“Then stop looking at him like he’s made of glass.”

Adrian lifted Lucas. The baby squirmed, made one unhappy sound, then rested his cheek against his father’s chest. Adrian stopped breathing.

“He knows you,” Hannah whispered.

Lucas’s tiny fist closed around Adrian’s shirt. The feared man lowered his face toward his son’s dark hair. That night, he did not return to the city.

Chapter 4 — Softness Is Not Weakness

By the end of the first month, Lucas had become a healthy, demanding baby with round cheeks and a cry powerful enough to summon three nurses from opposite ends of the mansion.

The house changed with him. Staff members laughed again. Guards gathered around the kitchen table between shifts. Emilio complained dramatically about anyone cutting fresh bread before it had cooled, which Hannah took as proof his spirit had returned.