The city was drowning in rain. Sheets of silver hammered against the glass walls of Knight Tower, blurring the skyline into a wash of light and water. Inside, everything gleamed, polished surfaces, cold air, silence so absolute it hummed.
Alexander stood before the window, hands clasped behind his back. His reflection hovered in the glass: immaculate suit, eyes that looked carved from patience and fury.
He had given her time. Enough to tell the truth herself. She hadn't.
The elevator chimed. He didn't turn.
"Mr. Knight," Damian's voice came from behind, cautious. "She's here."
"Send her in."
The door whispered open. The air shifted.
He didn't have to look to know it was her. Her presence changed a room the way music changed silence, sudden, total, irreversible.
"Selene."
Her name left his mouth like a taste he remembered too well.
"Alexander." Her voice was steady. She stood near the door, coat still damp from the rain, one hand on the strap of her bag as though it were armor.
He turned at last.
It had been years, but the sight of her still unmoored him in small, specific ways: the curve of her neck, the calm defiance in her posture, the way her gaze refused to flinch.
She wasn't the same woman who had walked away.She was sharper now. Polished by pain and pride.
He forced his voice into neutrality. "You could've told me."
Her brow creased slightly. "Told you what?"
He laughed once, low, disbelieving. "Don't insult both of us."
She didn't reply.
"Zane Ward." He spoke the name with quiet precision. "That's what you call him."
Her breath caught, almost imperceptibly. Then she steadied. "I don't know what you think you've found, but..."
"Don't." His tone sliced through the air. "Don't pretend ignorance. You think I wouldn't recognize my own reflection in a child's face?"
For the first time, her composure wavered. It was there, in the tightening of her fingers around her bag, the quick rise of her chest.
"I owe you nothing," she said softly.
"You owe me truth."
He closed the distance between them, steps measured, deliberate. The faint scent of rain clung to her, clean and human in a room built of money and glass.
"You vanished," he said. "No message. No explanation. You left me a ghost of a memory, and now, now I find out I have a son?"
Her jaw tensed. "You don't get to call him that."
He stopped just in front of her. "He's mine."
She lifted her chin, fire sparking in her eyes. "He's mine. I carried him, raised him, protected him. You did nothing."
Something sharp twisted in his chest. "Because you made sure I couldn't."
Her silence was an answer.
He exhaled, a sound between fury and disbelief. "Why, Selene? Why hide them?"
"Them?" The word slipped out before she could stop it.
His gaze snapped to her. "Them. "He moved closer. "So there's more."
She looked away. "You need to stop."
"Two of them." He said it like revelation, each word heavy. "A boy and a girl."
She pressed a hand to her temple as if the sound itself hurt. "You don't understand..."
"Then help me." His voice broke through, raw beneath its calm. "Make me understand why you took my children and erased me from their lives."
"I had to."
"Had to?" He laughed again, but there was no amusement in it. "What could possibly justify that?"
Her eyes lifted to his, and for the first time, he saw fear—not for herself, but for something deeper. "You were never meant for them, Alexander. You were ice. Business. Deals and deadlines. You made rules for affection. You made love a transaction. I couldn't let them grow up believing that was all there was."
Her words hit harder than any insult could have.
He didn't move. Didn't breathe.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter, heavier. "And yet you still loved me."
She looked away. "Once."
He stepped closer until they were only inches apart. "Liar."
Her pulse flickered at her throat. "You can't control everything, Alexander."
"I don't need to control," he said. "I only claim what's mine."
Her laugh was soft, bitter. "There it is. The empire builder. You think people are acquisitions."
His eyes darkened. "Not people. You."
Her lips parted, a tremor running through the mask she tried to hold. "You haven't changed."
"And you've learned to lie beautifully."
For a moment, neither spoke. The rain drummed harder against the glass, an orchestra of restrained violence.
She turned, as if to leave, and he caught her wrist.
The contact froze both of them.
Her skin was warm, alive, familiar. Memory hit like voltage, the echo of nights where this same touch had meant surrender, not resistance.
"Let me go," she whispered.
He didn't. Not immediately.
"Tell me one thing," he said. "If I hadn't found him, found them, were you ever going to tell me?"
Her silence was answer enough.
He released her wrist. Slowly. As though letting go of the last piece of illusion.
"You can hate me all you want," he said. "But you don't get to erase me again."
She turned toward the door, but he wasn't finished.
"I will find out everything," he said, his voice a quiet promise. "Where they were born. What they eat. What they dream about. You can bar me from your life, Selene, but not from theirs."
Her hand paused on the handle. "You don't get to decide that."
He smiled, faint and dangerous. "You should know by now, I always do."
Her breath hitched, but she didn't look back. She walked out, spine straight, head high, leaving the door to whisper shut behind her.
He stood there long after she was gone, the rain still hammering against the glass.
For the first time, the tower felt too quiet. Too empty.
His reflection stared back at him from the darkened window, composed, immaculate, but hollowed by something he couldn't name.
Beneath the rage, beneath the control, something older and more human stirred.
Not vengeance. Not pride. Need.
He pressed a hand to the cold glass, the city sprawling below him like a board of unfinished games.
"You should've told me," he murmured, voice lost to the storm.
But even as he said it, a darker truth settled in his chest: He wouldn't let her walk away again.
Not her. Not the twins. Not this time.