Chapter 3
The cascading chandeliers poured their warm, golden light over Maren’s delicate features. She stood frozen in her sophisticated black uniform, suddenly the focal point of thirty powerful, dangerous guests. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird.
She held Atticus’s intense, unyielding gaze. The mafia boss’s cold eyes demanded nothing less than the absolute truth. Maren knew the danger of crossing Cressida Blake, but she also knew the depth of the heartbreak etched onto little Evan’s face. She loved the boy as if he were her own, and she could not bear to see him discarded.
Maren’s inner brows lifted slightly in a helpless, agonizing expression of sorrow. Moisture gathered rapidly along her lower eyelids, making her beautiful eyes shine brilliantly under the crystal lights. She drew a steadying breath, her slender frame bracing for the impact of her own words.
"She said he's only adopted," Maren replied.
Her voice was soft and strained, carrying a fragile vulnerability that echoed in the deafening silence of the dining hall. After speaking the devastating truth, Maren pressed her lips firmly together. She reached out and placed one reassuring, steadying hand against Evan’s small shoulder, grounding him, letting him know he was not alone.
Atticus’s facial expression did not change, but the temperature in his eyes dropped to absolute zero. Without breaking his imposing posture, he slowly held out his tattooed hand to his son.
Evan looked at the outstretched hand, his rosy cheeks pale with anxiety, and then looked up at Maren. She gave him a tiny, encouraging nod. Evan stepped forward, slipping his small fingers into the massive, ink-stained hand of his father. Atticus immediately drew the boy close, bringing Evan to stand proudly and securely right beside him. Maren took a protective step forward, staying close to the boy’s side, creating an unbreakable unified front.
Cressida’s affectionate smile faltered, panic flashing briefly across her fair face before she expertly buried it. She looked directly into Atticus’s cold eyes, desperately attempting to reclaim her territory.
"Our baby carries your blood," Cressida said, resting her hand elegantly over her slightly rounded stomach.
Her smile returned, a brittle, strained curvature of her lips, inviting his agreement, begging him to validate the supreme importance of biological lineage. Atticus did not nod. He did not speak. He simply watched her face with slow, unwavering attention, letting her drown in the silence.
Standing securely beside his father, Evan looked directly at Cressida. The six-year-old’s brow furrowed in genuine, innocent confusion. He remembered the hushed, frantic phone call he had overheard earlier that afternoon when he had been hiding behind the velvet curtains in the drawing room.
"You said the baby's not Daddy's," Evan stated clearly.
His voice was small, but it rang through the luminous room with the force of a detonating bomb. He spoke with the sincere, uncalculated confusion of a child trying to make sense of a contradiction.
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Atticus kept a firm, protective hold of his son’s hand. His cold, perceptive eyes slowly left the boy and settled with lethal precision onto Cressida.
Cressida froze. She held Evan’s gaze for a second too long, her mouth parted in silent horror, before snapping her eyes back to Atticus. Her practiced, beautiful smile was completely gone, replaced by a mask of sheer, unadulterated terror. Every guest in the room remained completely, terrifyingly silent.
