The phone call with Mira did little to steady Ava’s nerves.
She paced the length of Liam’s penthouse, her bare feet silent against the cold marble. The city sprawled beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, indifferent to the storm raging inside her. “He can’t just force you into this,” Mira had insisted. “You have rights.” But Ava knew the truth. Liam Carter didn’t play by the rules. He made them.
She stopped in front of the closed study door, her fingers curling into her palms. She could walk away. Right now. Leave this place, this man, and never look back. But the memory of his words—“That child is mine. And I protect what’s mine.”—echoed in her skull, a warning and a promise.
She knocked.
No answer.
Ava pushed the door open anyway.
Liam stood by the window, his back to her, one hand
