?Chapter 1729:


    She knew their strange behavior had everything to do with William. All week long, they had watched her with that same silent, weighted look of concern, carefully avoiding his name, which only made it more obvious they were hiding something. If she stayed there much longer, she would lose her mind. She desperately needed fresh air and space to breathe.


    Her phone buzzed on the passenger seat. She nced over. William. Again. She had lost count of how many times he had called over the past few days. She still had feelings for him — which was precisely why she hadn’t blocked his number. She had simply been pretending not to notice his calls, and she did the same now.


    She steered into the underground parking garage of a sprawling downtown mall. After finding a spot, she took the elevator up to the first floor, hoping to lose herself in the rhythm of ordinary life for a while.


    The mall stood nearly deserted. Between the weekday lull and the threat of rain, only a handful of shoppers wandered the floors. Ste drifted through the corridors without purpose until she found herself stopped outside a baby boutique.


    The window disy featured rows of tiny, impossibly soft baby clothes — some fuzzy, others delicate, all of them heartbreakingly adorable.


    She and William had been together for so long, yet they had never once talked about having children. During their engagement nning, she had insisted there was plenty of time and that she wasn’t ready yet. But now, with everything between them unraveling, those tiny outfits caught her eye in a way they never had before.


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    Ste wrenched her gaze away from the disy and continued walking.


    She hadn’t made it very far when she spotted a familiar figure near a trash bin up ahead. Alisha leaned heavily against it, clearly beyond caring about appearances, bracing herself with one hand as she bent forward, making awful retching sounds.


    Ste had no intention of getting involved. But the soundsing from Alisha were so viscerally painful that she found herself pausing anyway. After several long seconds of hesitation, she approached and pulled a tissue from her bag.


    “Here. Use this to clean yourself up.”


    Alisha lifted her head and stared at Ste, clearly surprised. Something like panic flickered briefly across her expression before she pressed a hand over her mouth, retched a few more times, and finally epted the tissue.


    Ste didn’t like Alisha — never had. The woman’s intentions regarding William were written inly across her face, far too obvious to miss. But watching her struggle like this, Ste felt her sympathy override her dislike.


    “Do you need to go to the hospital?”


    Her voice came out t and measured, stripped of emotion, as though she were simply asking about the weather.


    Alisha shook her head weakly. “No, I’m fine. Just feeling a bit unwell.” As she spoke, her hand drifted unconsciously to her stomach before she straightened and met Ste’s gaze. Her eyes remained watery and red-rimmed, giving her a fragile, pitiful appearance.


    “Ms. Russell, I don’t know if I should say this — but I don’t want to hide it from you either. Mr. Briggs told me there’s nothing between you two, that you’re not actually a couple. Is that right?”


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