📖 The Story Continues
The story doesn't end here.Continue reading the full story adaptation below and discover what happens next.
Pregnant and Spoiled by the Billionaire – Episode 3
Amelia’s provocative question hung in the corridor outside Leo’s office. She had expected irritation, perhaps a cold order to leave, but the billionaire only studied her with an intensity that made her forget the employees moving nearby. His silence turned her own words against her until she wished she could pull them back into the safety of her notebook.
Leo moved close enough that she had to tilt her head to hold his gaze. “I can assure you, Ms. Gates, I’m very interested in women.” His voice remained measured, but the meaning beneath it was unmistakable. Heat rushed into Amelia’s face, and she understood exactly how reckless it had been to ask such a personal question.
He could have ended the interview there, yet something about her fascinated him. Amelia was ambitious without being calculating, nervous without being submissive, and she had challenged him with a sincerity no publicist could manufacture. “But until the right one comes along,” he continued, “I’m fine being single and focusing on my work.”
The answer was more honest than she had expected. For a moment, Leo did not sound like the untouchable founder profiled in business magazines. He sounded like a man who refused to settle merely because his family and the public demanded a romance from him. Amelia lowered her pen, caught between the journalist recording his words and the woman wondering what he considered right.
Leo noticed the shift in her expression. The interview had been entirely about him, yet Amelia’s curiosity had revealed almost nothing about the person asking the questions. He wanted to know what kind of woman visited the same building eight times for a five-minute chance—and why her presence had made an ordinary afternoon unexpectedly interesting.
“What about you, Ms. Gates?” he asked. “Are you single?” Amelia blinked, certain she had misunderstood. No part of her prepared list included answering personal questions from Leo Preston, especially when his gaze made the exchange feel less like an interview and more like flirtation.
She took refuge in professionalism. “I think we should keep this about you.” Her reply sounded sensible, but the slight tremor in it betrayed her. Leo’s mouth curved as though her evasion had told him more than an immediate answer would have.
“I’ve answered many questions,” he said, despite the fact that their interview had lasted only minutes. “I think it’s only fair if you answer mine.” The logic was shameless, and Amelia knew it. Still, he waited with such calm certainty that she found herself weighing the consequences of one simple truth.
She was single—painfully, uneventfully single. Between classes, campus assignments, and part-time work, romance had never risen to the top of her priorities. Men like Leo existed in a world she observed for articles, not one she expected to enter. Yet standing before him, that boundary no longer felt quite so absolute.
“I’m single,” she admitted. The words altered something in his expression, a flash of satisfaction too quick for her to name. Amelia looked down and pretended to make a note, though the page blurred beneath her pen. She had come for a quote about renewable energy and somehow revealed her relationship status to the city’s most eligible bachelor.
Before Leo could respond, his assistant approached with the careful urgency of someone interrupting a powerful man. “Mr. Preston, your three o’clock is ready.” The reminder broke the spell around them. Leo glanced toward the conference room, where several executives had already assembled behind the glass.
Amelia checked the time and felt panic replace embarrassment. Her five minutes were gone, and half her questions remained unanswered. “Wait,” she said as Leo reached for his office door. “I haven’t finished asking all my questions yet.”
His schedule gave him every reason to dismiss her. Instead, Leo took a card from his pocket and held it out. “Feel free to reach out,” he said. Their fingers brushed when Amelia accepted it, sending an absurd spark of awareness up her arm. “We can continue our conversation.”
Conversation, not interview. Amelia noticed the distinction and suspected he intended her to notice too. The card carried a direct number rarely given to reporters, let alone college students with campus press credentials. “Thank you, Mr. Preston,” she managed, closing her fingers around it before her unsteady hand could betray her.
Leo entered the conference room, but his attention followed her retreat down the corridor. He had meetings worth millions of dollars waiting for him, yet he was thinking about a woman who had argued over five minutes and blushed when he asked if she was single. His mother’s question returned with inconvenient timing: Who are you interested in?
Amelia did not breathe normally again until the elevator doors closed behind her. She leaned against the mirrored wall and pressed Leo’s card between the pages of her notebook. “What’s happening to me?” she whispered. “Why does he make me feel this way?”
She told herself it was adrenaline. Leo was charismatic, experienced, and accustomed to making people feel as though they had his undivided attention. Mistaking that talent for genuine interest would be foolish. Even so, Amelia replayed the warmth in his eyes and the way he had asked whether she was single.
Back on campus, she turned the brief exchange into the strongest article she had ever written. She highlighted Leo’s investment in clean energy, his extraordinary donation to education, and the discipline behind his guarded public image. She did not include the rumors about his love life—or the personal answer that had left her heart racing.
When the piece appeared on Urban Lens, the response exceeded anything Amelia had imagined. The view counter climbed past ten thousand, comments praised the rare glimpse of Leo Preston, and her editor celebrated the attention. At last, Amelia could see a path from struggling student to serious journalist opening before her.
Across the city, Leo read the article alone in his office. It was perceptive without being invasive, ambitious without twisting his words, and unmistakably hers. He paused over the byline—Amelia Gates—then saved her number from the contact information beneath it, certain that their unfinished conversation had only just begun.
