I wasn’t sure if it was everything that had been happening lately or simply a lack of rest catching up with , but one mont I was moving through the crowd and the next, the world went dark. It only lasted a few seconds, but it was enough. I had never blacked out before not once, not even during the worst of everything I’d been through.
Soone caught before I hit the ground.
A firm hand closed around my wrist, steady and sure. A calm male voice ca from sowhere just above . "Are you alright?"
I held still and waited for the fog to clear. When it did, I looked up slowly.
The man holding my wrist had a gentle face and quiet eyes. White shirt, black slacks, no urgency in his posture just a careful, unhurried stillness. He radiated warmth the way spring mornings did, soft and clear, like there was nothing complicated underneath. My first thought was that he seed too clean for the world he was standing in. Almost crystalline.
"Thank you." I pulled my hand back and took a small step away.
"Your color isn’t great," he said, not offended by the distance. "Will you let take you to the hospital? It’s not safe for a girl to faint on her own like that."
"I appreciate it," I said politely. "But I’ll have family take ."
He noticed my wariness and offered a small, easy smile. "I’m not trying anything. I’m a doctor I’m here today to give a lecture at your school."
As if on cue, a group of staff appeared from down the path, the principal nearly jogging to keep pace. "Dr. Donovan, thank you so much for today." He stopped when he saw , his expression shifting into sothing almost reverent which made sense, given that Lewis had funded an entire building on this campus. To the principal, I was basically attached to a very large cheque. "Riley, you’re here too."
"Hello, sir."
"Do you know Dr. Donovan?"
"We just t," I said. "I nearly fainted and he caught ."
I looked at the doctor again properly this ti. His fingers were long and slim, his wrists fine-boned, a strand of black prayer beads looped around one of them. He had the kind of composed, slightly distant energy that made you think of artists or architects not soone who spent their days in a hospital. He pulled his ID from his jacket and held it out to with the calm patience of soone who’d done it before.
Luther Donovan. Orthopedics.
I stared at it. An orthopedic surgeon. This soft, unhurried man who looked like he belonged in a gallery sowhere. I had a sudden absurd ntal image of him swinging a surgical mallet, and nearly laughed.
The principal jumped in before I could say anything. "Riley, you really shouldn’t wait on this. Dr. Donovan is far more accomplished than his age suggests he’s versatile, highly decorated, not just in his specialty. Please go with him. I’ll call Mr. Hale and have him et you at the hospital."
The level of panic in the principal’s voice made feel like I’d announced a terminal diagnosis.
"Then I won’t trouble you further," I said to Luther. I kept my expression open, but I quietly sent a ssage to Theo under my jacket follow at a distance, don’t alert anyone. I wasn’t being reckless. These days, genuine kindness from a stranger warranted at least a small amount of caution.
I followed him to a dark Cayenne parked at the curb, his assistant behind the wheel. Once we were moving, I asked, "Dr. Donovan are you always this attentive toward strangers?"
Luther turned the prayer beads between his fingers, unhurried. "Probably not," he said. "But I couldn’t walk past a pregnant woman."
The words hit like a physical thing.
I turned to stare at him. "What did you just say?"
He looked at , calm and direct. "You didn’t know? You’re pregnant."
The car felt very quiet all of a sudden.
Pregnant. It had been a while since that small town, and since then Lewis and I hadn’t been careful not even once. He had assud, given everything, that it wouldn’t happen so easily. I had wanted it to happen and had never said so out loud, just quietly stopped doing anything to prevent it. I had wanted this. I just hadn’t expected it to arrive like this, in the back seat of a stranger’s car, delivered as casually as a weather update.
"Dr. Donovan," I managed. "Are you certain?"
"When I caught you, I checked your pulse out of habit. You’re probably only a few weeks along less than a month." He said it with the sa easy confidence soone might use to tell you the ti. I kept staring. "You’re an orthopedic surgeon," I said, not quite forming it into a question.
"I have a background in holistic dicine as well. I was concerned you’d write it off as low blood sugar. The early weeks are the most fragile a miscarriage can happen before you even know there’s sothing to protect." He paused. "I didn’t want to say it in front of everyone, which is why I suggested the hospital instead. I hope I haven’t overstepped."
The embarrassnt moved through quietly. He had thought of everything my privacy, the risk, what I might not know while I’d been ntally tracking him as a potential threat. "I’m sorry, Dr. Donovan. I was too suspicious."
"It’s sensible," he said simply. "Especially at your age."
But the news had already taken over everything else in my mind. I was carrying Lewis’s child. A real, living thing that was half of him and half of , already there, already beginning. Only we knew the full weight of what that ant how long the road had been, how many tis we’d nearly lost each other, how in my last life I had never gotten to stand beside him the way I stood beside him now.
I pressed my hand flat against my stomach, gently, and felt my eyes sting.
"Thank you, Dr. Donovan," I said softly. "For telling ."
There had been no real signs. In my past life, carrying Julian’s child had co with sickness that hit like a wave every morning without rcy. This ti there had been nothing like that. My appetite had been better than usual, actually everything tasted sharper and more satisfying. I had been sleeping deeply and waking rested, even after everything that had happened on Rosbel Island. I had assud I was simply adjusting. Now it made sense.
Luther glanced at with mild curiosity. "You seem very young. Already mated and expecting?"
I smiled. "When you find the right person, everything else follows. I don’t need much. A quiet life, a safe one that’s enough for ."
Simple words. For most people, a simple wish. For , it had once felt completely out of reach. This body wasn’t even twenty-one yet, and I already knew what it was to lose everything. I wanted this child with my whole chest.
The car reached the hospital quickly. Luther walked as far as the gynecology departnt, then left with a quiet nod. By the ti I ca out of the ultrasound room, holding the report in both hands, Lewis was already there in the hallway Julian standing a few steps behind him.
I had no idea how the principal had reached him so fast. I hadn’t told Lewis I was coming, and I was glad. I wanted this to land right.
Lewis’s eyes moved over imdiately, reading my face the way he always did. "What’s wrong?" His hands ca to my shoulders, careful and warm. He had clearly been building worst-case scenarios the entire drive over I could see it in the set of his jaw. "It’s okay," he said, before I could speak. "Whatever it is, we handle it together. You don’t have to carry anything alone. Just tell ."
I pulled the ultrasound report from behind my back.
I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. "Carl," I said. "I’m pregnant."
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