“That’s why he talked about baby names with Sabeen.” Linnea understood before he finished.

Dorian had promised Sabeen the family and the legacy he had systematically stolen from his own wife.

She made herself follow the logic all the way to its floor, because she needed to see the full architecture of the man she had shared a bed with for years.

Her grandfather, drafting the trust decades ago, had been trying to do something protective and loving: he had built in a clause that ensured his great-grandchild — a biological heir — would inherit a secured block of the company, shielded from any spouse, any divorce, any marital maneuvering.

He had been guarding the bloodline’s stake against exactly the kind of fortune-hunter who might marry in.

He could not have imagined that the clause would become a death warrant for the very child it was meant to protect.