Chapter 442

[ 1,023 words ]

Katia’s POV

After a minute he pulled out carefully. I felt the warm slide of his cum leaking out of me and onto the sheets. He collapsed beside me and immediately pulled me against his chest, one heavy arm draped over my waist, hand resting protectively over the small curve of my stomach.

I turned my head enough to look at him. His eyes were closed, but he was smiling that same crooked, satisfied smile.

“Still think I’m a cheater?” he murmured.

“The worst kind,” I said, but I was smiling too. “You planned the whole thing just so you wouldn’t get cut off p>

“Smartest decision I’ve made all month p>

I laughed softly and shifted closer, tucking my face into his neck. The race felt far away now. The crowd, Tessa’s frustration, the careful formation he had held behind me the entire time—all of it had led here. To this bed. To his body still pressed against mine and the quiet knowledge that he had chosen my win over his own pride because he knew exactly what it would cost him if he didn’t.

I pressed a slow kiss to his throat.

“Next time,” I whispered, “I’m making you work harder for it p>

His arm tightened around me.

“Looking forward to it p>

I woke up to Julian’s phone buzzing like crazy on the nightstand. It wouldn’t stop. Whatever it was, it wasn’t waiting for us to finish sleeping.

He grabbed it without even opening his eyes properly. The second the screen lit up his face, his expression changed. Confusion first. Then something sharper.

“What?” I asked, sitting up against the pillows.

“Zane,” he said, already sitting up and scrolling. “You need to see this p>

He turned the phone toward me.

TESSA STERLING UNMASKS CATWOMAN. GAIL WINDSOR IDENTIFIED AS UNDERGROUND RACING PHENOM.

I stared at the headline. My stomach dropped hard. It had nothing to do with the pregnancy and everything to do with the photo underneath it. A grainy still of Gail disappearing into the crowd right when the cars lined up at the start. Next to it, another photo of her showing up near the same spot minutes after the race ended, mid-conversation with someone just out of frame.

“She thinks it’s Gail,” I said slowly.

“She thinks it’s Gail,” Julian confirmed, scrolling further. His jaw tightened with every line. “Look at the timeline she’s built. Gail vanishes right before the race starts. Gail reappears minutes after Catwoman crosses the finish line. She’s treating it like it’s confirmed p>

I grabbed my own phone. My hands were already shaking as I pulled up the same article, then a dozen others already spreading behind it. Every single one repeated the same claim with more confidence. The two photos stitched together into one sequence that, out of context, looked exactly like proof.

“This is my fucking fault,” I said quietly.

Julian looked at me.

“How is this your fault p>

“Gail disappeared to protect me,” I said. “She took Aiden somewhere away from the main crowd, then vanished the second the race started because we planned it that way. We wanted exactly this kind of confusion to protect my identity. I just didn’t think it would land on her. I thought it would just muddy the water enough that nobody could point at anyone directly p>

“It did muddy the water,” Julian said. “It just muddied it in the wrong direction. Tessa needed someone to accuse, and the timeline gave her the easiest target available p>

My phone buzzed. A text from Gail, sent only minutes earlier.

’Have you seen this? My phone will not stop ringing. Reporters are already outside Grandma’s estate p>

I closed my eyes for a second. The weight of what we had built settled over me like something physical.

“We have to fix this,” I said. “Right now. Before it spreads any further p>

“How?” Julian asked. “We can’t just announce who Catwoman actually is to clear Gail’s name. That defeats the whole point of everything we did last night p>

“I know,” I said. My mind was already racing, searching for some version of the truth that protected both of us. “But we can’t let her carry this either. She did nothing but help us, Julian. She took Aiden into that crowd, she disappeared exactly when we asked her to, and now she’s the one dealing with cameras outside her own grandmother’s house because of a plan we built to protect me p>

Julian ran a hand through his hair and started grabbing clothes, moving with that fast, focused urgency I recognized from every crisis this family had gone through.

“We go to the estate,” he said. “Now. Before this gets any more out of hand p>

I dressed as fast as my body would let me. The morning sickness I usually managed to avoid until later hit hard now—adrenaline and nausea tangled together. I forced myself past it. By the time we reached the car, my phone already had a dozen more notifications. The story was spreading with the kind of speed this city reserved for the scandals it loved most.

The drive to the estate felt longer than it actually was. Both of us stayed quiet, both of us turning over every possible way to handle what was waiting for us.

“What if we can’t fix this?” I said quietly somewhere around the halfway point.

Julian glanced at me. His expression had none of the panic I felt building in my own chest.

“Then we find another way,” he said. “We’re not letting my sister take the fall for something that was never hers to carry. Whatever it costs, we find a way to make this right p>

I looked out at the city passing by the window, at the headline still glowing on the phone in my lap, and thought about Gail’s easy laugh at the race the night before. Completely unaware that helping us would cost her this much by morning.

We arrived at the estate to find exactly what Gail had warned us about. A small cluster of reporters already at the gate. Cameras went up the second our car came into view.

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