“If you could hear me, Mr. Hayes…” She hesitated for a second, looking at him. “Mr. Hayes, I know you would help a little girl. You were always respectful. You never yelled at me at the company. You never made me feel invisible like other people did.”
Inside, Alexander went utterly still, but not from strategy.
From shock.
She knew him.
Not as a public figure. Not from magazines. Not from his businesses. She knew him from hallways, from the small gestures he himself barely remembered. And even on the worst day of her life, she was there, speaking to him as though he were still a human being and not a body attached to machines.
Maria lowered her head, pressed her hands to her forehead, and whispered, “God… I’m not asking for a miracle for me. Just please don’t let my daughter suffer. That’s all. If something has to happen, please don’t let her suffer.”
Her tears fell onto his skin.