Oliver operated with his trademark clinical efficiency. It took the assistant very little time to thoroughly investigate and discard the notion that Robin was being mistreated at his kindergarten.

In truth, Elise had never viewed that theory as particularly plausible. The academy’s headmaster was acutely aware of the boy’s lineage; as an heir to the formidable Bennett empire, Robin was insulated by a wall of institutional deference.

The faculty was far more inclined to coddle and overprotect the boy than to permit a single hair on his head to be harmed. Still, in Elise’s calculus, even the most microscopic variable had to be systematically eliminated.

With the school officially cleared, her suspicions shifted heavily toward a different target: the nanny who had so abruptly tendered her resignation from Orchard Residence. There was an unsettling asymmetry to that departure. Something about it felt entirely wrong.

Later that afternoon, Elise made several more patient attempts to untangle herself from Robin’s fierce, unconscious grasp.

Each time she moved, however, the boy’s fingers tightened reflexively into her clothing. Ultimately, she relented. Sinking back into the plush cushions of the sofa, she adjusted her posture to accommodate his weight, let her eyelids close, and succumbed to her own bone-deep exhaustion.

For the remainder of the afternoon, the living room remained bathed in a serene stillness. Curled securely against her chest, the boy slept without a single tremor—his first peaceful interval in days.

By the time Robin finally stirred, the amber rays of the setting sun were bleeding across the horizon, casting long, fractured shadows through the floor-to-ceiling windows. His thick eyelashes fluttered once, twice, before his dark eyes opened.

The first silhouette that crystallized in his vision was Elise. For several silent seconds, he simply stared up at her, his small face a canvas of disorientation. Then, the realization of his geography struck him: he was draped completely across her lap.

His eyes widened in sudden panic. The instant his frame shifted, Elise drifted awake, opening her eyes to find herself staring directly into a pair of startled, liquid-dark depths.

"P-Pretty Miss..." Robin stammered, his cheeks instantly flushing. He scrambled to a sitting position, falling off her lap so quickly he nearly tripped over his own feet, before dropping his head in deep contrition.

"I’m sorry." His voice was a microscopic whisper, laced with a cautious, heartbreaking trepidation. "I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you." 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

Elise sat upright, rolling her shoulders to dispel the stiffness. For a long moment, she simply studied the fragile curve of his spine.

"Why are you apologizing?" she asked, her voice quiet and deliberately devoid of edge.

The little boy picked nervously at his cuticles, his fingers twisting together. "Because... because I disturbed you."

A sharp, physical ache tightened across Elise’s chest. The child hovering anxiously before her was painfully familiar.

She remembered the very first time she had seen him—pale and burning with a fever, quietly enduring his sickness while curled in Dylan’s arms without a syllable of complaint.

Later, at the kindergarten, he had trailed her with an endearing, unprompted curiosity. Even when her blood sugar had crashed, he had offered his hoarded candy with a sincerity that could not be manufactured.

The more she retroactively pieced him together, the more she realized how inherently sweet and observant he truly was.

If only things were different, she thought, a phantom pang of grief echoing in her mind. If none of these toxic, agonizing complications existed...

Had Dylan simply brought the boy home from the start, had he chosen transparency over deceit and trusted her enough to share the weight of his reality, everything would have shifted.

Even while drowning in the suffocating sorrow of losing her own unborn children, Elise knew she would have opened her heart to this boy. Perhaps his very presence would have anchored her, stitching together a fraction of the vast emptiness left in the wake of her tragedy.

But Dylan had engineered a betrayal she could never sanction.

Suppressing a weary sigh, Elise reached out, her tone softening. "Robin."

The boy’s head snapped up instantly.

"If someone ever hurts you, or if you feel like you’re being treated unfairly, you must speak to an adult," she told him, her gaze locking onto his with absolute gravity. "You have to let people help you. You have to let them protect you. Do you understand me?"

Robin froze, a momentary flash of calculation crossing his young features before he nodded with absolute, practiced obedience. "I understand."

Elise tracked the micro-expressions flitting across his face. "When you were asleep just now, you had another nightmare. You’re aware of that, aren’t you?"

His small shoulders hitched. He shook his head instinctively, a defensive reflex, but after a beat of heavy silence, he slowly nodded.

"There are always bad people in my dreams," he admitted, his voice dropping into a raspy murmur. "They chase me. And they try to hit me." His tiny fists clenched against his knees. "I’m scared."

Elise memorized the tension in his hands. "Did you have these dreams before you came to stay here? Months ago?"

This time, the hesitation was stark. It was a calculated, heavy pause that stretched too long for a five-year-old child. Finally, he gave a slow, deliberate shake of his head.

The denial was all the confirmation Elise required. It solidified a dark, subterranean suspicion she wasn’t yet prepared to voice aloud. Reaching across the space between them, she gently ruffled his hair, letting a faint, reassuring smile grace her lips.

"Alright," she murmured softly. "I understand."

Choosing not to pry any deeper into his fragile psyche, she smoothly pivoted the conversation. "Are you hungry?"

The query caught the boy off guard, instantly reminding his body of its neglected needs. Over the past seventy-two hours, he had survived on sheer adrenaline, barely eating a crumb. Now that his nervous system had finally deregulated in sleep, his appetite returned with a vengeance.

Before his mouth could formulate a polite decline, his stomach betrayed him. A loud, resonant growl vibrated through the quiet living room.

The sound was so distinct that it was impossible to ignore. Robin’s entire face turned a vivid, burning crimson. Overwhelmed by embarrassment, he buried his chin in his chest.