Page 61 of His Captor

I leaned in and kissed his lips, despite the audience we had in the office, and breathed in his scent.

The threat Colin presented was there and arguably stronger than ever, but my resolve to fight and win was more powerful than anything he could throw at me. I wasn’t just fighting for my company and my ideas anymore. I was fighting for my omega, my child, and the life I wanted for us, and if Colin tried anything to hurt that, he would be the one in danger, not us.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Hayden

Idefinitely hadn’t thought the whole going to a fundraising dinner while inches away from giving birth thing through. Yes, I loved going to parties and dinners, like the kind Mace and I walked into, hand in hand, on Tuesday evening. I just hadn’t ever been to one while nearly nine months pregnant.

“I feel enormous,” I groaned as soon as we stepped into the swanky ballroom in the Grand Hotel. “I should have thought to buy a formal suit to hide this bulge.”

In fact, I’d had to hurry out to the closest maternity store earlier that day to find whatever suit they had ready-made that would fit me so that I didn’t have to attend the soiree wearing sweatpants and a pregnancy t-shirt.

“You look fine,” Mace said, more than usually on edge as we shifted to the side of the doorway, hugging the wall, but not blocking the entrance. “You’re pregnant. You’re not going to look like a fashion plate.”

Mace was distracted with his hunt for danger, which he was convinced was going to be a problem that night, and I was already exhausted, bloated, and my feet hurt. Neither of us were at our best, and the result wasn’t pretty.

“Are you saying I look like a trainwreck?” I asked, trying to fight my hurt feelings with logic, but coming up short.

Mace huffed in irritation and dragged his gaze to me. “What do you want me to say? You have a radiant glow? You’re beautiful no matter how pregnant you are? I want to throw you over that table and pound your ass until you’re weeping?”

Both my cock and my mouth twitched in amusement. “Maybe,” I said sullenly.

“Well, you’re beautiful,” Mace snapped, gazing around the room anxiously again. “You glow. But I draw the line at public displays of lust.”

I grinned at him while he looked in the other direction, but when his survey of the room swept back around in my direction, I schooled that grin into a pathetic look.

Mace’s posture softened, and he gave me an apologetic look. “I just don’t want anything to happen to you,” he said. “I can’t shake the feeling like we’re walking on broken glass right now.”

I glanced down. “I wouldn’t know,” I said, resting my free hand on my belly. “I haven’t seen the floor for a few months now.”

Mace managed a smile despite his tension. He squeezed my hand, then we headed deeper into the room.

The truth was, I felt miserable. My body had been more out of sorts than usual all day, and Junior had been throwing a fit, squirming and stomping on my bladder and generally proving that he took after his papa when it came to being a troublemaker. He was quiet now, but I couldn’t guarantee he’d stay that way.

Mace’s obligatory compliments made me feel better, even though I’d yanked them out of him. I got all the reasons whyhe was anxious. His asshole ex—I knew it was just a business partnership, but there was something satisfying in thinking about Colin as an ex—had broke into his apartment. He was still trying to bring Mace down with the lawsuit. And just that morning, though Mace had tried to hide it from me, someone had delivered a hollowed out, rotting watermelon with what I suspected was a threat telling Mace not to come to this dinner to the doorstep of the penthouse.

It wasn’t so much the gross watermelon, which Mace got rid of, or the note that I could tell bothered Mace, it was the fact that whoever had delivered it had gotten it all the way up to the building’s top floor and left it at the door without being seen. Ten minutes of Mace’s security footage from the middle of the night was missing, and the same ten minutes was missing from the footage Mr. Granger had of the building’s entrances.

So basically, Colin was still out to get us, and here we were, attending a formal event in a place filled with traffic and people we didn’t know.

“Stick close to me,” Mace said as he spotted Mr. Harvey himself across the room, nodded to the man, then escorted me in his direction. “We should be fine in a place with this many witnesses, but you still have to watch your step.”

“I know,” I said, trying not to sound as irritated as I felt. I was a trainwreck, not a complete idiot, after all.

We didn’t have a chance to bicker further.

“Ah, Mr. Canton,” Mr. Harvey, an older beta with silver-white hair, intelligent, blue eyes, and a kind smile said, extending his hand to Mace. “It’s lovely to see you here this evening. And this must be your omega.” His eyes shifted directly to my belly with a surprised but pleased smile.

“He is,” Mace said. “This is Hayden Kipling.”

“Kipling,” Mr. Harvey said, tilting his head slightly and looking at my face instead of my belly. “Not Darrin Kipling.”

“That’s my father,” I said, my smile growing tight.

Mr. Harvey laughed. “Canton, you clever man. You didn’t tell me you were connected to Darrin Kipling.”

Mace glanced to me, trying to hide his surprise. “I didn’t think it was important,” he said.

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