did. But I’m done lying to you and I’m done lying to myself. I love her.”

Aria’s heart slammed against her ribs. She turned her hand in his and held on.

Her mother’s eyes filled with tears and fury at the same time. “How long?”

“Since she came home,” Dominic answered. “It started before either of us meant for it to. I take full responsibility.”

“Full responsibility?” Her mother’s laugh was sharp and broken. “You’re sleeping with my daughter. Under my roof. While I was away and after I came back. And you sit there holding her hand like this is something you can just announce over the table.”

Aria finally found her voice. “Mom. It’s not just him. I wanted this too. I still do.”

The look her mother gave her was full of betrayal and disbelief. For a long moment no one spoke. The only sound was the quiet hum of the refrigerator.

Then her mother wiped her face with a shaking hand and straightened her shoulders.

“I want you both out of this house tonight,” she said. Her voice was cold now, stripped of everything soft. “I can’t look at either of you. I need time. Maybe a lot of it. Dominic, we’ll talk about the rest of this later through lawyers if we have to. Aria… I don’t even know what to say to you right now.”

She turned and walked upstairs without another word. The master bedroom door closed hard.

The kitchen felt enormous and empty.

Dominic let out a long breath and turned to Aria. His eyes were raw but clear.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know this costs you more than it costs me.”

Aria shook her head. Tears finally slipped down her cheeks, but her voice stayed steady. “I’m not sorry we told the truth. I’m only sorry it hurt her.”

He stood, pulled her up with him, and wrapped his arms around her. She pressed her face into his chest and breathed him in.

“We’ll go to my apartment in the city,” he said against her hair. “Tonight. You don’t have to decide anything permanent right now. But I meant what I said. I’m not walking away from you.”

Aria lifted her head and looked at him. The man who had been her father’s friend, her mother’s husband, and the secret she was never supposed to want. The man who had become everything.

“I’m coming with you,” she said.

They packed in silence. Aria moved through her childhood bedroom one last time, placing only the things she needed into a bag. When she came back downstairs Dominic was waiting by the front door with his own suitcase. The house felt already different, like a chapter that had closed.

He took her bag and her hand.

Outside, the night air was cool. They put the bags in the trunk of his car. Aria paused with her hand on the passenger door and looked back at the house once. A single light was on upstairs. Her mother’s silhouette stood at the window for a moment, then the curtain fell shut.

Dominic opened the door for her. She slid into the seat. He walked around, got behind the wheel, and started the engine.

As they pulled out of the driveway he reached over and laced his fingers through hers again.

“I love you,” he said quietly, eyes on the road. “I’m going to spend however long it takes proving that this wasn’t just the forbidden part. It was the real part.”

Aria squeezed his hand and let the weight of the night settle around them. The guilt was still there. The cost was real. But so was the solid warmth of his fingers around hers and the steady certainty in his voice.

For the first time since the afternoon she came home and found him alone in the house, she didn’t feel like she was drowning in a secret.

She felt like she was choosing.

And she chose him.