The pregnancy test sits on the marble counter like a loaded gun. Two pink lines. My hands shake as I shove it deep into my purse. Marcus Sterling can never know about this. Not after what I did. Not after the lie that destroyed us. Three months ago, I was nobody. A waitress at his family's charity gala. Then he looked at me across that ballroom, and everything changed. One night became two. Two became twenty. I fell in love with a man whose last name opens doors and closes mouths. Whose family built half this city. Whose trust I shattered with a single, stupid mistake. "Miss Chen?" His assistant's voice cuts through my spiral. "Mr. Sterling is ready to see you." I shouldn't be here. I should run. Disappear into another city, another life. But I need to see his face one more time before I vanish forever. The elevator ride to the penthouse office feels like ascending to my own execution. My reflection in the mirrored walls shows a girl playing dress-up in borrowed confidence. The designer dress Marcus bought me last month hangs differently now. Tighter in places it shouldn't be. The doors open. He stands at the floor-to-ceiling windows, silhouetted against the skyline he practically owns. Dark suit. Broad shoulders. The kind of beautiful that makes you forget to breathe. "Lily." My name sounds like broken glass in his mouth. "Marcus, I—" "Don't." He turns, and his eyes are ice. "My mother told me everything. About the photos you sold to the press. About the money they paid you." My stomach drops. "That's not what happened. I can explain—" "Can you?" He moves closer, and I smell his cologne. The same scent that's been on my pillows for months. "Can you explain why tabloids published private photos from my sister's wedding? Photos only you had access to?" "I didn't sell anything!" Desperation claws up my throat. "Your mother is lying. She's been trying to break us up since—" "Enough." His voice could freeze hell. "I trusted you. I brought you into my family. And you betrayed us for what? Fifty thousand dollars?" Tears burn my eyes. "Marcus, please. I love you." "Love?" He laughs, bitter and sharp. "You don't even know what that word means." He pulls an envelope from his desk. Slides it across to me. "That's a check for one hundred thousand dollars. Take it and disappear. If I ever see you again, I'll destroy you. My lawyers will make sure you never work in this city again. Do you understand?" I stare at the check. At the end of everything. "I understand," I whisper. I should tell him about the baby. About the life growing inside me that's half him, half me. But he's looking at me like I'm nothing. Like I'm trash he's paying to remove. So I take the check with trembling fingers. And I walk away from the only man I've ever loved.