Hired a Gigolo, Got a Billionaire

Chapter 665 Gwen's POV | waited. Not because | was too much of a coward to be in there. But because | heard Bella crying and recognized, from a distance, the kind of storm that doesn't need an audience. Achild's storm. Fear. | stood outside her bedroom, leaning against the hallway wall, my hand pressed over my mouth like that could keep any sound from escaping me. Like even the smallest noise from me could become another reason for her to hate me. When she screamed that I wasn't her mother, | felt the words slice through skin. | knew I wasn't. | had never pretended to be.

But there was a quiet, foolish place inside me that believed love, given enough time, became family. Bella had given me that place ---- From the very beginning, she hadn't looked at me like an intruder. She had looked at me like... someone. A safe adult. A harbor. And now, suddenly, she looked at me like a threat. | went to our bedroom so | wouldn't fall apart in the middle of the house. | closed the door carefully and sat on the edge of the bed. The air felt heavier than it had an hour ago. | don't know how long | stayed in the exact same position before | heard footsteps in the hallway.

Then the doorknob turning. Nick came in slowly and shut the door behind him. He stood there for a second, shoulders slumped, like a father exhausted from holding a child through a breakdown. | lifted my eyes. | couldn't smile. "She asleep?" | asked. He nodded once. "She cried herself out," he said, his voice hoarse. "I stayed until her breathing settled. She just... passed out from exhaustion." | swallowed. The tightness in my chest pulled tighter. "She loved me from the first minute," | said before | could stop ---- myself.

It came out like a confession, like | was speaking to the only man in the world who could understand that particular cut. * Nick, she loved me. She followed me around the house. Showed me her drawings. Asked me questions. She trusted me." My throat burned. "and now... Renee manages to undo that in one day." He crossed the room and sat beside me. He didn't press his body against mine right away. He just sat there, present, like he was giving my heart room to decide whether it wanted to be touched "Gwen," he said quietly. "This isn't about you." | let out a short laugh. No humor in it.

it fit. "She screamed, 'I don't want you." Nick exhaled slowly. "She screamed because she was terrified," he said. "And because Renee did what she always does. She put adult fears into a child's mouth and called it 'concern." He finally reached for my hand. "Bella didn't reject you,"

| whispered. "I just wanted to add to her world. Not replace it." "You haven't replaced anything," he said firmly. "You've built something with her. That doesn't disappear because of one ugly afternoon." | opened my eyes again. "She asked for her mom," | said. "Her real mom." He didn't flinch. "She needed

his hand sliding from mine to ---- rest gently over my belly. "Then we make sure she knows it didn't," he said. "Every day. Ina hundred small ways." let out a shaky breath. "| don't know how to compete with the story Renee planted." "You don't compete," he said. "You stay. You stay steady. You don't flinch

admitted. "Me too," he said. His hand tightened over mine. ---- "But we don't let Renee raise our child through fear," he added quietly.

warm around my shoulders. | rested my forehead against him and breathed. "| just wanted her to be happy,' | said. "I just wanted her to feel safe. Loved. And | thought she did. | thought we had built that." "We did," he said immediately. "Bella