HER SECRET HEIRS: TEN BROTHERS STAND GUARD

Evelyn's POV The nurse smiled at me like she had just handed me a winning lottery ticket. "Congratulations, you are six weeks along. The baby is healthy." I held the paper in both hands, and my fingers would not stop shaking. A baby…a tiny heart was beating inside me right now, and the whole world looked different because of it. I walked out of the hospital and stood on the sidewalk for a long time, just breathing. People rushed past me, taxis honked, and a street vendor sold roasted corn on the corner, but none of it touched me. My mind was stuck on one thought: I have to tell Richard. My husband and I had been married for three years, but we lived like strangers sharing an apartment. He slept in his study. I slept in our bedroom alone. He left before sunrise and came home after midnight, and on most days, the only proof that he existed in my life was the faint smell of his cologne on the hallway coat rack. But today could change everything. A baby could fix what words never could. I pulled out my phone and typed a message. "Will you come home for dinner tonight? I made your favorite." My thumb hovered over the send button. Richard hated being disturbed at work. His assistant, Favour, had told me that once in a cold voice during the first month of our marriage, and I had never forgotten it. I pressed send anyway. Five minutes passed. Ten. Fifteen. I started walking toward the market, telling myself that he would not reply, that I should stop hoping, that hope was the cruelest thing I did to myself. Then my phone buzzed. "I will be home by seven. I also have something to discuss with you." I read the message three times. He was coming home for dinner. He wanted to talk. My heart started racing, and I pressed the test results against my chest like a prayer. At the market, I bought fresh tomatoes, basil, the expensive olive oil he liked, and a thick cut of salmon. I even picked up a small bottle of sparkling grape juice because I could not drink real wine anymore, and the thought made me laugh out loud. The house was spotless by six o'clock. I set the dining table with the good plates, lit two candles, and placed the test results face down beside his plate. Then I flipped them over. Then face down again. I could not decide. At exactly seven, headlights swept across the living room curtains. A car door shut, and I heard his footsteps on the stone path. My pulse hammered so loud I was sure he could hear it from outside. The front door opened, and Richard walked in. He wore a dark gray suit, and his tie was already loosened. His jaw was sharp, his eyes were tired, and he was still the most handsome man I had ever seen, even after three years of him looking straight through me. "Richard, welcome home." I walked toward him and reached for his briefcase. He did not hand it to me. Instead, he pulled a brown envelope from inside it and held it out. "Read this first. We can talk about it over dinner." I took the envelope and something cold crawled up my spine. It was too thick to be a letter, too formal to be a gift. I opened it, and the first page punched the air out of my lungs. ANNULMENT AGREEMENT. The words sat there in big, bold print, clean and final, like a door slamming shut. Richard loosened his tie the rest of the way and draped it over the back of a chair. "I have been thinking about this for a while. It is the right thing to do, Evelyn. For both of us." I could not look away from the paper. My name was already typed in the blank spaces, and his lawyer had prepared everything. All that was missing was my signature. "You can keep the apartment on Fifth Street. I will also transfer a settlement into your account. You will not have to worry about money." He said it the way he talked about quarterly reports at his company. Calm, practiced, and already decided. My hand drifted to my stomach before I could stop it. The test results were still sitting on the dining table, hidden under a napkin. "Richard," I said, and my voice came out smaller than I wanted. "What if I told you... what if there was a reason we should not do this right now?" He raised an eyebrow. "What reason?" I swallowed hard. "What if I were pregnant?" The room went very quiet. The candles flickered between us, throwing shadows across his face. For one second, I thought I saw something move behind his eyes, something soft, something almost human. Then it was gone. "Did you not take the pills I left on the counter after that night?" he asked. That night. He could not even call it what it was. Six weeks ago, he had come home late from a company banquet, and for the first and only time in our marriage, he had stumbled into my room instead of his study. The next morning, he left two white pills on the kitchen counter with a glass of water and a note that said: Take these. I had held those pills in my palm for an hour. Then I flushed them down the toilet. "I am asking you a question, Richard. If I were carrying your child, would you still want me to sign these papers?" He looked at me for a long moment. Then he let out a breath that seemed to carry the weight of three wasted years. "A child does not fix a broken marriage, Evelyn. It only gives the broken marriage a witness." The salmon was burning. I could smell it from the kitchen, but I could not move. I just stood there, holding his annulment papers in one hand, and pressing the other hand flat against my stomach where his baby was growing, a baby he had just told me he did not want. Richard picked up his briefcase and turned toward the hallway. "Take a few days to think about it. There is no rush." He disappeared into his study, and the door clicked shut behind him. I walked to the dining table on legs that felt like they belonged to someone else. I picked up the pregnancy test and held it next to the annulment papers, one in each hand, like two futures balancing on a scale. Then I sat down at the table I had set for two, surrounded by food that was getting cold, candles that were melting into puddles, and silence so thick it hurt to breathe. My phone buzzed on the counter. A message from a number I did not recognize. "Evelyn, this is Aunt Mirabel. Please call me as soon as you can. Someone is looking for you. Someone who says they are your real family." I stared at the screen, and my hands started shaking all over again, but this time it had nothing to do with the baby.