The engagement was a week old when the first crack appeared.
Makayla woke one morning to find Declan standing at the study window, the city gray and indifferent below, a folder in his hand. She knew that stillness — it was the posture of a man about to fight. She padded to him barefoot and touched his arm. "What is it?"
He did not turn. "The hospital reached out," he said quietly. "They want to meet about the baby."
The cold came up through her, slow and certain. In all the months of the ring and the scandal and the love, she had let herself forget the small, terrible origin of everything — that the miracle was born of a mistake, and a mistake could be unmade. "What do they want?" she whispered.
"They're being sued over the insemination," he said, and finally turned. His face was drawn
