Children recover hope so easily.
Adults forget how.
Just then the elevator doors opened.
Dominic stepped out wearing a perfectly tailored black tuxedo.
He looked exactly the way he had on our wedding day.
Confident.
Handsome.
Completely unaware his life was about to change.
His left arm rested comfortably around a beautiful woman in an emerald evening gown.
With his right hand, he held the shoulder of a little boy no older than seven.
The boy laughed.
“Dad, hurry!”
Dad.
The word echoed through the hotel lobby.
Sophia heard it too.
Her little fingers slowly loosened around the paper necklace.
Dominic finally looked toward us.
His smile disappeared.
For a second, pure panic crossed his face.
Then it vanished beneath practiced confidence.
“Vivienne…”
The woman beside him looked between us.
“You know her?”
Dominic hesitated.
Only for a heartbeat.
But that heartbeat told me everything.
“She…”
He forced a laugh.
“She used to help with some community outreach projects.”
Used to.
Not my wife.
Not Sophia’s mother.
Just someone convenient to erase.
Sophia took one uncertain step forward.
“Daddy?”
Every conversation in the lobby stopped.
The little boy beside Dominic looked confused.
“Dad… who’s she?”
The woman in the emerald dress frowned.
“Dominic?”
He looked trapped.
