Forgiveness, Trust & Forever

Emily

They were already inside.
For one second, I forgot how to breathe.
Not because of Hayden.
Not because of the photographers outside my gates.
Not because of the article turning my worst moment into entertainment for strangers who would never know what it cost me to survive it.
Because upstairs, Eleanora was crying.
And someone had been inside my building.
My building.
My studio.
My home.
The one place I had managed to carve out after Hero. The one place that belonged to me, even with his name tangled in the paperwork like a ghost that refused to leave. A flat above the studio behind gates where no one could touch me unless I opened the door.
Except someone had already been inside.
Hero went still beside me.
Not visibly.
Not to anyone who didn't know him.
But I knew.
His shoulders locked. His jaw tightened. His eyes changed from worried to something much quieter. Something colder.
Fatherhood had made him softer in places I hadn't expected.
It had also made him dangerous.
"Show me," he said.
Jen turned the laptop around on the reception desk.
I didn't want to look.
I did anyway.
The footage showed the private driveway from the camera above the garage. The black gates stood open for Jen's car, rain blurring the edges of the image. The street beyond was empty except for one parked van and the dark shape of a person standing near the far wall, half hidden beneath the awning by the studio door.
Already inside.
Waiting.
My stomach rolled.
The figure lifted a phone.
Seconds later, my building appeared in the message on Hero's phone.
Nice flat.
A sound left me.
Small.
Humiliating.
Hero's head snapped towards me.
"Emily."
I stepped back from the desk. "Who is that?"
Jen zoomed in, but the image was grainy. Hood up. Face down. Nothing useful except the shape of a body and the glowing phone in their hand.
"I can pull the other angles," Jen said. "Garage camera might catch them leaving."
"Do it," Hero said.
I hated the way he sounded.
Like he had the right to give orders in my studio.
Like he belonged here.
Like the past year hadn't happened.
Like the courtroom hadn't happened.
Like I hadn't sat under lights colder than the ones in this studio while barristers and social workers and solicitors picked apart the ugliest parts of me until they decided Hero was safer.
Better.
More fit.
I wrapped my arms around myself.
"They had to get through the gate," I said.
Hero looked at me. "Who has access?"
"No one."
"Emily."
"No one," I snapped.
My voice bounced off the mirrors.
Upstairs, Eleanora cried again.
It sliced through me.
Not the way it should have.
Not with instant maternal instinct or some warm ache in my chest.
It cut because I knew everyone expected me to move.
Hero.
Jen.
Anna upstairs.
Maybe even myself.
A baby cried, and mothers went.
That was the rule.
That was the part that had never worked properly inside me.
Hero's eyes softened, and I hated him for it.
"I'll go," he said.
Relief came so fast I nearly hated myself sick.
Then shame followed.
Hot.
Rotten.
He saw both.
Of course he did.
He always had.
Even when we were eighteen and I could hide a bad day from everyone else, Hero would look at me for three seconds and know exactly where it hurt.
"No," I said.
The word surprised both of us.
Hero stilled.
I swallowed, eyes flicking towards the stairs.
"I said I'd come with you."
His face changed.
Not hope.
He was smarter than that.
Hope around me had never been safe.
But something close to it moved across his face before he buried it.
"Okay."
Just that.
Okay.
No praise.
No big moment.
No telling me I was brave or good or finally acting like her mother.
Thank God.
Because if he had, I would have run.
I turned before I could change my mind and started up the stairs.
The stairwell felt narrower than usual.
Too many bodies in my building.
Too much history pressing in from behind me.
Hero followed close enough that I could feel him but not close enough to touch. That was worse somehow. His restraint had always been more dangerous than his hands.
At the top, Eleanora's crying grew louder.
My fingers curled around the bannister.
She sounded exhausted.
Frightened.
Small.
I had heard her cry before.
Of course I had.
My daughter.
The words still didn't sit right.
They felt borrowed.
Like wearing shoes in the wrong size.
Anna stood in the bedroom doorway with Eleanora in her arms, rocking her gently.
The travel cot was half-built beside the bed. My bed. My room. My stupid old sanctuary that now smelled like baby powder, rain, and Hero.
Eleanora's face was red and scrunched, damp curls stuck to her forehead, rabbit pressed between her tiny fists. When she saw Hero, she reached immediately, crying harder with relief.
That did something awful to me.
Not jealousy.
I didn't have the right.
Not pain exactly.
Something emptier.
A confirmation.
She knew him.
Needed him.
Loved him.
And me?
I was the woman in the room.
The one whose body made her.
The one whose arms she didn't reach for.
Hero stepped forward automatically, then stopped.
He looked at me.
I hated him for that too.
For giving me the choice.
For making me be the one to refuse.
"I can't," I whispered.
His face didn't change.
But his eyes did.
"Okay," he said again.
He took Eleanora from Anna, and the second she hit his chest, her crying changed. Not stopped. But changed. Softened into hurt little hiccups as he tucked her beneath his chin and rubbed her back.
"Hi, baby," he murmured. "I know. Too much noise, wasn't it? Too much day."
His voice was low.
Warm.
The voice I used to hear when he woke before me and thought I was still asleep.
The voice I had imagined one day being used in a house with a cot and coffee going cold and him making faces at a baby who had his mouth and my temper.
Then I had got pregnant alone.
And every dream had turned into a trap.
Eleanora's cries faded into shaky breaths.
I stood in the doorway, useless.
Anna touched my arm as she slipped past me.
Not a squeeze.
Not pity.
Just a touch.
Somehow that was worse.
"I'll check on Jen," she said softly.
Then she left us alone.
Hero sat on the edge of my bed with Eleanora in his arms.
I stayed standing.
The room was too intimate.
Too full of things he had no right to see.
My old ballet shoes. My open wardrobe. The candle I lit when I couldn't sleep. The grey hoodie hanging over the chair that I had sworn to myself I kept because it was comfortable, not because it had once smelled like him.
His eyes had already found it earlier.
Of course they had.
"Don't say anything about the hoodie," I said.
He looked up.
"I wasn't going to."
"You were thinking it."
His mouth twitched. "You always accuse me of that."
"Because you think loudly."
Eleanora made a tiny whining sound against his chest.
Both of us went quiet immediately.
Hero shifted her, pressing a kiss into her hair.
"She's overtired."
I nodded like I knew that.
Like I could have guessed that.
Like I knew anything about what she needed.
My throat tightened.
"There's nothing here for her," I said.
"We've got her bag."
"That's not what I mean."
"I know."
I looked at him.
He did.
That was the problem.
Hero always heard the thing underneath.
I stepped into the room, keeping distance between myself and the bed.
"There's no nursery. No toys. No photos. No little corner where I pretended I was going to be part of this." I swallowed hard. "There is nothing in this flat that says she exists."
Hero's eyes moved over my face.
I wanted him to be angry.
It would be easier if he was angry.
"I didn't expect there to be," he said.
The softness of it almost broke me.
I wrapped my arms tighter around myself. "You should have."
"Why?"
"Because I gave birth to her."
He looked down at Eleanora.
Then back at me.
"Giving birth doesn't magically make you ready."
"No, but it's supposed to make you something."
His jaw tightened.
Not at me.
For me, maybe.
I hated that possibility most of all.
"What do you think you're supposed to be?" he asked.
A laugh came out of me before I could stop it.
Ugly.
Sharp.
"The internet will have a list by noon."
"Emily."
"No, really. I'm sure they'll explain it all beautifully. Cold. Selfish. Unfit. Fame-hungry. The girl who tried to give away Hero Fiennes Tiffin's baby because she didn't want motherhood interfering with her career."
"That's not true."
"Which part?"
His mouth closed.
Exactly.
I looked away first.
Eleanora had settled now, her eyes heavy, one little hand resting flat against Hero's neck. The sight was too much. Too tender. Too natural. Like they had been made for each other and I had been made wrong.
"I did want adoption," I whispered.
Hero went still.
The room changed.
The sentence sat between us, naked and awful.
"I know."
"No." I shook my head. "You know the legal version. You know what my solicitor said. What the reports said. What everyone translated it into." My eyes burned. "But you don't know what it felt like."
He didn't speak.
Maybe he knew better.
Maybe he was afraid to.
I stared at the floorboards near his feet.
"I thought I was doing the right thing."
My voice sounded smaller than I wanted.
"I thought if she went to people who wanted her properly, people who had a room ready and tiny clothes folded and grandparents who weren't crying in kitchens because their daughter had ruined her life, then maybe she'd be better." I swallowed. "Maybe she wouldn't grow up with a mother who looked at her and panicked."
Hero's face tightened.
"I didn't panic because she was awful," I said quickly, because suddenly that mattered. "She wasn't. She was perfect. That made it worse."
Eleanora sighed in her almost-sleep.
The tiny sound made my eyes sting.
"She was so small," I whispered. "And everyone kept putting her in my arms like instinct would arrive if I just held her long enough. But all I could feel was fear. Fear that I'd drop her. Fear that I'd resent her. Fear that every time I looked at her, I'd see you and hate her for it."
Hero flinched.
Good.
No.
Not good.
True.
"I didn't want to hate her," I said, tears finally spilling. "So I thought letting someone else love her was kinder."
Hero looked like every word hurt him.
But he did not interrupt.
He did not turn the pain into his.
For once, he let mine stay mine.
"That's why," I whispered. "Not because I didn't care. Because I cared enough to know I wasn't safe."
His voice was hoarse when he finally spoke.
"You were never unsafe."
I looked at him through wet lashes.
"You don't know that."
"Yes, I do."
"No." My voice sharpened. "You don't get to decide that. You weren't inside my head."
"I know."
"You weren't there."
His eyes closed briefly.
The words hit where I meant them to.
I hated myself for throwing that knife.
But I didn't take it back.
Because he hadn't been there.
Not when the doctor said I qaa pregnant.
Not when I sat on the bathroom floor with the worst sickness.
Not when I stopped fitting into my jeans.
Not when I woke up at three in the morning with my hand over my stomach, whispering apologies to her for standing in the abortion clinic ready to erase her from my future.
Not when I woke from my Caesarean and the room waited for me to cry happy tears while all I felt was terror.
Hero opened his eyes.
"No," he said quietly. "I wasn't."
The simple admission took all the fight from me.
He didn't defend it.
Didn't explain filming.
Didn't explain schedules or missed calls or bad timing.
He just let the truth exist.
And somehow, that hurt more.
Eleanora shifted against him, her little mouth opening in a sleepy yawn. Hero looked down, instinctively softening, and my chest did that strange, painful thing again.
"She loves you," I said.
He smiled faintly, but there was sadness in it.
"I hope so."
"She does."
"You don't know that."
I looked at Eleanora's tiny hand curled against his throat.
"Yes, I do."
He looked up at me then.
The air changed.
I realised too late how close I had moved.
Not close enough to touch either of them.
But closer than before.
Hero noticed too.
Of course he did.
My phone rang from somewhere in the flat.
Hayden.
I didn't need to see the screen to know.
My body knew his ringtone now the way it used to know Hero's footsteps.
The sound sliced through the room.
Hero's expression shuttered.
I stepped back.
Just like that, whatever fragile thing had been between us snapped.
"You should answer," he said.
"Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Pretend you're not jealous."
His jaw clenched. "I'm not pretending."
"So you are jealous?"
He looked down at Eleanora.
My stupid heart twisted.
"Emily, I'm sitting in your bedroom with our daughter while your boyfriend calls after finding out you spent the night with me. I'm trying very hard not to be a bastard about it."
The honesty startled a laugh out of me.
A real one.
Small, but real.
Hero looked up.
His mouth softened.
There it was.
That old pull.
The one that had made me forget every reason I should stay away from him last night.
The one that made my body remember his before my brain could remind it of the damage.
My phone stopped ringing.
Started again.
I closed my eyes.
"I ended it with him downstairs."
Hero went still.
I kept my eyes closed because looking at him felt too dangerous.
"What?"
"I told Hayden it was over."
Silence.
Then, carefully, "Because of me?"
I opened my eyes.
"Don't flatter yourself."
His mouth twitched again, but his eyes stayed serious.
"Emily."
"No," I said. "Not because of you. Not exactly." I wrapped my arms around myself again. "Because when he said she wasn't my responsibility, something in me wanted to defend her. And I hated that he thought the worst part of me was the truest part."
Hero's voice softened. "It isn't."
"You don't know me anymore."
"I know enough."
"No, you know who I was when I loved you."
He stared at me.
The words dropped between us like glass.
I hadn't meant to say loved.
Past tense.
Present tense.
Both lies.
Both true.
Eleanora made another sleepy sound, and Hero looked down at her, letting the moment pass because she needed him more than he needed answers.
That was the cruelest part.
The most beautiful.
He was good at this.
At being hers.
I could hate him for a lot of things.
Not that.
A shout came from downstairs.
Jen.
"Hero!"
His head lifted.
I turned towards the door.
Eleanora startled, but he soothed her quickly.
"Stay with her," he said.
I blinked. "What?"
"I need to see what Jen found."
He stood carefully, Eleanora heavy against him.
"I'll take her."
"She'll wake if you move too fast."
"So?"
"So she needs quiet."
I stared at him.
Then realised what he was suggesting.
"No."
He didn't push.
He just looked at me.
Calm.
Patient.
Infuriating.
"I'm not asking you to hold her," he said.
"Good."
"I'm asking you to sit here while she sleeps in the cot. That's all."
My pulse jumped.
That's all.
As if that was nothing.
As if sitting alone in a room with the baby I had failed was not equivalent to being locked in a room with every version of myself I hated.
"I can't."
"Okay."
Again.
No anger.
No punishment.
Just acceptance.
It made me want to scream.
Hero moved to carry Eleanora out with him.
But the second he shifted her, she whined and clung tighter to his shirt, tiny face scrunching.
He stopped.
His eyes closed briefly.
Downstairs, Jen called again.
"Hero, you need to see this!"
Anna appeared at the bedroom door.
"I'll take her."
Eleanora stirred at Anna's voice, one eye opening, lower lip wobbling.
Hero looked torn.
I hated it.
I hated that he had to choose between protecting her and finding out who had threatened her.
I hated that I was standing there useless while everyone else became necessary.
"Put her in the cot," I heard myself say.
Hero looked at me.
So did Anna.
I immediately regretted speaking.
"Emily-"
"Don't make me say it again."
He nodded once.
Slowly, carefully, he lowered Eleanora into the travel cot Anna had set up beside my bed.
Eleanora stirred, hands reaching for him.
A tiny, broken sound left her.
Not a word.
Not even close.
But needing.
Clear as anything.
Hero crouched beside the cot, rubbing her tummy.
"I'm here," he whispered. "I'm right here."
Her eyes fluttered.
I stood frozen.
Anna stayed at the door but didn't come in.
Hero looked up at me.
"I'll be downstairs."
I nodded.
"I won't be long."
"Go."
He hesitated.
Then he left.
Anna stayed a second longer.
I looked at her. "Don't."
She held up both hands. "Didn't say a word."
Then she left too.
The silence after them was enormous.
I stood in my bedroom with my daughter in a travel cot beside my bed and no idea what to do with my hands.
Eleanora shifted.
I froze.
She made a soft, unsettled noise and turned her head towards where Hero had gone.
My chest tightened.
"Please don't cry," I whispered.
Her little face scrunched.
"No, no, no," I breathed, panic rising. "Please don't."
She whimpered.
I took one step closer.
Then stopped.
What if I made it worse?
What if she knew?
What if she felt everything wrong in me and screamed until Hero came back and saw exactly why the court was right to keep her away from me?
Eleanora's hand opened and closed against the sheet.
Searching.
Not for me.
For comfort.
For anyone.
I stepped closer before I could think myself out of it.
Her rabbit had slipped near her feet.
I picked it up carefully and placed it beside her.
She turned her face into it.
The whimper softened.
I didn't breathe.
She settled.
Just like that.
No miracle.
No choir of angels.
No sudden flood of maternal love.
Just a baby given her toy.
A baby who stopped crying because I did one tiny thing right.
My hand gripped the side of the cot.
Tears blurred the room.
"Oh," I whispered.
Such a stupid word.
Such a small word for the way my chest cracked open.
Eleanora's lashes fluttered again.
I should have stepped away.
I didn't.
I crouched slowly beside the cot, keeping one hand on the rail like it was the only thing holding me upright.
She was beautiful.
I had always known that objectively, in the way everyone said babies were beautiful. But now, quiet and sleepy and not being thrust into my arms with expectation wrapped around her like a rope, I could look.
Really look.
Her dark curls.
Hero's mouth.
My nose, maybe.
A tiny crease between her brows like she was annoyed with the world even in sleep.
A laugh caught in my throat and turned into a sob.
"I'm sorry," I whispered.
Her fingers flexed against the rabbit.
"I'm so sorry."
Downstairs, voices rose.
Hero's.
Jen's.
Anna's.
I should have gone to hear what they had found.
Instead, I stayed there, crouched on the floor beside the daughter I still did not know how to want properly, guarding her sleep like it mattered.
Because it did.
Even if I was late learning.
Even if everyone else had known first.
From downstairs, Hero's voice came sharp enough to cut through the flat.
"Jo?"
My blood went cold.
I stood too fast, gripping the cot when my knees wobbled.
Eleanora stirred but didn't wake.
Hero spoke again, lower this time.
Deadly.
"Play it again."
My heart started pounding.
I looked down at Eleanora.
Still asleep.
Still safe.
For one second, I hesitated.
Then I stepped into the hallway and moved silently towards the stairs.
Halfway down, I could see them gathered around Jen's laptop in the studio office.
Hero stood with both hands planted on the desk, head bowed.
Anna was beside him, face pale.
Jen clicked something.
A voice filled the room.
Jo's voice.
Soft.
Shaking.
But unmistakable.
"You said if the story came out, Emily would run. You promised me she'd run."
My stomach dropped.
Another voice answered.
Female.
Colder.
Familiar enough to make Hero's shoulders go rigid.
Ava.
"She will. Emily always runs when she remembers what she is."
A pause.
Then Jo again.
"And Hero?"
Ava laughed.
"Hero will do what he always does. Try to save the broken thing. Let him. Once she rejects the baby again, he'll finally hate her properly."
My hand flew to my mouth.
Below me, Hero lifted his head.
The look on his face was terrifying.
Not because it was angry.
Because it was broken.
Jo continued through the laptop speakers.
"I don't want Eleanora hurt."
Ava's answer came instantly.
"Then stop pretending this is about the baby."
The recording ended.
Silence swallowed the studio.
I stood on the stairs, one hand on the wall, the world tilting around me.
Jo.
Ava.
They had done this.
Not the press.
Not random strangers.
Not some faceless source.
Women who knew him.
One who wanted him.
One who had once had him.
They had taken the worst thing I had ever done, the shame that already kept me awake at night, and handed it to the world because they believed I would run.
Because they knew I might.
Hero turned then.
His eyes found me on the stairs.
For a moment, neither of us moved.
Then he said my name.
Not Emme.
Not baby.
Not with anger.
"Emily."
And I realised something with a clarity that nearly knocked me down.
They were right about one thing.
I did run.
I had run from him.
From pregnancy.
From court.
From Eleanora.
From every feeling that asked too much of me.
But upstairs, my daughter was asleep beside my bed because I had given her a rabbit.
And downstairs, Hero looked like the last piece of trust he had in the world had just been ripped out by the root.
Ava thought I would run.
Jo needed me to.
My hand tightened on the bannister.
Not this time.