It wasn’t the whine of a spoiled child, but a desperate, aching sound that turned heads and tightened chests. Nathaniel Brooks, a powerful real estate investor known for controlling boardrooms with ease, felt utterly defeated.
Dressed in a tailored suit and wearing a watch worth more than most people’s annual salary, he clumsily rocked his eight-month-old son, sweat forming under the judgmental stares of San Francisco’s elite.
“It’s okay, sweetheart… Daddy’s here,” Nathaniel murmured, though he knew the words meant nothing. Lucas didn’t want toys or expensive pacifiers. He wanted his mother. But Claire had passed away five months earlier, leaving silence behind in their Pacific Heights home and an emptiness Nathaniel couldn’t escape.
Whispers rippled through the dining room. “Why doesn’t he step outside?” a woman muttered. “So inconsiderate,” another guest complained. Nathaniel’s loneliness pressed in from all sides. Surrounded by people, yet completely unseen, he was about to leave when a hesitant figure approached the table.
It wasn’t a manager.
It was Ava Morales.