Chapter 1 - The Six Unanswered CallsThe sterile, rhythmic beep of the heart monitor in Room 314 was the only sound breaking the heavy silence of the early morning.

I stood two feet from the foot of Elise’s bed, my broad six-foot-two frame frozen beneath the fluorescent lights. My wool coat was thrown carelessly over my arm, my shirt unbuttoned at the collar, my dark hair disheveled from racing across Chicago.

Elise sat upright against the pillows, her dark hair pulled back into a loose knot, her pale skin contrasting sharply with the deep purple smudges of exhaustion under her hazel eyes. The red line from her oxygen mask was still visible along her jawline, yet her posture was unbending, quiet, and sovereign.

"I tried six times, Grant," Elise spoke. Her voice was scratchy from smoke inhalation, barely above a whisper, but every word fell into the room like a heavy iron weight.

I shook my head, my hands trembling as I reached out toward the footboard. "That’s impossible, Elise. I never received a letter, a call, or a message from you after the separation papers were signed in October."

Elise offered a small, humorless smile—a look of profound, ancient fatigue that cut deeper than any blade.

"Attempts one and two were in November," Elise revealed softly, her hazel eyes locking onto mine with razor-sharp clarity. "I was eight weeks pregnant when the morning sickness began. I walked into the lobby of Holloway Enterprises on Michigan Avenue. I asked your executive assistant, Sophia Reynolds, for ten minutes of your time."

My stomach plummeted into a cold, bottomless void. "Sophia...?"

"Sophia looked at my coat, looked at the ringless finger on my hand, and told me you were in a closed-door acquisition meeting," Elise continued, her tone deadpan and clinical. "She told me—and I quote—‘Mr. Holloway has made it clear that personal matters from his dissolved marriage are to be handled strictly through legal counsel.’ She refused to validate my parking, Grant. I threw up in the parking garage drain on 8th Street before I could even drive home."

I felt the blood drain completely from my face.

"I... I didn't know," I stammered, my voice cracking into a ragged thread. "Sophia never gave me a message."

"Attempt three was in January," Elise said, ignoring my plea. "After the twelve-week ultrasound confirmed twins. I sent a certified courier envelope marked PERSONAL & CONFIDENTIAL—MEDICAL directly to your penthouse at the Ritz-Carlton. I included the ultrasound images showing two distinct heartbeats."

My pulse hammered against my ears like a sledgehammer.

"Attempt four," Elise proceeded, her voice unyielding, "was in March. When my apartment lease in Lincoln Park was up for renewal, and I needed your signature on the trust severance papers so I could access my late mother's inheritance to buy cribs. I called your personal line six times in one afternoon."

"My phone was replaced in March!" I bellowed in desperate self-hatred, taking a step closer to her bed. "The firm executed an emergency server migration after the cyber-audit! My old device was wiped!"

"And attempt five," Elise whispered, her eyes shining with sudden, suppressed tears that she refused to let fall, "was in May. When I went into premature labor at twenty-six weeks at St. Joseph’s Hospital. I was terrified, Grant. I thought I was going to lose them both. The attending nurse called your chief security officer, Marcus Vance, on his emergency line, telling him your wife was in labor with twins."

The air in Room 314 completely turned to ice.

I stood paralyzed. Marcus Vance—my chief security director for nine years, the man who lived in the suite next to mine, the man who handled every aspect of my life.

"Do you know what Marcus told the head nurse, Grant?" Elise asked, her voice cracking into a quiet, devastating whisper.

"What...?" I choked out.

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"He told her that Mr. Holloway was currently hosting a six-million-dollar gala for international investors at the Drake Hotel, and that 'faking a high-risk pregnancy' was an old, pathetic tactic that would result in a restraining order."

I dropped flat onto both knees beside her hospital bed, the floorboards cold beneath me, burying my face in the scratchy white blanket, my broad shoulders shaking violently as a guttural sob tore through my chest.