~Katia~

“Get out!” my mom screamed, her voice tearing through the hallway like a bomb going off in a small room.

The sound hit the walls and bounced back so violently, like the house itself was flinching. Even the air felt startled, buzzing with the kind of tension that makes your skin crawl. My heart slammed against my ribs, not from surprise, but from inevitability. This was the moment I’d been bracing for since the pregnancy test turned positive, since the ring had caught her eye, since her fantasy version of my life collapsed like a cheap stage prop.

I didn’t even flinch because I knew it would come to this. I just knew it. The second she saw the ring, the second her fantasy of me being some corporate bride-to-be shattered, I could feel the sentence forming behind her teeth. I could practically hear the gears turning in her head, grinding down whatever affection she pretended to have left for me and replacing it with raw rage. And there it was. A weapon wrapped in spite and fury.

“Martha, stop it!” my dad barked, stepping toward her like he might physically block the words from coming out of her mouth. “She needs to tell us who got her pregnant. That’s what we need to focus on!”

That was cute. He thought logic was still on the table. He thought this was still a conversation and not a public execution.

“I don’t care!” she snapped. “She was supposed to marry Julian Windsor! And now, now she’s pregnant for some crazy man!”

She spat the word like it tasted poisonous. Her eyes dragged over my face, scanning for shame, for tears, for something she could grab onto and weaponize. Her mouth twisted like she’d already decided I disgusted her more than usual, which honestly felt like a competitive sport in this house.

“Do you even know who got you pregnant?” she hissed.

Did it matter?

I stayed quiet. My silence only made her louder and more unhinged. It always did. Silence terrified her. It meant she didn’t have control.

But let’s be real: she didn’t care about the truth. She didn’t care about my body or my decisions or even the baby growing inside me. She cared about Julian Windsor.

Julian fucking Windsor. The man I was apparently betrothed to, like I was livestock in some Victorian tragedy. A man I’d never met. Never spoken to. Never even seen in real life or on a screen or on a grainy news clip. He existed in theory and in contracts and in whispered business conversations behind closed doors.

Not that I didn’t try. Delia and I had searched him online once late at night, half curious, half bored, scrolling through search results like teenagers hunting for gossip, but we found nothing. No photos, no online interviews, no social media presence. Not even a blurry LinkedIn profile or a suspicious Wikipedia stub. Julian Windsor didn’t exist, not in the way normal people exist. All we knew was that he was ridiculously rich. Like old-money, owns-an-island, probably-has-a-butler-named-Cedric rich. The kind of rich that doesn’t need publicity because money itself is already power.

And for some reason, my parents thought tossing me at him like a bargaining chip would fix everything wrong with their company, their reputation, and their fragile egos.

My pregnancy ruined that plan. And no, I couldn’t tell them I didn’t know who the father was. Not because I was ashamed; shame was a luxury emotion in this house, but because I didn’t have an answer. Vegas was a blur of neon lights, alcohol-soaked memories, half-remembered laughter, a ring, a promise made in chaos, and a reality I hadn’t fully unpacked yet. I couldn’t hand them a name even if my life depended on it.

“Oh my God, Kat, you’re pregnant?” Delia’s voice sliced through the tension like an excited knife.

Great. Just what I needed. The audience had arrived.

She appeared at the top of the stairs, barefoot, wearing one of those silky little nightgowns she always saved for dramatic moments, like she was auditioning for some spoiled heiress role in her own fantasy movie. Her hair was twisted into that perfectly messy updo that probably took thirty minutes and three hair products to achieve. She leaned against the railing, eyes sparkling like she was about to witness something deliciously scandalous.

She looked down at me like I was a soap opera she’d been waiting to binge. “Does that mean…” she gasped, pressing a hand to her chest theatrically, “I’ll be the one marrying Julian Windsor?” She said it like she just won a billion-dollar lottery.

I scoffed, dryly and bitterly. “Glad to see someone’s living the dream.”

Delia didn’t even pretend to be offended. Her smile widened like Christmas had come early.

I turned toward my mom, hoping maybe this was the moment she’d shut Delia down. That she’d say no, that she’d insist I was still the daughter promised, that she wouldn’t trade me in like defective merchandise.

But she didn’t. She looked at my dad. And she smiled. “David,” she said softly, with that tone that always meant a scheme was sharpening its claws.

My dad hesitated. His eyes met mine for a split second. Dark. Tired. Worn down by years of surrender. I saw the exact moment he folded, the exact moment he decided peace was more important than protecting me.

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