Chapter 1 - Three Minutes ApartBy the time my husband realized the stranger carrying me through the pouring Seattle rain was the billionaire who could destroy his career with one phone call, he had already made the worst mistake of his life.
“Emma!”
Grant shouted my name only after I collapsed outside our downtown apartment.
Rain soaked through my dress in seconds.
I was eight months pregnant.
My water had broken twenty minutes earlier, and every contraction came harder than the last.
Across the curb, Vanessa Cole sat comfortably inside Grant’s silver Maserati.
She rolled down the window.
“Grant, are we leaving or not?”
I stared at him.
“My water broke.”
He looked at the Maserati.
“You can’t get blood and water all over the seats.”
For a moment, the rain seemed to stop.
I thought surely I had misheard him.
“Our daughter might be coming six weeks early.”
Grant exhaled impatiently.
“Emma, stop making this dramatic.”
Then Vanessa honked.
Something inside me broke.
Not physically.
Something colder.
“You’re leaving with her?”
“It’s business.”
“At midnight?”
“The Whitaker deal is collapsing. Vanessa arranged a meeting in Vancouver.”
My stomach twisted again.
Three hours earlier, Grant had kissed my forehead and told me he was going to a strategy dinner.
Now I saw his overnight bag in the Maserati.
His passport.
And beneath both, a dark blue presentation folder.
The folder he had guarded for weeks.
“You’re cheating on me.”
Grant crouched beside me.
“We’ll discuss this when you’re thinking clearly.”
“I am thinking clearly.”
Another contraction tore through me.
I grabbed the pavement.
“My baby is coming, and you’re worried about your leather seats.”
Grant looked away.
“Emma…”
“Then act like her father.”
Headlights suddenly flooded the street.
A black luxury sedan stopped at the curb.
Behind it came two security vehicles.
A tall man stepped out.
Charcoal overcoat.
Black suit.
Cold, controlled eyes.
Noah Whitaker.
The billionaire behind Whitaker Global.
The man whose investment could turn Grant into the youngest vice president in the company.
Or erase his career in a single morning.
Noah looked at me.
“How far apart are the contractions?”
“Three minutes.”
“When did your water break?”
“Twenty minutes ago.”
Our doorman, Walter, came running.
“Ambulance is still eighteen minutes away.”
Noah looked toward the road.
“She doesn’t have eighteen minutes.”
Grant stepped forward.
“She can wait.”
Noah turned.
“No.”
His voice was quiet.
“She can’t.”
Grant swallowed.
“She’s my wife.”
Noah stared at him.
“Then you should have acted like her husband.”
Another contraction hit.
I screamed.
Noah immediately crouched beside me.
“Emma, I’m taking you to Harborview.”
Before I could answer, he lifted me into his arms.
For the first time that night, someone was actually helping me.
I felt his coat tighten around me as rain hammered his shoulders.
Then Grant spoke.
“Mr. Whitaker…”
Noah stopped.
Grant’s voice had changed.
The confidence was gone.
“Sir, I can explain.”
Noah slowly turned.
His eyes moved from Grant…
to Vanessa…
then to the blue presentation folder inside the Maserati.
His expression became unreadable.
“You’re Grant?”
Grant went pale.
“Yes.”
Noah’s gaze returned to me.
“Emma Grant?”
I nodded weakly.
He looked at Grant again.
“How interesting.”
Then he carried me toward the waiting sedan.
As he opened the door, something slipped from the pocket of Grant’s coat.
A small black envelope.
It landed face-up in the rain.
I saw my own name.
EMMA HAYES.
I stared at it.
Grant lunged for it.
Noah noticed.
And that was the moment everything changed.
Because Noah didn’t let him pick it up.
He did.
He opened the envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
A photograph of me.
Taken ten years earlier.
May you like
And written across the back were six words:
SHE MUST NEVER REMEMBER VANCOUVER.
