Then I heard his footsteps coming closer.
“Emma?” Liam called from the hallway. “You okay?”
I stared at the test in my shaking hand, realizing I had only seconds to hide the one secret Alessandro Vitali could never be allowed to find.
But how do you hide a pregnancy when the entire identity you’ve been living is a lie?
👇
The doorknob jiggled.
It didn’t turn all the way. The old lock Liam never fixed caught, and the door rattled in its frame.
“Emma?” His voice was closer now, just on the other side of the wood. “You’ve been in there ten minutes. Your shift starts in twenty.”
My breath came short and too loud. I stared at the white plastic stick and the two impossible pink lines bleeding into certainty.
I shoved it into the empty toilet paper roll on instinct, pushed the cardboard tube to the back of the trash can, under a tissue.
My hands were still shaking when I unlocked the door.
Liam stood there in his faded Northwestern hoodie, holding two mugs. Steam curled around his face. He took one look at me — barefoot, uniform half-zipped, eyes red — and his smile fell.
“Hey,” he said softly. “Hey, what happened?”
“Nothing,” I said too quickly. “Stomach bug. I’m fine.”
He didn’t move. Liam had known me since I was seven, since my mom used to cut his hair in our kitchen because his mom worked nights. He knew every version of my lying face.
“You’re pale as paper,” he said. He held out the mug. “You sure?”
I took it because my hands needed something to hold. The coffee burned my palms. I couldn’t look at him.
Behind him, my phone buzzed on the hallway table. Then again. And again.
Liam glanced back. “You’ve got like six missed calls. Same number. No caller ID.”
Ice shot through my stomach. Only one person called from a blocked number.
Damien Cross.
The man who had paid me three thousand dollars to walk into that gala as Emma, to get close enough to Alessandro Vitali to copy the files from his foundation’s private drive.
The man who told me Emma was just a girl who used to work for Alessandro, a girl who disappeared, and all I had to do was borrow her name for one night.
My phone buzzed again.
Liam frowned. “You want me to answer?”
“No!” The word came out sharp, raw. I grabbed the phone, silenced it. My thumb hovered over the screen, slick with sweat. A text preview glowed there.
*You missed check-in, Emma. We need to talk about what you took from 1520. Tonight. Or I talk to Vitali for you.*
The floor tilted.
He knew I’d been in the room. He thought I’d stolen something.
Liam’s eyes flicked from my face to the phone. “Em, who is that?”
“No one. Wrong number.”
“Liar.” His voice was gentle, but it cracked. “Elizabeth, talk to me.”
Hearing my real name from his mouth after weeks of being Emma made my eyes fill instantly. Tears spilled before I could stop them.
“I messed up,” I whispered. “Liam, I really messed up.”
He set both mugs down without looking and pulled me into his chest. I was stiff at first, then I folded. I cried into his hoodie and he just held the back of my head, his hand big and steady.
“What did you do?” he murmured into my hair.
I couldn’t say the words *I’m pregnant* out loud. Not yet. Not with Damien threatening to blow my life apart.
“I took a job,” I said against his shoulder. “A guy paid me to go to that gala. To pretend to be someone else. To get close to Alessandro. I was supposed to just get photos of his schedule, his office. I didn’t. I swear I didn’t take anything. But now he says I did.”
Liam went very still.
“Who paid you?”
“Damien Cross. He owns half the riverfront. He said Alessandro ruined him. He found me through Marla, my catering supervisor. He said it was easy money. I needed the money for tuition.” My voice broke. “I was supposed to be invisible. I was supposed to never see Alessandro again.”
Liam pulled back just enough to look at me. His jaw was tight. “And did you see him again?”
I stared at the floor. My bare toes curled against the cold tile.
“Once,” I whispered. “That night.”
Understanding moved across Liam’s face slowly, then all at once. His eyes dropped to my stomach before he could stop them, then shot back up, full of shock and something softer.
“Oh,” he said quietly. “Oh, Elizabeth.”
I shook my head hard, tears coming faster. “Don’t. Don’t say it. If I say it out loud it becomes real and I don’t know how to be real right now.”
He didn’t say it. He just crouched a little so we were eye level, his hands on my shoulders.
“Does Alessandro know who you are? The real you?”
“No. He thinks I’m Emma. A catering girl.”
