Chapter 11 011
RYAN
The words were out before I could stop them.
“I want a DNA test.”
The second they left my mouth, I knew I’d detonated something I couldn’t take back.
Emily stared at me like I’d slapped her.
The color drained from her face so fast it was painful to watch, like someone had reached inside her and pulled the plug. Her lips parted, but for a long, awful second, no sound came out at all. She just stood there, frozen, carrying Zara against her chest as if instinct alone knew she needed protecting.
Zara squirmed in her arms, little fingers tugging at Emily’s necklace, bored and restless and blissfully unaware that the ground beneath us had just split wide open.
“What the hell are you talking about, Ryan?” Emily finally whispered.
Her voice wasn’t angry. That was the worst part. It was thin. Shaken. Petrified. Like she couldn’t reconcile the man standing in front of her with the one who used to kiss her forehead in the mornings and promise her forever without hesitation.
Like she couldn’t believe I was asking her to prove that the child she carried was mine.
I swallowed hard. My throat felt like sandpaper. My chest burned.
“I want a DNA test,” I said again, quieter this time.
It didn’t soften the blow. The words still landed like stones.
Aaron stepped forward, his hand half-raised, eyes darting between us. “Ryan, come on—”
“Please,” I said to him.
Aaron stopped. His shoulders sagged slightly as he raised both hands and backed off a step. He knew that tone. He’d heard it before—late nights, empty bottles, me staring at the ceiling replaying every mistake I’d ever made with her, with us.
Emily let out a short, broken laugh.
It held no humor. No warmth. It sounded like something snapping under pressure.
“Fine,” she said. “Fine. You want a DNA test?” She nodded once, sharp and decisive, like she was sealing something shut. “You’ll get it. Okay? Just send me the details of the hospital you want us to do it at.”
She didn’t wait for me to respond.
Didn’t give me a chance to explain that I didn’t doubt her, that this wasn’t about mistrust the way it sounded, that I was drowning and grasping for anything solid enough to hold me above water.
She shifted Zara higher on her hip and turned on her heel, heels clicking decisively against the marble floor.
Zara whined, craning her neck to look back at the glittering ballroom doors. “Mommy, but we didn’t see the pretty lights yet…”
Emily pressed her lips to the top of Zara’s curls, eyes squeezed shut for just a second too long. “Next time, baby girl. I promise.”
Then they were gone.
The heavy glass doors swung shut behind them, and the night swallowed them whole.
I stood there, rooted to the marble floor, my chest so tight I could barely draw breath. The jazz drifting from the ballroom felt mocking now—too cheerful, too careless. Like it belonged to a world I no longer lived in.
Aaron turned on me the second they disappeared.
“What the fuck, man?” he snapped.
I rubbed the back of my neck hard, like I could physically scrub the moment away. “I know.”
“That little girl is your exact replica,” he said. “Anyone with two working eyes can see she’s yours.”
“I know,” I snapped back.
Then, softer. Quieter. Almost pleading. “I know, okay? I don’t know why I said that.”
Aaron scoffed, crossing his arms. “Well, I hope you didn’t just spoil every chance you had with her. Because you were doing so great with the whole calm-and-reasonable act.”
A shaky breath left me. It might’ve been a laugh if it hadn’t been so broken. “I panicked.”
He waited.
“Seeing her walk in with Zara,” I continued, voice rough, “seeing them together like that… I needed something solid. Something real. Proof. Because the second I looked at that kid, I knew.”
Aaron’s expression softened just a fraction.
“And that scared the hell out of me,” I admitted.
He shook his head slowly. “You’re an idiot sometimes, you know that?”
“Yeah,” I muttered. “I’ve heard.”
We stood there in the quiet lobby for a long minute as the music drifted out slowly.
I finally looked at him. “Why exactly did you tell me to come with you tonight, Aaron?”
He shrugged, but his eyes were too honest. “I hoped you guys would talk. Really talk. I hoped you’d finally get your head out of your ass and see what you’re doing to yourself.”
I said nothing.
“You’ve been miserable ever since you left her,” he went on. “I tried everything—beers, road trips, new projects, new women. Nothing stuck. You’re not happy, Ryan. You’re just… existing.”
I rubbed both hands over my face. My skin felt hot. Too tight. “I need to go. I don’t know… I don’t know how I feel.”
Aaron nodded slowly. “Yeah. Go. Breathe. Call me when you’re ready to stop punishing yourself for something that happened three years ago.”
I turned toward the exit.
At the exact same moment, Frederick stepped out of the event doors.
He saw me and smirked.
That slow, smug curl of his lips that always made my blood boil. Like he still owned the room. Like he still owned her.
“My man,” he drawled.
I saw red.
I rushed forward, my fist already pulled back, rage roaring in my ears. Aaron was faster. He grabbed my arm and yanked me to a stop.
“Hey. Hey. Easy.”
“You bastard,” I growled at Frederick. I wanted to punch his face since I never got the chance to do that three years ago.
He didn’t flinch. Didn’t even step back. Just smiled wider, like he was untouchable. “Watch me, Thompson,” he said lazily. “I’ll get her again. Just watch me.”
My vision tunneled.
“I didn’t have the connections then,” I shot back, voice shaking with fury. “But I do now, Lang. Try me. Try me and I’ll fuck you up.”
Aaron moved between us, his hand firm against my chest. “You have to leave now,” he told Frederick, his tone leaving zero room for argument.
Frederick smirked one last time, gave a lazy two-finger salute, and walked away.
Casual. Untouched.
Like he hadn’t just threatened to take back the only woman I’d ever loved.
Aaron turned to me, voice low. “You have to calm down.”
I shrugged his hand off. My skin buzzed. Everything felt too loud, too bright, too wrong. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
I didn’t argue.
I just turned and walked out of the hotel without saying another word.
The night air hit me like a bucket of ice water and I sucked in a deep breath letting it burn my lungs.
I found my car, climbed in, shut the door, and sat there with my hands gripping the steering wheel so tight my knuckles went white.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
I pulled it out with shaking fingers.
A text from an unknown number.
Send the hospital details this night, latest, tomorrow. Don’t make this harder than it has to be. – Emily.
I stared at the words until they blurred.
Then I dropped my head against the steering wheel and let out a breath I’d been holding for three years.
She was right.
I’d made it hard enough already.