Next page.
A park.
She held hands with a toddling little boy. The child fell. She crouched down, gently brushing dirt from his knee, kissing his forehead. The little boy looked up at her, grinning, showing a few baby teeth.
I flipped through page after page. Each photo like a dull knife, slowly and precisely splitting open my chest.
Her pregnant belly in jewelry school classes. Her carrying a baby to meet clients. Her calculating carefully in the supermarket discountsection. Her leaning against the wall from exhaustion after getting up at night to make formula. Her teaching the child to talk, to walk, to tie his shoes.
Her celebrating his birthday with him—a small cake, a few candles, in the dim rental apartment. They must have been singing the birthday song, but she smiled and smiled until she cried.
Always just her. Alone. And yet she'd named this child—
Kai.
My hands began shaking. Not just my hands—my entire arm holding the photos trembled.
Kayden, this is what you did. Everything a coward does.
Evan watched my expression and wisely left.
The instant he closed the door, I could no longer maintain surface calm. I shot up and slammed my fist on the solid wood desk. The chair fell backward, crashing to the floor with a loud bang. Photos scattered everywhere.
One landed face-up—
A recent photo.
Kai was in her arms, little hand touching her face, saying something. Layla laughed at whatever he said, eyes curving into crescents.
That was the smile she used to show me. Gentle, full of love, completely unguarded.
Past tense.
A sour emotion surged up my throat.
Was this jealousy?
Was I jealous of my own son? Jealous that he got all her love, all her tenderness, all her smiles? Jealous that he'd been by her side these six years while I...
I crouched down, trembling fingers picking up that photo.
Kai really looked like me. Same eyes, same hair color, even the arch of his eyebrows matched. But when he smiled, he reminded me of Layla. I finally understood that children inherit parts from each parent. He was Kayden Blackwood and Layla Gray's child.
This wasn't jealousy. It was regret.
I staggered to my feet. Endless bitterness overwhelmed me. Igripped the desk corner to barely stand straight. Before the floor-to-ceiling window, Baltimore's night scene spread before me—thousands of lights, prosperous and dazzling—yet I felt utterly alone.
Layla was somewhere in this city.
I placed my hand over my left chest, feeling that still-severed bond. The one I'd cut with my own hands. It had lain dormant for seven years, like a wound that would never heal, silently bleeding. I'd even grown accustomed to this bleeding, as long as I never again caught her fleeting fragrance.
When I'd held her tight again, when I'd finally filled that bleeding hollow, the bond's sharp pain faded, and I felt long-lost warmth instead of being a machine that only existed to "be the perfect Alpha."
But she wouldn't even speak a word about "Layla Gray" to me now.
I numbly flipped through all the materials on the desk, recording the fragments I could glimpse of her seven years—without me. She had no me by her side, her identity didn't belong to me, her love was no longer mine, her future...
"Ella Ross Studio's current main partners include: Lucas Jewelry Group, Victoria Arts Foundation, Harbor Design Alliance..."
