The night was merciless.
By the time Amelia dragged her exhausted body back to the crumbling apartment she barely called home, dawn was already breaking through the rain-soaked skies.
She stood in front of the cracked mirror above her tiny bathroom sink, her eyes swollen, her face pale like a porcelain doll left to gather dust in a forgotten attic.
Her delicate hands trembled as she reached up to wipe the smudged mascara from her cheeks.
But no matter how hard she scrubbed, she couldn't wash away the humiliation of last night.
He didn't just abandon me… he erased me.
The thought echoed like a cruel mantra.
Her stomach twisted painfully, a wave of nausea surging up from deep inside.
She barely made it to the sink before retching, her fragile body heaving from the force.
Sweat dotted her forehead as she collapsed onto the cold bathroom floor, her chest rising and falling in uneven gasps.
Maybe it's just the stress… the cold… she tried to reason.
But then she remembered.
The late nights staring at the ceiling, the sudden dizziness, the odd food cravings she'd dismissed as nothing.
And the missed dates on her calendar…
Her blood ran cold.
"No… no, this can't be happening," she whispered hoarsely, her fingers clawing through the cluttered drawer until she found it—
The test.
Her hands shook so violently that she almost dropped it before she could even open the packaging.
Minutes felt like hours as she sat curled up on the bathroom floor, her head pressed against her knees, her heart pounding louder than any storm.
She didn't need to wait for the timer.
The second line appeared bold and undeniable.
Positive.
A strangled sob tore from her throat, raw and agonizing.
Her arms wrapped protectively around her flat stomach, her entire body shuddering with the weight of the truth.
I'm pregnant… with his child.
Her tears fell freely now, hot against her frozen cheeks.
How cruel is fate, to give me a piece of him when all I want is to forget?
For a long moment, she sat in that suffocating silence.
But slowly… something inside her shifted.
Her eyes, once dulled by despair, began to gleam with a faint, dangerous light.
She pressed her trembling fingers gently against her belly, a spark of steel hardening her spine.
"Ethan Blake… you may have abandoned me, but I will raise this child without you. And one day, when you beg for forgiveness—"
Her lips curled into a cold, bitter smile.
"—I will stand tall, and you will kneel before me."