I make it halfway home before I realize I'm driving to the wrong address.

Not to the sterile condo I share with Marcus.

To Lily's apartment. Where she's been holed up since she dropped her pregnancy bombshell.

My hands are steady on the wheel, but my mind is anything but.

Dominic Kincaid.

He said his name in that office like he'd been rehearsing it for years. Dominic Kane. Used to be Dominic Kincaid. The man I left standing at the altar in a borrowed suit, holding a ring he'd saved six months to buy.

The man who built a billion-dollar empire and walked back into my life wearing a different name.

The scar on his neck. Cedar and bourbon. Steel-gray eyes that looked at me like I was already his.

Of course I knew him. Of course I felt that pull from the moment we touched. Ten years of trying to bury someone doesn't make them go away—it just drives them deeper.

I press my palm flat against the steering wheel and force myself to focus on something I can actually deal with right now.

Lily's pregnancy.

Because if I've learned anything in the past forty-eight hours, it's that everyone in my life is a goddamn liar.

---

Lily's apartment building is dark except for the lobby light. It's past ten, but I know she'll be awake. She's always been nocturnal, a creature of late nights and poor decisions.

I buzz up and she lets me in without a word. The apartment smells like cheap perfume and takeout containers.

I can hear music playing softly from her bedroom.

I don't knock.

She's lying on her bed, scrolling through her phone, wearing one of those ridiculous silk pajama sets that cost more than my monthly grocery budget. Probably bought with money Marcus gave her.

"Jesus, Elena." She sits up, hand to her chest. "You scared the shit out of me."

"Where's your prenatal vitamins?"

She blinks. "What?"

"Prenatal vitamins. You're pregnant, right? So where are they?"

Her eyes dart to her nightstand, then back to me. "I... I don't need them yet. It's really early."

"Bullshit." I walk to her dresser, start opening drawers. "Every pregnancy website says to start taking them immediately. You've been telling everyone for three days now. Where are they, Lily?"

"Get out of my stuff!" She scrambles off the bed, tries to grab my arm.

I shake her off easily. She's always been smaller than me, more delicate. It used to make me feel protective.

Now it just pisses me off.

"Where's your doctor's appointment card? Your ultrasound picture? Any fucking proof at all?"

"I don't have to prove anything to you." Her voice rises, taking on that whiny quality that's always gotten her out of trouble. "You're just jealous that Marcus wants me, that we're having a baby—"

"You're not pregnant."

The words hang in the air between us.

Her face does something complicated. Hurt, anger, fear—all cycling through in rapid succession.

"You don't know that."

"Actually, I do." I pull out my phone, open the photo I've been staring at for the past hour. "Because I called Dr. Chen. Remember her? Mom's friend from book club? The gynecologist?"

Lily's face goes white.

"Turns out she's very concerned about you. Has been for years. Because you had a procedure done when you were twenty-one. A botched abortion at some sketchy clinic that left you with severe scarring. You're infertile, Lily. You have been for five years."

She sits down hard on the bed.

"Dr. Chen wouldn't tell me that. Patient confidentiality—"

"She didn't have to. I found the medical records in Mom's filing cabinet when I was packing her things for the hospital." I hold up my phone. "You know how she keeps everything. Every medical bill, every insurance claim. I photographed it all. Including the follow-up visits where they confirmed you'd never be able to carry a pregnancy to term."

Tears start sliding down her face, but I'm beyond caring.

"How could you?" My voice cracks despite my best efforts. "How could you lie about something like that?"

"You don't understand." She's sobbing now, mascara running down her cheeks. "You have no idea what it's like to be me. To always be the fuck-up, the disappointment. You got everything—the perfect career, the perfect husband—"

"Perfect?" I laugh, and it sounds unhinged even to my own ears. "You're fucking my husband, Lily. You're literally sleeping with my husband and lying about being pregnant with his baby. In what universe is that me having everything?"

"At least people wanted you!" She's shouting now, standing up, getting in my face. "At least you were someone's first choice! Do you know what it's like to always be second? To watch everyone choose you over me, every single time?"

Something in her words hits too close to home.

Second choice.

I've been someone's second choice too, haven't I?

But whose first choice was I?

The thought slips away before I can grasp it.

"This doesn't fix anything," I say quietly. "Lying about being pregnant doesn't make Marcus love you. It doesn't make you matter more."

"It made him look at me." Her voice is small now, broken. "For three days, he looked at me like I was important. Like I was worth something."

God, we're both so fucking pathetic.

Two women fighting over a man who isn't worth either of our time.

"I'm telling him," I say. "Tomorrow. I'm telling him the truth."

"Elena, please—"

"You should have thought about that before you decided to blow up my entire life."

I walk out, leaving her crying on her childhood bed.

I don't feel victorious.

I just feel tired.

---

I'm halfway to my car when my phone rings.

Dominic's name flashes on the screen.

I should ignore it. I should go home, take a shower, drink an entire bottle of wine, and forget this day ever happened.

Instead, I answer.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" His voice is bourbon and smoke, curling through the phone like a physical touch.

"How did you know I was looking for anything?"

"Because I know you, Elena. You don't just accept things at face value. You investigate. You dig until you find the truth."

That sensation again. That feeling of being known.

"She's not pregnant," I say. "Lily. She's infertile. Has been for years."

Silence on the other end.

Then: "I know."

My hand tightens on the phone. "What?"

"I've known since before she started the affair with Marcus. I have medical records on everyone connected to you."

The world tilts slightly.

"Why would you—"

"Come to the penthouse. We need to talk."

"It's almost eleven o'clock."

"I know what time it is, Lena."

The phone slips from my hand.

Lena.

Lena.

Only one person has ever called me that.

Only one person made that nickname sound like a prayer and a curse all at once.

But that was ten years ago.

And he's gone.

I left him at the altar, and he disappeared, and I married Marcus two months later because I thought I was pregnant and I was terrified and—

Oh god.

Oh god.

I pick up the phone with shaking hands.

"Dominic?"

"Come to the penthouse, Elena. It's time we stopped playing games."

He hangs up.

I stand in the parking lot outside Lily's building, his voice still in my head.

Lena.

He called me Lena. That name no one else had ever used, the one that used to mean safety and home and the reckless certainty that I was loved.

Dominic Kincaid, who became Dominic Kane. Who shed his name and built an empire and came back to find me. I've known since he said it in that office—used to be Dominic Kincaid—and knowing it hasn't made it real. It's like being told a fact you can't fit inside your body. His voice, his hands, that scar. The cedar and bourbon I tasted ten years ago, and again on Valentine's night without understanding why it felt like memory.

Now I understand.

My hands are shaking as I unlock my car.

I need to see him. Not to confirm what I already know. But to say it out loud, to both of us, because the weight of it has been sitting in my chest since that office and I can't carry it alone.

---

The drive to his penthouse takes twenty minutes.

It feels like twenty years.

I park in the underground garage, take the private elevator up, use the key card he gave me yesterday.

Was it only yesterday?

It feels like a lifetime ago.

The elevator doors open directly into his living room.

He's standing by the windows, backlit by the city lights, a glass of bourbon in his hand.

He doesn't turn around.

"You came."

"You knew I would."

"Yes."

I step out of the elevator. The doors close behind me with a soft click.

We're alone.

Thirty floors above the city.

In this glass tower he built.

Built by a man I abandoned.

I've known since he said his name in that office. Known it in my chest before I could say it to myself. But knowing and standing here are two different weights.

He turns without being asked, and there it is—the scar on his neck. The one I've been circling since Valentine's night.

It's from a broken bottle. A bar fight when he was nineteen. He got it defending his younger brother from some drunk asshole twice his size.

I know this because I was there.

I held a bar towel to the wound while we waited for the ambulance.

I rode with him to the hospital.

I stayed with him through twelve stitches and a tetanus shot.

My voice, when it comes, is barely a whisper.

"I left you."

He's close now. Close enough that I can smell cedar and bourbon. Close enough that I can see the silver threading through his dark hair at the temples.

Close enough that I can see the exact moment his mask drops.

"Yes." His voice is rough. "You left me at the altar ten years ago. You destroyed me when you chose Marcus Cross instead."

The room spins.

I reach out blindly, and his hands catch me, steady me.

His touch burns.

"You changed everything," I breathe.

"I changed everything. My name. My life. My entire fucking existence." His fingers tighten on my arms. "I built an empire from nothing. I became the man your parents said I'd never be. Rich. Powerful. Successful. Everything they said Marcus was and I wasn't."

"Why?"

"Why do you think?" He pulls me closer, and I can feel the heat of him, the barely controlled fury vibrating through his body. "I spent ten years planning this. Ten years building the resources to destroy the man you chose over me. To make you see what a mistake you made."

"You hired Marcus."

"Yes."

"You orchestrated this entire thing."

"Every fucking detail." His eyes are burning into mine. "The job offer. The promotion. Even Lily—I knew about her resentment, her addiction issues. I knew exactly how to manipulate her into Marcus's path."

I should pull away.

I should run.

Instead, I'm frozen, staring up at this stranger who used to be everything to me.

"The night at the bar," I whisper. "That wasn't chance."

"Nothing has been chance, Lena. I've been planning this since the day you married him."

Lena.

That nickname undoes me.

Because it's not just a name. It's late nights studying together in the library. It's stolen kisses in the rain. It's promises made in the dark, bodies tangled together, futures planned in whispered words.

It's everything I gave up.

Everything I've tried to forget.

"I didn't know," I say. My voice sounds hollow. "I didn't know you'd become... this."

"Would it have mattered?" His hand comes up, cups my face with a gentleness that contradicts the rage in his eyes. "If you'd known I'd become a billionaire, would you have stayed?"

"That's not fair."

"Nothing about this is fair." His thumb brushes across my cheekbone. "You left me standing at the altar, Lena. You married him two months later. You spent ten years in his bed, in his life, while I spent ten years becoming someone worthy of you."

"You were always worthy—"

"THEN WHY DID YOU LEAVE?"

His shout echoes through the penthouse.

We're both breathing hard, standing so close I can feel his heartbeat.

Or maybe that's mine.

I can't tell anymore where I end and he begins.

"I thought I was pregnant," I whisper. "I thought I was pregnant with Marcus's baby."

Something flickers across his face. Pain. Rage. Betrayal.

"You cheated on me."

"No." Tears are streaming down my face now. "It was before. Before we got engaged. Marcus and I had dated briefly, and we... it was one night. One stupid, drunken night. And then I met you, and everything changed, and I thought—I thought it was over. I thought I could just forget about him and move on and—"

"And then you found out you were pregnant."

"Two weeks before our wedding. I took the test, and it was positive, and I didn't know what to do. You were working three jobs just to afford our shitty apartment. You had student loans and no degree and—"

"So you left me for him because he had money."

"Because he had stability!" I'm shouting now too. "Because my parents said I was being irresponsible, that I needed to think about the baby, that Marcus could provide in ways you couldn't—"

"And you believed them."

His voice is quiet now.

Deadly.

"I was twenty-two and terrified and convinced I was pregnant." I'm sobbing. "I was scared, and everyone was telling me I was making a mistake, that you weren't enough, that I needed to choose the safe option—"

"So you chose him."

"Yes."

The word hangs between us.

Ten years of regret compressed into one syllable.

He drops his hand from my face, steps back.

The loss of his touch feels like amputation.

"And the baby?" he asks. "Where is this child you sacrificed everything for?"

I close my eyes.

Here it is.

The truth I've never told anyone.

The secret that's been eating me alive for a decade.

"There was no baby," I whisper.

Silence.

When I open my eyes, he's staring at me like he's never seen me before.

"What?"

"The test was wrong." My voice breaks. "It was a false positive. I was never pregnant. By the time I found out, I was already married to Marcus, and it was too late. There was no baby. There never was. Just a false positive and a lot of fear and a choice I can never take back."

He's frozen.

Completely still.

Like if he moves, he'll shatter.

"You left me for nothing."

It's not a question.

"I left you because I was scared and stupid and I believed everyone who told me you weren't enough." I'm crying so hard I can barely see him. "I left you because I thought I was making the mature choice. The responsible choice. And I've regretted it every single day since."

"Good."

The word is cold.

Final.

"You should regret it. You should wake up every morning and remember what you threw away. What we could have been." He turns back to the window, his shoulders rigid. "I spent ten years building this empire just to prove them wrong. To prove I was worthy of you. And you know what the truly fucked up part is?"

I wait.

"The moment I saw you again, the moment I touched you, I realized I don't want revenge anymore." He laughs, and it's the saddest sound I've ever heard. "I want you back. After everything—after you destroyed me, after you chose him, after ten years of hating you—I still fucking want you."

My heart stops.

"Dominic—"

"Get out."

"What?"

He finally turns to face me, and his expression is carefully blank.

"Get out of my penthouse, Elena. Go home to your husband. To the life you chose."

"You don't mean that."

"Don't I?" He walks to the bar, pours himself another drink. "I've orchestrated this entire revenge plot. I've manipulated everyone in your life. I've spent ten years and billions of dollars setting up this moment. And now that it's here, I realize I don't actually want to destroy you."

He downs the bourbon in one swallow.

"I want you to destroy yourself."

The words hit like a physical blow.

"What does that mean?"

"It means you need to make a choice, Lena. The same choice you made ten years ago. Him or me. Safety or passion. The life you have or the life you could have had."

"That's not fair—"

"I told you. Nothing about this is fair." He sets down his glass with controlled precision. "But this time, you get to make the choice knowing exactly who I am. What I've become. What I'm offering."

"And what are you offering?"

He crosses the room in three strides, backs me against the wall.

His hands frame my face, and his eyes are burning into mine.

"Everything," he breathes. "My empire. My fortune. My fucking soul. Everything I've built, everything I've become—it's all yours if you want it."

"Dominic—"

"But you have to choose. You have to walk away from him. From your marriage. From the safe, respectable life you've been hiding in for the past decade." His thumb traces my lower lip. "You have to choose me knowing exactly what you're getting into. A man who's spent ten years plotting revenge. A man who's manipulated everyone in your life. A man who's still so fucking in love with you he can barely breathe when you're near him."

I can't breathe either.

His scent surrounds me—cedar and bourbon and something darker, something that smells like possession and promise and danger.

"I can't just—"

"Yes, you can." His forehead drops to mine. "You can walk out that door right now and go back to Marcus. File for divorce. End your marriage. And then you can come back here and let me spend the rest of my life proving that I'm enough. That I've always been enough."

"And if I don't?"

His jaw clenches.

"Then this was all for nothing, and I'll disappear again. You'll never see me again. I'll sell the company, leave the city, and you can go back to pretending you made the right choice ten years ago."

"That's not—"

"That's the deal, Lena. All or nothing. Me or him. Choose."

But before I can answer, before I can even process what he's asking, a voice cuts through the tension.

"Well, Elena. This is interesting."

We both freeze.

Turn toward the elevator.

Marcus is standing there, his key card in hand, his expression unreadable.

"Tell us both," he says with deadly calm. "What really happened ten—"