After My Groom Returned with His Secret Family

The security alert comes at three in the morning. My phone vibrates against the nightstand, pulling me from a dream where I'm drowning in champagne bubbles and vintage watches.

I don't check it. Not immediately. I lie in the dark of my Seattle apartment, listening to the rain hammer against the windows, and wonder if this is what freedom feels like—this hollow ache where devotion used to live.

The phone buzzes again. Then again.

I reach for it. The screen burns my eyes. Three messages from Anders.

*Don't panic.*

*Someone accessed your office server.*

*I'm handling it.*

My pulse kicks up. I'm out of bed, pulling on clothes, my fingers clumsy with adrenaline. The merger documents. The forensic accounting files on Jonathan. Everything that could destroy this alliance is on that server.

Anders calls before I can.

"Where are you?" I ask.

"Your office. Don't come here. Go home. I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"Anders—"

"Trust me."

The line goes dead.

***

He arrives in fifteen minutes, his hair wet from the rain, carrying a laptop under his arm. I'm still in my pajamas—silk, but wrinkled. No makeup. My eyes are swollen from crying over a photograph I found while unpacking. Me and Felix at his college graduation, his arm around my shoulders, both of us laughing at something I can't remember anymore.

Anders stops in the doorway. His eyes take in my bare face, the photo still on the coffee table, the tissue box beside it.

"I'm fine," I say, before he can ask.

He closes the door. Locks it. Sets the laptop on the dining table and opens it without a word. The screen glows blue in the dim apartment.

"Someone planted falsified emails on your server," he says. "They're designed to look like you've been leaking Griffin trade secrets to Hartwell Industries."

My stomach drops. Hartwell is our biggest competitor. "When?"

"Two hours ago. They used the guest Wi-Fi from the Griffin estate." He pulls up a log file, lines of code I can barely parse. "Cleo's iPad."

The name lands like a slap.

"She was at the estate?" My voice sounds distant, like it belongs to someone else.

"Felix brought her and the boy for a 'family visit.' My mother was... displeased." Anders's jaw tightens. "Security logged her device when she connected. She accessed your office remotely through a VPN, but she's not smart enough to cover her digital footprint."

I sink into the chair across from him. "She's trying to sabotage the merger."

"She's trying to eliminate you." Anders turns the laptop toward me. "If these emails surface during the board meeting next week, the Griffins will pull out. Your father will blame you. Felix gets what he wants—you back in New York, powerless, dependent."

The photograph on the coffee table stares at me. Felix's arm around my shoulders. My smile, so genuine it hurts to look at.

"What do we do?" I ask.

Anders reaches into his jacket and pulls out a handkerchief. White linen, monogrammed. He hands it to me, and I realize my face is wet.

"We let her think it worked," he says quietly. "We let the trap play out. And when she springs it, we show the board exactly who planted the evidence."

I wipe my eyes. The handkerchief smells like cedar and rain. "You want to use me as bait."

"I want to give you the weapon to destroy her."

Our eyes meet across the table. In the blue glow of the laptop, his face is all sharp angles and shadows.

"Okay," I whisper.

He closes the laptop. Stands. But he doesn't leave. He walks around the table and sits beside me, close enough that I can feel the warmth radiating from his body.

"He doesn't deserve your tears," Anders says, nodding toward the photograph.

I look at Felix's face, frozen in a moment when I believed in forever. "I know."

"Then why?"

"Because I gave him five years." My voice cracks. "Because I built his empire while he was building a family with someone else. Because I was so stupid—"

"You weren't stupid." Anders's hand covers mine. "You were loyal. There's a difference."

The touch is gentle. Grounding. Nothing like Felix's desperate grasping at the estate, his fingers always reaching, never holding.

"We should prepare for the board meeting," I say, but I don't move.

Neither does he.

***

Three days later, we're still preparing. The conference room in Anders's private office has become our war room. Takeout containers litter the table—Thai food, barely touched. It's past midnight. The city below is a scatter of lights against the dark water.

"The watch," Anders says suddenly. "The Patek Philippe she wears. What does it mean to you?"

I set down my pen. We've been reviewing the merger terms for hours, and my eyes are burning. "Why?"

"Because every time she wears it, you stop breathing."

I'm silent for a long moment. The rain has started again, soft against the windows.

"I had it made for Felix," I say finally. "Custom. Vintage movement, modern case. I had it engraved: 'Time brought you home.' I sent it to him in Prague, two years into his absence. I thought..." I laugh, but it sounds broken. "I thought it would remind him what he was coming back to."

"And he gave it to her."

"Like it meant nothing."

Anders stands. He walks around the table and stops in front of my chair. His hands reach for my face, and I freeze.

But he's not touching my face. He's touching my ears.

His fingers are gentle as he removes my diamond earrings, one at a time. The weight disappears, and I feel suddenly naked.

"Your armor," he says softly, setting them on the table. "You don't need it with me."

I look up at him. His gray eyes are steady, patient, seeing everything I've tried to hide.

"Anders—"

"You don't need to be defensive," he says. "Not here. Not with me."

His thumb brushes my cheekbone, and the touch is so tender it breaks something inside me. Not my heart—that's already broken. Something deeper. The wall I built to survive Felix's betrayal.

I stand. We're inches apart. I can feel his breath, warm against my forehead.

"This is dangerous," I whisper.

"I know."

"The merger—"

"Isn't why I'm here."

His hand slides to the back of my neck, and when he kisses me, it's nothing like Felix. There's no desperation, no ghosts. Just the present moment, solid and real and mine.

When we break apart, I'm breathless.

"We have a board meeting to win," I say.

Anders smiles. "We will."

And for the first time since the gala, I believe in something other than revenge.

I believe in this.