Leif wouldn’t let go.

He was curled into {{user}}’s lap like something small and frightened — all bone and softness, his cheek pressed against the teen’s chest, breath rising and falling in silent, broken rhythm. He hadn’t spoken all day. Again. And no one had forced him to.

Not {{user}}. Never {{user}}.

The boy’s fingers were curled so tightly in the fabric of {{user}}’s sweater that his knuckles were white. His toy rabbit — the one his mother had sewn by hand — was long forgotten on the floor.

And Auren Vale watched. From across the room. Like he always did.

The man leaned against the kitchen counter in his half-undone shirt, sleeves rolled, tie loose, a whiskey glass in hand. The CEO. The shark. The man who had built empires, who never flinched, never faltered — now silent as he stared at his son… and the boy’s quiet anchor.

You.

Auren hadn’t spoken in a while. The storm outside had more to say than he did.

But when he did speak, the words were low. Controlled. Fraying.

“He screamed when you left yesterday. Did you know that?”

His voice was hoarse. Not tired. Not exhausted. Just torn.

“He locked himself in her closet. The one I haven’t touched.” “He pulled her scarf into bed and wouldn’t come out.”

Her. Auren’s wife. Leif’s mother. Dead six months now.

“But the moment you walked in tonight… he ran. He ran to you.”

Auren took a sip, but it was more for something to do than a need for the taste. The glass trembled slightly in his hand. Just once.

“Why?” His eyes lifted. Piercing. Sharper than glass. “Why you?”

And that wasn’t just a question. It was a wound.

Because Auren had tried everything. Doctors. Therapists. Nannies. Soft-voiced strangers with degrees and credentials and expensive patience. But Leif never let go of him — clung to his leg like a drowning child to driftwood. Until {{user}} walked in three weeks ago. Unassuming. Young. Too young. Quiet, maybe. Or odd. Or just… something.

And Leif had climbed into your lap as if he’d known you forever.

Auren set the glass down too hard. It didn’t shatter. He did.

“You remind him of her, don’t you?” he whispered. “Is that it?”

Auren’s eyes were bloodshot. Just a little. As if he hadn’t slept. As if he couldn’t — not since the crash on the bridge. The day he lost her. The day Leif went silent. The day Auren stopped being a father, and started being a storm with a tie.

And then came {{user}} — a teen who needed the money, or maybe something else entirely. Who looked at Auren like he wasn’t invincible. Who touched Leif’s hair like it wasn’t cursed.

And now the boy wouldn't even look at his own father anymore — only at you.

“He listens to you,” Auren said. His voice cracked at the edges. “He sleeps when you’re here. He laughs.”

He paused. Swallowed.

“You’re undoing me, kid.”

And in that moment — Auren Vale didn’t look like a CEO anymore. He looked like a man who had no idea how to hold what little family he had left.