Alexander stared at the small boy, a cold dread settling deep in his stomach. The name “Benjamin” echoed in his mind, carrying with it a ghost from a past he had spent nine years trying to bury.
“What was your mother’s name, Benjamin?” Alexander asked, his voice shaking slightly, dropping all of his usual corporate authority.
The boy wiped his dusty forehead with his sleeve, leaving a smudge of dirt across his brow. “Her name was Clara. Clara Vance.”
The courtyard seemed to tilt. Alexander felt his bodyguard catch his elbow, but he pushed him away, stepping closer to the child. Clara. The brilliant, quiet woman he had loved during his final year of university—before his billionaire father had forced them apart, threatening to ruin Clara’s family if Alexander didn’t marry a woman of their own social standing. Alexander had been told Clara left the country. He never knew she was pregnant. He never knew she had died.
“She told me stories about this academy,” Benjamin whispered, clutching his worn, frayed blue blanket tighter around his shoulders. “She said… she said a very smart man used to go here. She told me if I ever got lost, I should come to these gates, and I’d find a way to learn.”
Lily looked between her father and the boy, her eyes wide. “Daddy? Why are you crying?”
Alexander hadn’t even realized the tears were falling. He dropped to his knees right there on the dirty stone steps, unheeding of his expensive tailored suit. He looked at Benjamin’s eyes—they weren’t just the eyes of a hungry child. They were his own eyes. The exact same piercing gray.
“Benjamin,” Alexander said, his voice breaking entirely. “The blanket you’re holding… can I see the corner of it?”
The boy hesitated, then slowly held out the edge of the faded blue fabric. There, stitched in clumsy, fading golden thread, were the initials A.W. It was Alexander’s old rowing blanket from his academy days—the one token he had left with Clara the night they were forced to say goodbye.
“I’m not a stranger, Benjamin,” Alexander choked out, reaching forward with trembling hands. “I’m… I’m the man your mama was looking for. I’m your father.”
