Chapter 5
Three weeks later, I went into labor.
It was early.
Too early.
I woke before dawn with a fierce pain tearing through my body. My mother called an ambulance while my father paced the hallway like a trapped animal.
At the hospital, everything became bright lights, rushing feet, and doctors speaking in calm voices that scared me more than shouting would have.
“The babies are coming,” the doctor said.
I cried.
Not because I did not want them.
Because I wanted to give them more time.
I wanted to protect them from every cruel thing waiting outside that room.
Hours passed.
Then I heard the first cry.
Thin.
Furious.
Beautiful.
My first son was born at 9:14 in the morning.
My second arrived six minutes later.
They were small, but breathing.
They were taken to the neonatal unit before I could hold them for more than a moment.
I named them Noah and Eli.
My mother cried when she heard their names.
My father pressed his forehead against mine.
“They’re fighters,” he said.
Connor arrived that evening.
Elena had told him I was in labor because, despite everything, she believed he had a legal right to know.
He stood outside my hospital room for almost an hour before asking to come in.
I let him.
He looked terrified.
“How are they?” he asked.
“Small. Strong.”
“Can I see them?”
“You can see them through the nursery window.”
He nodded.
Then he stood there, twisting his wedding ring.
“I got the paternity test request approved,” he said. “The results will be back soon.”
I stared at him.
“You really needed it.”
“I know they’re mine,” he said quickly. “I do.”
“But you needed a laboratory to tell you what you should have known in your heart.”
His eyes filled.
“I failed you.”
“Yes.”
He sat down, and for the first time, I saw no arrogance in him. No Sterling confidence. Only a broken man finally facing what he had done.
“My mother admitted she hired the investigator,” he said.
My whole body went still.
“She said she did it to protect me.”
“From what?”
“She won’t say.”
Before I could answer, Elena came in with a folder.
“The test results are here,” she said.
Connor stood.
His hands shook as he opened the envelope.
He read it once.
Then again.
Then he covered his face and began to cry.
The report confirmed what I had never doubted.
Connor Sterling was the biological father of both boys.
He fell to his knees beside my bed.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
I looked at him for a long time.
There had been a day when I would have forgiven him instantly.
A day when his tears would have been enough.
But I had changed in the rain.
“You need to be sorry to your sons,” I said. “You need to become someone they can trust.”
“I will.”
“You do not get me back because a test proves I was telling the truth.”
“I know.”
The next day, Connor went to Victoria’s house with his father, Richard Sterling.
He called me afterward.
His voice sounded stunned.
“Dad didn’t know about the investigator,” he said. “But he knows about Daniel.”
“Who is Daniel?”
Connor was quiet for so long I thought the call had dropped.
Then he said, “Daniel is my older brother.”
I sat up in bed.
“You have a brother?”
“I did. My mother told me he died before I was born.”
“And?”
“And Dad says he is alive.”
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The secret had finally begun to open.
And Victoria was running out of places to hide.
