But not goodbye either.
Their child moved again beneath their hands.
Dominic smiled before he could stop himself.
Grace saw it and remembered the man she had once believed existed beneath all that control.
Maybe he had always been there.
Maybe love had never been the lie.
The lie had been Dominic’s belief that love could survive without trust.
That night, beneath the quiet chandeliers of the Vale estate, Grace did not return as someone who belonged to Dominic’s kingdom.
She returned as herself.
And if Dominic wanted a place beside her and their child, he understood at last that he would not earn it through power, money, fear, or the Vale name.
He would earn it the ordinary way.
One truthful choice at a time.
