“Mr. Harrington?”
Elena’s quiet voice came from the doorway. The housekeeper wrung her apron the way she always did when she was about to ask for something impossible.
“Would it be all right if Lily played outside with Lucas today? Just for a little while?”
Alexander turned. Elena had been with the family eight years—soft-spoken, invisible, flawless at her job. Her daughter Lily was seven, all freckles and wild auburn curls, the only child on the estate who had never treated Lucas like he was made of glass.
“Elena, you know he—”
“Please, sir. Lily wants to push him around the old rose garden. She says the mud doesn’t scare her.” Elena’s eyes filled. “He hasn’t laughed since the last doctor told us there was nothing left to try.”
Fifteen specialists. Fifteen identical verdicts: spine perfect, nerves perfect, muscles perfect. “It’s as if the signal from his brain simply never arrived,” they said, shrugging, as if that explained a lifetime sentence.