My Accidental Billionaire Husband (Katia and Julian) novel Chapter 338

not having a conversation through a metal box while I’m standing on my own porch. Do you have any idea how ridiculous this looks?”

“It’s not your house anymore,” she replied, and I could hear the faint, mocking amusement in her tone. “It’s mine. I have the security, I have the deed, and more importantly, I have our son. You lost the right to walk through this door the moment you decided that seven years of marriage was a secret you could keep from me. Did you really think I wouldn’t eventually notice the discrepancy?” 1

“I did what I thought was best!” I yelled, the frustration boiling over. “I was trying to keep our lives from being torn apart! You think you’re punishing me, but you’re just creating a spectacle for the staff.”

“A spectacle?” Katia laughed, a sharp, biting sound. “Julian, you’re the one standing on the curb like a solicitor I’m the one inside, living in the reality you tried to pretend didn’t exist. You kept the truth from me for a year after you realized who I was. You watched me, you lived with me, and you lied to me every single day. Did you think I was just going to wait for you to decide when I was ready to know? You didn’t give me a choice, so don’t you dare act like you have one now.”

“I am his father, Katia,” I said, my voice dropping to a low, guttural growl. “You don’t get to deny me access to my son. I know he’s in there. I know he’s looking for me.”

“You were his ‘Dad’ for a year while you kept his mother in the dark,” she snapped, and I could hear the shift in her breathing. “Don’t you dare talk to me about rights. You forfeited those when you treated our life like a strategy game. You wanted to play the mysterious benefactor? Fine. Enjoy the view from the sidewalk. I’m sure the cold will do wonders for your perspective.”

“Open the door,” I demanded, pounding on the wood again. “I’m not leaving. I have every right to be in that house.

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“Good,” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper that sounded like a threat. “Stay there as long as you like. Maybe the securities will enjoy the show. But if you try to force your way in, I will have security throw you back into the gutter. And believe me, Julian, I have already instructed them to do it with extreme prejudice. They are no longer your employees; they are mine.”

The intercom cut out with a sharp click that sounded like a final judgment.

I stood there in the dark. I knew Aiden was probably in his room, oblivious to the fact that his father was being shut out by his mother. I had spent a year playing the part of a man who had everything under control, only to realize that the person I had been molding, my own wife, had been waiting for the exact right moment to turn the

table.

She wasn’t just my wife. She was my equal. And God help me, I had never wanted her more than I did in this moment of absolute, total rejection. The irony was suffocating. I had spent years running from the truth of our connection, and now that the truth was fully exposed, it was the very thing she was using to keep me at bay.

“Katia!” I shouted, but the house remained silent, the lights glowing like a taunt.

She had won this round, and she had done it with the kind of ruthless, beautiful efficiency that made my blood run hot. I stood there, caught between the urge to break down the door and the realization that if I did, I would only be proving her point. She wanted me to lose my composure. She wanted me to be the desperate, chaotic husband. And as much as I hated the position I was in, I couldn’t help but admire the way she had dismantled my defenses.

I was Julian Windsor, and for the first time in my life, I had absolutely no leverage. Every move I had made to protect our family had been a move she had interpreted as a betrayal. And looking back, it was hard to argue with her. I had treated her like a secret to be kept rather than a partner to be trusted.

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I leaned my forehead against the cool, dark wood of the door, closing my eyes. I could smell the faint scent of her perfume lingering on the threshold-a ghost of the woman who had walked away and the woman who was now holding my entire world hostage.

If I walked away now, I was admitting defeat. If I stayed, I was just a beggar at my own gate. There was no easy path forward, and that was exactly how she wanted it. She was forcing me to feel the weight of every lie, every omission, and every year of silence. And the worst part? As I stood there in the damp night air, I realized that I

would stand here for as long as it took if it meant seeing her again. I was trapped by my own desires, bound by the very woman I had tried to keep at a distance.

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His Son Needs Him

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His Son Needs Him

~Katia~

I woke up to the sound of small feet in the hallway.

I sat up in bed, still half asleep, and by the time my eyes adjusted to the dark, Aiden was already standing in my doorway in his pajamas, clutching the edge of his blanket in one hand.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” I said, pulling the covers back so he could climb in beside me. “Did you have a bad dream.

He shook his head and climbed onto the bed anyway, curling up close to me the way he used to when he was much smaller, his knees pulled up to his chest.

“I can’t sleep,” he said.

“Why not?”

He didn’t answer right away. I waited, running my hand slowly over his hair, and after a while he spoke again, his voice small in the dark room.

“When I used to stay at Gigi’s and Aunt Gail’s, Dad would come by at night,” he said. “He would read me a story. Sometimes two if I asked nicely enough. And then he would fall asleep on my bed because he said the chair hurt his back.” He paused. “I miss him.”

I didn’t say anything for a moment. I kept my hand moving through his hair, giving myself a second to figure out how to answer my son honestly without unloading things on him that belonged to the adults in his life and not to him.

“I know you do,” I said finally.

“Is he coming back?” Aiden asked.

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