The Divorced Military Queen Awakens (by Sadie Baxter) novel Chapter 602

From the one who hates you more than anyone else alive.

Julius stared at the letter. Every line seethed with loathing for his father, and not once did it mention him. It was as though he had never existed for her, not even in passing.

It struck him then that perhaps he had never occupied even a corner of her heart, not for a single, fragile heartbeat. The letter was hardly lengthy, yet every sentence dripped with venom thick enough to stain the page. And he—fool that he was—had still dared to hope for something tender between the lines.

Quinn, noticing the color drain from his face, touched his arm. "What is it? What does the letter say?"

"It was written for my father, not for me." He handed the pages to her, his voice flat.

Quinn skimmed the letter, eyes moving fast. The sentences were few, yet each dripped with venom.

"I actually dared to hope," Julius muttered, "that my mother had left me even a single word. But of course she didn't. To her, I was nothing but a blemish."

He shook his head at his own foolishness. He had always known she despised him. In her rages, she had wrapped her fingers around his throat, desperate for him to die. He was her living sin, a constant reminder of the moment she most wished to forget.

"You're not a stain on my life—you're the person I love more fiercely than anyone else on this earth!" Quinn blurted, her voice quivering as tears burned behind her eyes. She crashed against Julius' chest and locked her arms around his neck. "I'm sorry. I should have read the letter first—I never meant to hand it over and let you dream."

Regret flooded her so swiftly that it stole the air from her lungs. She wondered how she could have been so careless. Had she skimmed those pages first, she might have offered a warning, a small cushion against the hope now shattered in his hands.

"None of this is your fault." Julius lifted his gaze, pinning her with eyes so dark and steady they felt like anchors. "I once cursed fate for dropping me into this world, but now I thank it for leading me to you."

He whispered the admission, then pressed a feather-light kiss to the center of her forehead.

"Thank you, Quinn, for loving me," he breathed, a confession soaked in gratitude and wonder.

In the colorless wasteland he once called life, she had become his lone salvation, the single shaft of light that refused to dim.

For that radiance, he would pay any price, tear down any wall, extinguish any threat that dared inch toward her. Even—if it came to it—his own father.

At the entrance of Jexburgh's premier maternity hospital, a sleek procession of black sedans rolled to a stop beneath the muted streetlights.

Doors swung open in silent unison. Dozens of professional bodyguards, identical in tailored charcoal suits and discreet earpieces, spilled out and formed a living corridor around Julius and Quinn as they headed inside.

More guards were already stationed throughout the lobby, their watchful eyes feeding real-time footage into the Whitethorn security network. Every heartbeat in the building now pulsed beneath the family's invisible lens.

Every line of ink held his full attention. This paper proclaimed that a child carrying both their blood and their stories was quietly, determinedly taking shape.

In just a handful of months, that fragile heartbeat would arrive in his arms, warm and real.

"This child will come into the world safely—I want to hear our baby call me Dad," he whispered, almost as if making a pact with the universe.

"You'll have to wait a few more months," Quinn teased, a smile curving the corners of her mouth. "But it will be here before we know it."

Time, she thought, sometimes slipped past in the blink of an eye.

"If my mother's illness is really genetic, what will that mean for our child?" Julius asked, worry etching deep lines beside his mouth.

Tracing the shadowy history of her mother's family would demand patience—and time he did not yet possess. Even the attending physician stood speechless, momentarily stunned by

"We can sit beside our baby through every procedure," Quinn said, certainty sharpening her normally gentle tone. "Besides, I feel it in my bones—your father's warning is wrong, and nothing will happen to our child."