Page 98 of Discretion at Its Finest

Silence stretched between us again… Then, before I could think to stop it, my hand lifted slow and pressed against the glass between us.

I didn’t even know why I did it. Maybe because I hadn’t touched him in weeks and this was the closest I’d ever get again.

Reid went completely still as his gaze dropped to my hand. Then slowly, and deliberately, he lifted his own and set it against the glass opposite mine.

Our palms lined up through the barrier, not touching, but touching. For the moment, I convinced myself it was enough.

“…Are you getting enough sleep?” he asked, his possessive tone running straight through me.

I shook my head gently.

His jaw shifted. “Eating?”

That I responded to honestly. “Yes.”

“Don’t lie to me, Vieve,” he pressed, and I rolled my eyes, a smile coming to my lips at his complete seriousness, my hand toying with the glass separating our hands, trying to feel his warmth.

“I’m not, I promise.” It was the truth. I could choose not to sleep, but I had no choice but to eat. Especially with how hungry the baby—

My hand paused on the glass and Reid instantly noticed. “What is it?”

Realization dawned on me.I still needed to tell him I was pregnant.I dropped my eyes to the table, blinking hard, my hand slowly lowering, the soft moment between us gone.

He was tense on the other side of the glass.

“Reid,” I muttered before meeting his eyes once more, “I need to tell you something.”

Chapter thirty-eight

Reid

Genevieve sat before me, perched so small on that metal stool, hands shaking, eyes already glossed with fear she couldn’t hide. My heart clenched before I could stop it, an involuntary reaction I’d spent the last few weeks trying to kill. If three years apart hadn’t managed to cauterize the wound she left inside me, I was a fool for thinking confinement would.

I wasn’t supposed to feel anything when I saw her. Not wanting, resentment, especially not hope. Because hope was the exact thing that would ruin me.

Ruin her and whatever fragile thread existed between us.

And that’s what I’d told myself, over and over. And the second I sat down, the second she lifted that phone, something in me hardened.

I told myself I wouldn’t soften, wouldn’t let her see what her absence had done to me or feel anything when I saw her. I had to push her away somehow. I had to find a way to distance myself from her.

Because I was in federal custody. The elites behind these walls were watching everything… Always watching me, nowher. As ofright then, I was not the powerful arrogant bastard that stormed back into her life.

I was contained leverage, an asset being re-assessed until they decided what they wanted from me.

But the moment her voice cracked, all those empty promises went to hell. The moment she cried, I felt the urge to reach through the glass to hold her, to storm over to the guard and knock him clean out for even allowing her in to see me like this. I was ready to break every rule in this building and every rule I’d tried setting for myself to get to her.

Every strategy I constructed in my mind to keep her away from me fell apart the longer she cried. And I couldn’t do a damn thing to stop her crying from in here.

At some point it was no use lying to myself either. Because I still wanted things I had no right wanting. Still wanted the family I was deprived of and the son who already looked at me like I meant the world to him. I wanted the woman I’d dreamed of every night since I met her until now.

I couldn’t let her hear those thoughts, clinging to the idea of us. Not while I was locked away and she was drowning in chaos. The men who put me in here could turn her into collateral without blinking.

But I couldn’t fucking let her go either.

Eventually, something in her expression shifted. Then her voice wavered, barely audible through the receiver. “Reid… I have to tell you something.”

My chest tightened, but I kept eyes on her as she mustered up the courage to say it.