The Billionaire's Contract Wife: He Doesn't Know He Fathered My Twins

The church smelled like lilies and betrayal. I stood at the altar in a thirty-thousand-dollar dress, holding flowers that cost more than my old car. My hands were shaking. Not from nerves. From his words. “I can’t do this, Kiara.” Xander Kane said it quiet. But the microphone caught it. The whole church heard it. Two hundred guests. His mother in the front row, smiling. My mother crying in the back. I looked up at him. My husband. For three hours. My groom. My one-night stand from the night before. “What?” My voice broke. He didn’t touch me. He didn’t look at me. He looked past me, at the big wooden doors. Like he wanted to run. “The doctors called. Before the ceremony.” His jaw was tight. “The accident… it damaged more than they thought. I can’t have kids, Kiara. Ever.” The flowers fell from my hands. White roses hit the marble floor. “You said it didn’t matter,” I whispered. Last night, drunk on champagne and vows, he’d told me. I’d kissed him and said we’d adopt. I’d said I loved him anyway. “That was before I was sober,” he said. Cold. CEO voice. “I need an heir, Kiara. Kane Holdings needs an heir. I can’t… I won’t trap you in a childless marriage.” Trap. Like I was a problem. His mother stood up. Victoria Kane. Diamonds and poison. “Xander, darling, the papers are ready. Just as we discussed.” Papers. Divorce papers. At my wedding. I looked at the crowd. Everyone I knew. Everyone he knew. All watching me break. So I did the only thing I could do. I lifted my chin. I took the pen his lawyer gave me. And I signed. Kiara Stone. Not Kiara Kane. Never Kiara Kane. “Congratulations,” I told him. “You’re free.” I walked out of that church alone. Barefoot, because I kicked off the heels. Carrying my dress in my hands. I didn’t tell him I was already late. I didn’t tell him the test I took that morning was positive. I didn’t tell him he’d just divorced the mother of his children. --- Four years later. “Daddy, I want ice cream!” The little voice froze me in the middle of the grocery store. Not my kids. They were at daycare. A man walked past me, holding a little girl’s hand. She had his eyes. I pressed my palm to my cart. Breathe. Just breathe. Four years. I was safe. I was invisible. I worked at a bookstore now. Small apartment. Smaller life. But my twins were happy. Kemi and Kunle. They had my curls. My smile. And his eyes. God, they had his eyes. I turned the corner with my cart. And crashed straight into a wall of black suit and cologne. Oud and money. The smell hit me first. Then the hands that caught my arms before I could fall. “Careful.” That voice. I looked up. Xander Kane looked down. The world stopped. He was worse in person. Taller. Harder. A scar through his left eyebrow I didn’t remember. His blue eyes ran over my face, my cheap sweater, my cart full of mac and cheese and chicken nuggets. Mom food. “Kiara.” My name in his mouth was still a weapon. I stepped back. “Mr. Kane.” Professional. Dead. “Sorry. I didn’t see you.” He didn’t move. He was blocking my cart. Blocking me. “You cut your hair.” “It’s been four years.” I gripped the cart. “People change.” “Do they?” His eyes were too sharp. “Because you still look at me like you hate me.” “I don’t think about you at all,” I lied. Then his phone rang. He ignored it. His eyes dropped to my left hand. No ring. He’d looked for that first. “Are you… married?” he asked. The question was casual. His eyes were not. “No.” I couldn’t breathe. “Are you?” “No.” One word. Heavy. “My mother keeps trying. But no.” His mother. The woman who handed me divorce papers at the altar. The woman who told me Xander only married me because he was drunk and guilty. The woman who paid me fifty thousand dollars to disappear. Money I never touched. Money I burned. “My car is outside,” Xander said. “Let me—” “Mommy!” My heart dropped to the floor. Kemi came running down the aisle. Her backpack bounced. Her curls were wild. She stopped when she saw Xander. Her eyes went wide. She had his eyes. Exact. Same blue. Same shape. Same way they got cold when she was mad. Xander stared at her. His face drained of color. Then Kunle ran up behind her. “Kemi, wait!” He skidded to a stop. Looked up at Xander. Copy. Paste. Two of them. Two little Xander Kanes, staring at the original. The mac and cheese fell out of my cart. Xander’s hand went to the shelf beside him. Like he needed it to stand up. “Twins,” he said. The word was broken. “You have twins.” I grabbed both my kids. Pulled them behind me. Mama bear mode. “They’re mine.” “They’re four years old.” His math was fast. Harvard MBA. “Four years, Kiara.” “They’re MINE,” I said again. Louder. He stepped forward. I stepped back. “Did you know?” His voice was ice and fire. “When you walked out of that church. Did you know you were pregnant?” “Yes.” I wouldn’t lie. Not about this. “I found out that morning.” He flinched like I’d shot him. “And you still signed the papers. You still left.” “Your mother said you’d resent me. That you’d hate me and the baby. That you only married me because you were drunk and felt sorry for me!” I was shouting now. People were staring. I didn’t care. “She said I was trapping you!” “MY MOTHER?” He roared it. A man near us dropped his eggs. “Victoria told you that?” “She gave me money to leave! She said you couldn’t have kids and you’d blame me forever!” Xander ran a hand through his hair. The CEO mask was gone. He looked wrecked. Human. “I never told her about the doctors. I told her AFTER you left. Because you were gone and it didn’t matter anymore.” The air left my lungs. She lied. She lied to both of us. Xander dropped to his knees. Right there in aisle five. In front of the cereal. He didn’t care who saw. He looked at Kemi. At Kunle. His hands shook. “Hi,” he said to them. His voice was wrong. Soft. Broken. “I’m… I’m a friend of your mom’s.” Kemi stepped out from behind me. Fearless. “You have my eyes.” “Yeah,” Xander whispered. “Yeah, I do, sweetheart. What’s your name?” “Kemi. And this is Kunle. We’re twins. We’re four.” “Four,” Xander repeated. He looked up at me. Tears in his eyes. Xander Kane did not cry. Ever. “Four years, Kiara. Four years I missed.” “You didn’t want kids,” I said. But it sounded weak now. “I wanted YOU!” he shouted. Then quieter. “And if you came with kids, then I wanted them too. More than anything.” Kunle walked up to him. Touched the scar on his eyebrow. “You got a boo-boo.” Xander’s breath hitched. “Yeah, buddy. I did.” He stood up. Slow. He looked at me like I was a ghost. Like I was everything he lost. “We’re leaving. Right now.” “The hell we are.” I put my kids behind me again. “You don’t get to—” “Viktor Drake got out of prison last week.” The name shut me up. Cold. Viktor Drake. The man who tried to kill Xander last year with a car bomb. Xander’s biggest enemy. The man on the news. “He’s looking for a weakness,” Xander said. His CEO voice was back. Hard. “A pregnant ex-wife is a weakness. Two heirs? That’s a target on their backs. On YOUR back.” My stomach turned. He was right. I read the papers. I knew. “I can protect them,” Xander said. “I have gates. Guards. Lawyers. Money. What do you have, Kiara? A bookstore job?” Pride and fear warred in me. Fear won. Always, when it came to them. “What do you want?” I whispered. He pulled a folded paper from his inside pocket. Like he’d been carrying it. Waiting. “Contract marriage. Twelve months. You and the twins live in my penthouse. Full protection. Full access to everything I own.” I took the paper. **CONTRACT MARRIAGE AGREEMENT** **Rule #1: No falling in love.** **Rule #2: You sleep in my bed. For appearance and safety.** **Rule #3: Nobody touches the twins. Ever.** “Why?” I asked. “Why not just take them? You have lawyers. You have money. You could win.” His eyes went to Kemi. To Kunle. “Because they’re already looking at you like you’re their world. I’m not gonna be the man who destroys their world.” He looked at me. “Even if I have to live in it.” I looked down at the contract. At my kids. At the man I married for one night and divorced at dawn. “Fine,” I said. My voice shook. “But if you hurt them—” “I won’t.” He gave me a pen. Gold. Heavy. “But if anyone else tries, I’ll burn the world down.” I signed. Kiara Stone. Again. He took the pen. His fingers brushed mine. Still fire. Still wrong. “Welcome home, Mrs. Kane,” he said. Rule #1: No falling in love. Looking at him, holding my twins’ hands, I knew I was in trouble. Because I never stopped.