Page 9 of Secret Heir

It’s pulled back in a messy braid that looks like she did it without looking in a mirror.

She’s wearing jeans that hang loose on her frame and a sweater that’s been mended at the elbows.

No makeup. Bitten nails. Chapped lips.

She looks like she’s been surviving, not living.

Good. Maybe she should know what it feels like to suffer.

Then I see the boy, and every thought in my head evaporates.

He’s in her arms, head tucked against her shoulder, still half-asleep. He’s small.

So fucking small it makes my chest twist painfully.

His legs dangle, skinny limbs in worn pajama pants that are too short. His feet are clad in thin socks.

They should be warm in slippers but aren’t.

Aria’s carrying him like he weighs nothing, and he probably doesn’t. My investigators told me he’s underweight for his age.

Twenty-third percentile.

My son is smaller than seventy-seven percent of children his age because he hasn’t been eating enough.

Because Aria couldn’t provide for him.

Because she chose this over letting me be his father.

She shifts him in her arms, and his head turns. I see his face for the first time in person and my breath catches.

It’s like looking at old photographs of Nikolai and me as children.

The same bone structure—high Slavic cheekbones, strong brow, sharp jawline that will become more pronounced as he grows.

His nose is small now, delicate like Aria’s, but I can see the shape of my mother’s nose there.

The slightly upturned tip.

The narrow bridge.

And his eyes.

Even drowsy and confused, those eyes are unmistakably Sokolov gray.

The exact shade Nikolai and I inherited from our father.

Lighter than steel, darker than silver, with that same intense quality that makes people uncomfortable.

My son looks at me with my own eyes, and I feel my breathing hitch as an overwhelming feeling courses through me.

He’s beautiful. Perfect. Mine.

And he’s scared.

I can see it in the way he shrinks against Aria and his small hand fists in her sweater.

His eyes go wide and wary, tracking my every movement like a prey animal watching a predator.