I had forbidden Caspian Rourke from bringing that woman—the daughter of one of his men—into our lives. He agreed. Then, behind my back, he set her up in a mansion in Lincoln Park.

Everyone envied me for marrying the most feared man in Chicago, for carrying the Rourke family’s twin sons.

But on the night I gave birth, while I was bleeding out on the operating table from a gunshot wound, Caspian was with that woman, handling a "family emergency" she had engineered.

My mother knelt in the hospital corridor, sobbing as she dialed his encrypted phone, only to be met with a dead line.

Only later did I learn the daughter of his man had been his secret lover since she was eighteen.

I took the twins and fled to my family's brownstone in Brooklyn. When Caspian finally came for me, I was in the middle of changing a diaper.

He stood in the doorway, a vision in his bespoke suit, holding a solid-gold baby rattle.

"Aurora, come home with me."

He held out the rattle. "I know I was wrong."

I glanced up at him and smiled. "Wrong about what?"

He blinked, thrown by the question.

I snatched the rattle from his hand and smashed it against the wall.

It dented with a dull thud.

"You should have honored your blood oath and married her. You shouldn't have used me to bear your children."

————————

1

Caspian bent to pick up the rattle.

The trash can was tipped over, spilling used diapers and wipes. One clung to the polished toe of his handmade Italian leather shoe. He didn't even flinch.

"Aurora," he said, his voice low, "I know you're angry—"

"I'm angry?"

I lifted my younger son. He'd just finished his milk and let out a soft, milky burp against my shoulder. "What could I possibly be angry about?"

Caspian straightened, his gaze sweeping across the cluttered living room.

A changing table, cans of formula, and baby toys littered the floor.

Genevieve visited last week. She took one look at this Brooklyn brownstone, called it a hovel, and demanded I move back to Chicago.

"About Daisy… I handled it poorly."

"Daisy."

I repeated her name, my voice flat. "What's her full name, Caspian?"

His expression tightened.

"You don't even know her full name, but you bought her a penthouse in Lincoln Park?"

I patted my younger son’s back. "The security fees alone are a hundred thousand a month. That's more than the rent for my family's entire building."

"That apartment is held in a trust," he said.

My hand stilled on my son's back.

My younger son began to fuss. I switched him to my other shoulder and resumed the gentle patting.

"A trust," I echoed, my voice hollow. "Caspian, you set up a trust for her?"

He was silent for two long seconds.

Those two seconds were all the answer I needed.

In his crib, my older son suddenly wailed, his small voice cracking as his tiny arms and legs flailed.

My hands were full. Caspian instinctively moved toward the crib, bending as if to pick him up, but his hands hovered uselessly before pulling back.

He didn't know how to hold a baby.

We’d always had nannies. He had never changed a single diaper.

"You should go," I said.

He stood frozen beside the crib.

My older son’s face was flushed red from crying. I watched, numb, as the pristine cuff of Caspian’s suit jacket brushed against a dried milk stain on the crib rail.

"Aurora, the doctor said your postpartum recovery isn't going well. The children can't be without a father."

I placed my younger son in the bouncy chair and strode over to scoop up my older son.

The moment he was in my arms, he quieted, nuzzling his tiny face into my chest.

"They never had a father to begin with," I said.

Caspian's head snapped up.

"How many times did you answer my calls?"

I soothed my older son, my voice a low murmur. "That time I fainted during a prenatal check-up, the nurse called you. You were handling 'family business.' The time I was terrified because the babies weren't moving, it was Daisy who answered your encrypted phone. And the day I was attacked?"

My older son started sucking his hand. I gently pulled it from his mouth.

"My mother knelt in the hallway outside the operating room. She made forty-three calls to your Capos, one after the other."

Caspian's Adam's apple bobbed.

"That day was Daisy's birthday."

"You took her to a private island," I stated. "A round trip by helicopter, just for her."

He started to speak. "That was a promise I made a long time ago, I couldn't break it—"

"Couldn't break it?"

I let out a harsh, humorless laugh. "She's been with you for eight years, since she was a teenager. For a promise to her, you were willing to cast aside your wife and your children?"

The living room fell silent, the only sound the soft cooing from my younger son in his bouncy chair.

From the kitchen, the rhythmic chop of my mom's knife stopped.

Caspian met my gaze. "Aurora, I broke it off with her."

I said nothing.

"I gave her money. Compensation."

He took a step forward. "I promise, from now on…"

"You promise."

I smiled again, that same cold, brittle smile. "Last time, you promised to keep her away from our lives, and you set up a trust for her. Before that, you promised to end it before the babies were born, yet three days after I gave birth, she posted a picture of the two of you on her private social media."

Caspian froze.

"And do you want to guess what she posted?"

I put my older son down and turned to face him fully. "A picture of you putting a ring on her finger. The Rourke family signet ring. The one you swore would only ever be mine."

The color drained from his face.

...

"Caspian," I said, leaning against the crib for support. "When you were courting me, you swore you only wanted me. When you proposed, you said I was the only one. When I was pregnant with the twins, heaving up nothing but bile, you’d stroke my belly and promise the four of us a perfect life."

My younger son whimpered in his chair. I walked over and picked him up.

His little mouth puckered, on the verge of tears. I turned away from Caspian, lifted my shirt, and began to nurse him.

The only sounds in the living room were the ticking of the clock and my older son sucking his fingers.

Caspian hadn't moved an inch. He didn't even glance at the filth clinging to his polished shoes.

"That ring."

He finally spoke, his voice hoarse. "I didn't know she took that picture."

"Of course you didn't know."

I cradled the back of my younger son's head. "Just like you didn't know she sent the pictures to me. Or that she used your encrypted phone to leave me voice messages at two in the morning. Or that she was showing off my ultrasound scans to her friends?"

Caspian took a half step forward, his hand slightly raised as if in supplication.

My younger son hiccupped mid-feed. A bubble of white milk frothed at the corner of his mouth.

I reached for a cloth to wipe his chin, my hand knocking a stack of papers off the coffee table. They scattered across the floor. Divorce papers.

My mom had them drawn up yesterday. Her friend, Camila Santos, is the best family law attorney in the city.

Caspian’s eyes locked onto them.

He bent and picked them up, his fingers riffling through the pages.

"You want a divorce?"

"The terms are clear."

"The children stay with you?"

"With me."

He pinched the edge of a page, his thumb pressing the crease flat.

"Aurora, the boys are so young. You can't do this alone—"

"Alone?"

I laughed, a sharp, broken sound. "The day I was shot, the nurse brought the babies to me. 'Look, Mamma,' she whispered. 'They both made it.' I lay on that operating table, trembling as the anesthesia wore off. The doctor kept asking where my family was, and the nurse just said no one could be reached."

My younger son finished eating. I held him upright to burp him.

His soft little head rested on my shoulder, drool seeping into the collar of my shirt.

"It was my mom who signed the consent forms."

I said, "Her hand was shaking so badly she could barely hold the pen. The doctor said if she didn't sign, it was mother and babies, all at risk. She had to use her left hand to steady her right, tracing each letter like it was an eternity."

Caspian remained silent, his jaw tight.

Into the silence, my mom emerged from the kitchen.

She had taken off her apron but was still clutching a vegetable peeler, its blade dotted with flecks of carrot.

"Caspian," my mom said, her voice dangerously quiet. "Are you leaving, or not?"

He glanced at my mom.

She’s five-foot-two, barely reaching his shoulder, but as she brandished the peeler, she seemed to tower over him.

"Helen—"

"Don't you 'Helen' me." My mom slammed the peeler down on the shoe cabinet. "Who do you think you are? In three years, you've set foot in this house less than five times. When Aurora was in her first trimester, so sick she was hospitalized, she cried for you. You were 'handling business.' When she had contractions and started bleeding, she had to call an ambulance herself. Our neighbors had to help her onto the stretcher."

Caspian's lips parted, but no words came out.

My mom took a sharp breath. "If you so much as think about taking Aurora from this house today, I swear I'll give you a taste of this blade first."

My older son suddenly coughed, a wet, rattling sound. His face turned red.

I quickly put my younger son down and scooped up my older one, patting his back firmly.

He coughed up a bit of phlegm and started to wail.

Caspian moved toward us, reaching out. "Let me—"

I flinched back.

"Don't you touch him."

His hand froze in mid-air.

"You smell of her perfume," I said, my voice flat. "Creed Aventus. Her favorite."

Caspian slowly lowered his hand.

"Did you see her before you came here?"

He didn't answer.

"What did you talk about?"

"She said," Caspian's voice was a raw whisper, "she's pregnant."

The room was so quiet I could hear my son's choked sobs.

My mom's peeler clattered to the floor.

I kept patting my older son’s back, my movements steady, automatic.

"How many months?"

"A little over two."

"So, she's two months along. And my boys are barely three."

I managed a brittle smile. "You're efficient, Caspian."

He looked up sharply. "Aurora, I didn't—"

"Then whose baby is it?"

His lips trembled.

"She said it was that night… on the private island… the night you gave birth."

"That night?"

I cut him off, my voice like ice. "While I was bleeding out on an operating table from a gunshot wound, the two of you were… what? Celebrating?"

He didn't deny it.

...

My older son started crying again. I paced the floor, rocking him in my arms.

I walked to the window. Down on the street, a young couple pushed a stroller. The man knelt to tie the woman's shoelace. A lump formed in my throat.

"You should go," I said, my back to him.

"Aurora—"

"Go back to Daisy."

I stared out the window. "She's pregnant. You wouldn't want her to go hungry."

Silence stretched between us.

After a long moment, I heard the scuff of leather on wood, followed by a sticky squelch as his shoe found a discarded diaper.

He was gone.

My mom crouched to pick up the peeler. A chip had been knocked from the blade. She turned the broken edge toward herself, hiding it in her palm.

"Aurora," she said, her voice thick. "I made your favorite for dinner."

I turned, still holding my older son.

My younger son had fallen asleep in the bouncy chair, his little mouth working silently.

I gently placed my older son beside him, their two identical heads touching.

"Mom," I said, "contact Camila tomorrow."

My mom, her back to me, resumed chopping carrots, the knife a steady, furious rhythm against the cutting board.

"Okay."

I walked to the coffee table and picked up the divorce papers from the floor.

Caspian must have dropped them near the door.

My younger son shifted, his tiny fist connecting with my older son's face.

My older son grunted but didn't wake, just turned his face to the side.

I perched on the arm of the sofa, just watching them.

My phone buzzed.

A voice message. New number. Daisy. Twenty seconds.

I pressed play.

Her voice was sickly sweet. "Dearest Aurora, is Cassy with you? I made soup. I'm waiting for him to come home."

I slapped my phone face down on the coffee table.

The screen was still lit. Her profile picture was a close-up of the Rourke signet ring on her finger.

On the windowsill, the pothos my mom was growing trailed down, a single drop of water clinging to the tip of a leaf.

I played the message again.

"Dearest Aurora, is Cassy with you? I made soup. I'm waiting for him to come home."

My mom peeked out from the kitchen. "Who was that?"

"Spam," I said, and blocked the number.

The next morning, I was at the law firm. Camila Santos, my mom's friend, had been practicing family law for twenty years. Her office walls were a gallery of her victories. She read the agreement three times, her finger tapping the "Asset Division" clause.

"His pre-marital villa in River North is untouchable."

"I know."

"But properties acquired after the marriage, and shares in the family businesses, are community property. Fifty-fifty. As for the house he bought that woman, we can sue to have it returned."

I nodded.

Camila pushed her glasses up her nose. "Did he sign?"

"No."

"Then we'll start with a letter from my office."

At two in the afternoon, the letter was delivered to Caspian's headquarters. At three, his call came. I silenced it. At four, he called my mom. She answered, said, "Aurora's resting," and hung up. At five-thirty, he was downstairs. The window of his Cadillac slid down. Daisy was in the passenger seat, wearing a loose-fitting dress, one hand resting protectively—pointedly—on her stomach.

I was on the balcony, bringing in laundry. My younger son was fussing inside. Genevieve, Caspian's mother, was there too, standing at the building entrance with several boxes of imported formula, staring up at me.

"Aurora," she called out. "Come down. We need to talk."

I went downstairs holding my younger son. Genevieve stood by the flowerbed, her designer heels sinking into the soft dirt as her eyes raked over me.

"The twins have lost weight."

"No, they haven't."

"Caspian told me. He was wrong about that woman, but he's already handled it."

I shifted my son to my other shoulder. "How did he 'handle' it?"

"He gave her money and told her to get rid of the child."

I stared at her, speechless.

She smoothed a perfect strand of hair into place. "Aurora, you've made your point. You've had your little tantrum. It's time to come home. The children can't be without a father. And a woman in your position, in a place like this… it reflects poorly on the Rourke name."

"Reputation?"

I gave a short, sharp laugh. "And your son keeping a mistress for eight years—a pregnant mistress—that's good for the Rourke name?"

Her face hardened. "Aurora, that is no way to speak to me."

The noise woke my younger son, and he started to cry. I patted his back and turned to go inside. She called after me, "Think about it! Where will you go? You know the state of your own family! More importantly, do you really think our rivals will just leave two Rourke heirs—two unprotected targets—out in the open?"

I pulled the heavy door shut behind me.

Caspian didn't come back.

The next morning, his younger brother Ronan came. He was five years younger than Caspian and ran a branch of the family business. He squatted in my doorway, lit a cigarette, and flicked the ash onto my mom's polished floor.