She Threw Up on the Morning of Their Divorce and Her Feared Husband Changed the Destination Before She Could Stop Him

By the third morning at St. Joseph Point, the weather had shifted.

A heavy autumn-like storm had rolled across Lake Michigan overnight, bringing cold gray rain that lashed against the stone walls and whipped the pine trees into frantic, tossing shapes against the dim sky.

Inside the great room, a massive fire was roaring in the stone hearth, casting a deep amber light across the wide pine floorboards and the soft leather sofas.

Naomi sat on the rug before the hearth, wrapped in a heavy gray wool blanket, her back resting against Adrian’s chest as he sat behind her.

Her health had stabilized. The dizziness had receded, replaced by the deep, ravenous hunger typical of the early weeks of pregnancy. A empty plate that had held three scrambled eggs, four slices of dry toast, and two sliced peaches sat on the hearth hearth beside them.

Adrian had not touched his phone in seventy-two hours.

It sat on the high mantelpiece, its black screen dark and lifeless, its battery long dead. Roman had come up from the gatehouse twice a day to deliver short, oral reports on the state of Vale Maritime: the Calumet terminal was operational, the federal auditors had been satisfied by the corporate legal team, and the Detroit shipping interests had been warned that Adrian was temporarily out of the country on private business.

"They're going to think you've gone soft," Naomi said softly, resting her head back against his shoulder.

Adrian’s arm was wrapped around her waist, his hand resting broad and warm over her lower abdomen.

"Let them think what they want," Adrian said smoothly. "The last man who thought I had gone soft tried to redirect three coal barges in Toledo. He spent six months explaining his decision to a bankruptcy judge in Ohio."

Naomi let out a quiet, genuine laugh—a sound Adrian hadn't heard in nearly eighteen months.

He tightened his arm around her, pressing his lips against the warm skin of her temple.

"You laughed," he murmured against her skin.

"It was funny," she said, turning her face slightly so her nose brushed his jaw. "You sound like a villain in an old movie."

"I am a villain to most people," he acknowledged without pride or regret. "I run a shipping cartel that spans five states. I buy politicians when they are useful, and I break unions when they try to steal from my spur lines."

"And what are you to me?" she asked softly.

Adrian was quiet for a second. He turned his hand over, tracing small circles over the thin silk of her blouse where their child was growing in the dark.

"I am whatever you need me to be," he said softly. "If you need a husband who stays home, I will hire three managing directors to run the terminals. If you need a man who leaves the work at the gate, I will sell the Calumet facility by the end of the year."

Naomi turned around in his arms, her dark eyes looking deep into his blue ones.

"I don't want you to sell your business, Adrian," she said quietly. "You built it. It's who you are. But I need you to promise me one thing."

"Anything."

"No more secrets," she said firmly. "If the federal government comes to your office, I want to know before I read it in the Tribune. If a shipment goes missing in Detroit, I want you to tell me why you're late for dinner instead of letting me sit at a cold table thinking you forgot our life."

Adrian looked at her, his face serious and unblinking in the firelight.

"No more secrets," he agreed softly. He reached into his trouser pocket, pulled out the small black frame he had bought from a shop in town two days ago, and set it on the rug between them.

Inside the frame sat the small, blurry thermal image from Prentice Women’s Hospital—the tiny white grain of rice floating in its dark circle of life.

"I called Arthur this morning," Adrian said quietly.

Naomi’s brow pulled together. "Your divorce attorney?"

"My former divorce attorney," Adrian corrected. "I told him to shred the asset division files. I told him if he ever sent another settlement document to my house, I would buy his law firm and make him manage parking permits in South Chicago."

Naomi let out another sharp laugh, her eyes crinkling at the corners. "Adrian! He's a senior partner!"

"He's an annoyance," Adrian said flatly. He reached out, lifted her jaw with his forefinger, and looked down into her eyes with a quiet, overwhelming intensity that made her breath catch.

"We are not getting divorced, Naomi," he said, his voice dropping into that deep, iron-clad certainty that no longer frightened her. "Not today. Not when this child is born. Not in fifty years when we are buried on the bluff behind this house."

Naomi reached up, her fingers resting against his broad cheek, feeling the warm, solid reality of the man who had torn down a city to bring her home.

"Okay," she whispered softly.