Austin stood at the edge of the terrace, his sharp eyes scanning the city skyline. The lights glimmered like stars over concrete, but he wasn't watching for beauty. He was watching for movement, signals. Every breath of wind tonight felt like a whisper of danger.
Behind him, Clair leaned against the sliding doorframe, arms folded across her chest. Her bump was barely showing, but to him, it was already the world.
"You haven't slept," she said softly.
Austin didn't turn around. "Neither have you."
"That's not an answer," she said, stepping closer. "The FBI storming one of your warehouses today wasn't a small thing. And now you're planning a trap for Isadora without telling me anything?"
He finally turned, the muscles in his jaw flexing. "Clair. I need you to trust that I'm doing what I have to. You and our child are my only priorities. Isadora made this personal the moment she tried to leak intel through a federal mole. I won't let her get close to you."
Clair stepped into his space, placing her hand on his chest. "Austin, I know you're doing everything to protect us. But you don't have to carry it alone. You have Elias. You have me. Let me in."
His eyes softened for a moment, the steel melting into something she only ever saw when they were alone. Austin leaned in and pressed his forehead against hers.
"Then I'll tell you everything."
An hour later, inside the war room beneath the estate, Elias leaned over a digital table surrounded by blueprints and encrypted surveillance feeds.
"We've traced Isadora's movements to a private estate near Edgewater," he said, dragging a map into view. "She's using a fashion export front as cover, but that place is armed to the teeth. If we go in loud, we risk tipping off the mole still embedded in the Bureau."
"Which means we go silent," Austin replied. "We bait her out instead."
Clair sat across the room, her laptop open, absorbing everything. "She's obsessed with reputation and control. What if you feed her the illusion she's already won? Leak a rumor. Something that suggests you're preparing to disappear with me."
Elias grinned. "She'd come out of hiding thinking she's pushed the king off his throne."
Austin looked at his wife with a prideful gleam. "You're brilliant."
Clair smirked. "Took you this long to notice?"
Elias laughed, but it was cut short by an alert on the screen. A news article was surfacing, fast. A leaked image of Clair entering the clinic for her last prenatal appointment, followed by wild headlines.
"Austin Montgomery's bride secretly pregnant? Is the mafia king softening?"
Austin's fists clenched. "They're targeting her."
Elias tapped into the article's source code. "It was uploaded by a dummy account traced to DC. FBI territory."
Austin growled. "They're using her to smoke me out."
Clair touched her belly unconsciously. "We're not running, Austin."
"No," he said, eyes burning. "We're hunting."
That night, the trap was set.
Elias and a handpicked team disguised themselves as civilians near the Edgewater pier while Clair, safely under 24-hour protection, acted the part of a woman whose husband was abandoning everything for her. She released a public statement hinting at plans to leave the country for the safety of their unborn child. The media exploded.
But the real explosion was happening behind the scenes.
Isadora took the bait.
At exactly 2:00 a.m., she emerged in a blacked-out SUV flanked by mercenaries. She was stunning in that venomous way—elegant dress, high heels, and a smile like poison.
Austin was waiting.
The moment her car turned the corner onto the pier, his voice rang through a hidden comm.
"Move."
In seconds, Elias's team swarmed. Tires burst, flashbangs lit up the docks, and Isadora's guards were neutralized with swift precision. But she wasn't going down without a show.
From her purse, she pulled a remote trigger.
Austin's heart dropped.
"Clair!"
Back at the mansion, alarms blared. The safe room sealed. A hidden device had been planted under their home weeks ago, activated remotely.
But Clair, thinking ahead, had installed extra sweeps of the mansion after the first media leak.
The bomb was found, just in time.
By dawn, Isadora was in chains, spitting blood and venom as Austin stood before her in the interrogation room deep under one of his private facilities.
"You think this ends with me, Montgomery? The Bureau knows. Your empire's crumbling. You'll never be free."
Austin didn't flinch. "I don't want freedom. I want your silence."
She smirked. "And if I don't?"
He stepped closer, cold and calm. "Then I'll let Clair deal with you. She's been wanting to try her hand at poison control."
Isadora blinked, caught off guard.
"You think she's just a pretty nurse? She's stronger than you'll ever be."
Later, Austin returned home. The house was quiet except for the hum of the nursery Clair had started preparing.
He found her there, curled up on the floor, sorting tiny clothes with a dazed look in her eyes. When she saw him, she stood slowly.
"It's over?" she asked.
"For now," he said, stepping forward.
Her lips trembled. "You could've died tonight. You were inches away from her."
He wrapped his arms around her. "And all I thought about was getting back to you. Every second. I've faced death so many times, Clair, but the thought of losing you..." His voice cracked, just barely.
She pressed her forehead against his chest. "Then promise me we'll raise this baby in peace. Away from bloodshed. Away from war."
Austin nodded. "I will burn down every part of this empire to give you that. You and our son."
Their kiss that night wasn't rushed or fiery, it was deep. Real. A union of two people who'd survived war and heartbreak to find something worth fighting for.
Love.
And the storm was only just beginning.