Page 131 of Knocked Up By the Silver Foxes

Asher’s already moving.

I put my hand up, just out, and he stops, and I can feel all three of them behind me going completely still.

I look at my dad. Then at my mom, who’s gone flat and closed off the way she does when she’s decided not to be accountable for what’s happening in the room.

“You’re right,” I tell him. “I wouldn’t be here without you.” And I mean it the way it’s actually true, not the way he meant it. “I wouldn’t know what love isn’t without you two teaching me. It’s not using your daughter to close a deal. It’s not pressuring her to lie about a former employer so you can make money off a situation she had nothing to do with. Love is being the example. It’s guiding your child to trust themselves, to leave this world better than they found it. That’s the mother I want to be. That’s who I’m choosing to be, because you spent twenty-four years showing me exactly what not to.”

My mom stares at me. Something moves through her expression that might be the first real thing I’ve seen from her in years.

“You’re pregnant?”

I smile, and it’s the most genuine smile I’ve had in this room all morning. “I am. And they’re going to have me and three fathers who’ll love them and show up for them every single day. They won’t have you. Because you taught me that being without you is better than being with you. And I believe you.”

The door opens and two officers from the Police Nationale step in with the unhurried authority of people who have everything they need and aren’t in a rush about it.

“You can’t do this to us!” My father shouts, struggling against the officers.

“Harper, please,” my mom pleads, but I don’t take any action to help them.

They brought this on themselves.

They’re escorted out, and I watch them go, and for the first time in my life I watch them leave without wondering if I handled it wrong.

Then Killian’s arm comes around my shoulders and Maddox’s hand finds my waist and Asher steps in front of me and pulls me in, and I let all three of them happen at once because I’m almost six months pregnant and I just looked my parents in the face and told them the truth and my legs are doing their best.

“You didn’t need us here,” Killian says, low, against my hair.

“I know,” I say. “But I’m really glad you were.”

Maddox presses his mouth to my temple. Asher doesn’t say anything, just holds on, and that’s exactly right, that’s exactly him.

Out the window the vineyard’s going gold in the afternoon light and there’s a harvest coming and a baby coming and a wedding Sophia’s already planning in her head even though nobody’s officially asked her to, and none of it was here when I arrived.

Some of it I built. Some of it built me.

I press my face into Asher’s shoulder and breathe and let myself have all of it.

50

HARPER

Killian and Maddox leave together about an hour after the police do. Maddox with his phone already up making calls before he’s out of the corridor. There are legal teams to brief and evidence chains to confirm and official statements to give, and whatever comes next for my parents happens somewhere beyond the estate’s gates in offices that don’t need me in them.

Thank God. I’ve had about enough worrying about them screwing with my life. It was different when it was just me I had to worry about, but the thought of them hurting anyone I love, especially this little niblet in my tummy… I guess my mommy instinct gave me the added push I needed to confront them.

I watch them go from the front entrance and feel something settle in my chest that’s been suspended for a long time, that voice in the back of my consciousness asking when will it be safe for me to have a life has finally quieted and a spectacular show of fireworks booming in my minds skies paints the horizon.

Asher appears at my elbow the way he always does, just there, and puts his hand at the small of my back.

“Let’s get you something to eat,” he says.

“Asher—”

“You haven’t eaten since this morning. Come on.”

He walks me to Vine, the main restaurant, which is empty at this hour between lunch and dinner service, all linen and soft light and the smell of whatever he’s been prepping before any of this morning happened. He settles me at a corner table that looks out over the vineyard, fills my water glass without being asked, and disappears into the kitchen without another word.

I sit with the quiet for a while. I let it be quiet. I don’t make a list or run through what needs to happen next or think about anything at all. I just watch the vineyard through the window and breathe and let the morning exist without trying to organize it into something manageable.