Chapter 3

Ryan caught up with me in the hallway.

"Grace, wait."

I didn't stop. My heels clicked sharply against the marble floor.

He grabbed my arm, and the contact sent a jolt through me that I hated myself for feeling.

"Let go," I said quietly.

He didn't.

"You disappeared for three years. No phone, no address, nothing. I—"

"You what?" I turned to face him. "You looked for me? Don't make me laugh, Ryan. You sent your assistant to hand me divorce papers while I was still bleeding from giving birth to your son."

Something cracked in his expression. "I was wrong about that. I know that now."

"Do you? Then where's my son?"

Silence.

That silence told me everything.

"Where is he, Ryan?"

He released my arm and stepped back. The look on his face was one I'd never seen before—shame, raw and undisguised.

"After you left... Vanessa told me the baby wasn't mine. So I—" He stopped.

My blood ran cold. "So you what?"

"I sent him to a care facility outside the city."

The world tilted.

My son. My baby. The child I had kissed goodbye through tears, believing Ryan would at least raise him—even if he hated me.

He'd thrown our son away. Just like he'd thrown me away.

"You abandoned a newborn," I whispered, "because my sister told you to."

"I didn't abandon him. The facility is—"

"A facility is not a home!" My voice cracked, and I hated it. I hated that after three years of rebuilding myself, he could still break something inside me with a single sentence.

Ryan flinched. "Grace, I'll make it right. I'm already—"

"You'll make it right?" I laughed, and it came out bitter and sharp. "You don't even know where he is, do you?"

His silence confirmed it.

I stepped closer, and for the first time, I saw fear in Ryan Carter's eyes.

"Let me tell you where he is. He's with me. I found him eleven months after I left. He was malnourished, neglected, and he didn't even know how to smile.

"It took me a year to teach my own son that the world wasn't going to hurt him."

Ryan's face drained of color.

"He's three now," I continued. "He's smart. He's kind. He looks exactly like you, which you would've known if you'd ever bothered to look at him."

"Grace—"

"Don't. We're done talking about this."

I pulled a business card from my pocket and held it out. "If your mother wants the surgery, have her team contact my office. I'll treat her because it's my job, not because of anything between us."

He took the card. Our fingers brushed, and I pulled away fast.

As I turned to leave, he called out, "What's his name?"

I paused but didn't look back.

"Ethan. His name is Ethan Mitchell."

Not Carter. Mitchell. Mine.

I walked away, and this time, he didn't follow.

That evening, I sat in my apartment watching Ethan build a tower out of blocks. He had Ryan's dark eyes and my stubborn chin, and when he smiled, it was like sunlight breaking through clouds.

"Mama, look! Castle!"

"It's beautiful, baby."

My phone buzzed. A message from an unknown number.

"I ran a DNA test after you left. The results came back last year. Ethan is mine. I've been looking for both of you ever since. Please let me explain."

I stared at the message for a long time.

Then I deleted it.

The next morning, I arrived at the hospital to find a wall of reporters outside the entrance and Ryan Carter standing at the front door, holding a stuffed dinosaur.