Chapter 2 - The Severed Knot
Julian’s neck twitched. He did not jump, but the apple in his fingers ceased rotating. He turned his head slowly over his left shoulder, the bored arrogance on his face freezing into a sudden, rigid mask of incomprehension.
Edward was already moving.
He did not shout. He did not curse. The transition from stillness to velocity was instantaneous and silent, his oxfords finding traction on the dry marble border as he crossed the twelve yards of open hall in four long, driving strides. The air in the foyer seemed to drop ten degrees as his broad, six-foot-two frame cut through the sunlight, the tendons in his neck corded like steel cables beneath his open collar.
He bypassed Julian entirely, his shoulder brushing past the younger man with enough kinetic force to knock Julian half a step sideways.
Edward dropped to both knees directly into the dirty, bleach-slicked water.
He did not care about the bespoke trousers, the freezing chemical slurry that soaked through the fabric to his skin, or the filthy foam that splashed across his cuffs. He reached out with two large, calloused hands, his palms trembling with a violent, suppressed tremor as he caught Maya by her slender upper arms, pulling her away from the dented bucket and drawing her small body toward his chest.
"Maya," Edward whispered.
His voice was thick, raw, and scraping against his vocal cords—a sound torn from the deepest marrow of his chest.
The little girl froze. The scouring pad slipped from her gray-tinted fingers, sinking into the cloudy water with a soft splash. She did not look up immediately; her shoulders stayed hunched, her neck retracted, conditioned by days of anticipating a harsh reprimand for stopping her task.
"Maya. Look at me. Baby, look at Daddy."
Her head lifted slowly, her neck muscles stiff as iron. Her large hazel eyes—the exact shape and shade of his own—were sunken, framed by bruised, dark purple crescents of exhaustion. Her lips were dry, split at the center, and pale. When her gaze finally registered the dark, wavy hair, the stubbled jaw, and the familiar black coordinates tattooed across his wrist, her face broke into an expression of catastrophic, disbelieving relief.
Her small, freezing, soap-slicked hands shot forward, clutching the linen of his white dress shirt with desperate, white-knuckled ferocity.
"I’m sorry, Daddy," she sobbed, the tears instantly cutting clean tracks through the gray film of dust on her cheeks. "I’m sorry. I tried to make it clean. I tried to get the gray out of the floor before three o’clock. The bucket was too heavy to carry to the sink..."
Edward closed his eyes for a fraction of a second, an agonizing wave of nausea rolling through his stomach. He gathered her head against his neck, his broad hand cradling her skull, feeling the rapid, terrified flutter of her pulse against his palm.
"Stop," Edward breathed, his lips pressed against her damp hairline. "You don't apologize. You don't ever apologize for this. Daddy is here. I’m right here."
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Without pausing, his fingers moved to the coarse knots of the canvas harness. The straps were digging deep into her clavicles, tightened with cruel, clumsy efficiency to prevent the baby from shifting while she bent over the stone. Edward worked the coarse fabric with frantic care, his thumbs peeling back the frayed webbing until the harness loosened.
He reached behind her, his hands sliding beneath the pink flannel blanket to take hold of his son.
