Chapter 23 - The Boy with Autumn Eyes
The Carlyle Hotel was unchanged from the era of Alexander’s youth—gilded moldings, black-and-white marble floors, and the suffocating scent of fresh white lilies and old money.
The elevator ride to the twenty-second floor was silent, save for the hum of the brass cables. Genevieve led us down the deeply carpeted hallway, stopping before Suite 2204. She unlocked the heavy mahogany door with a gold key card and pushed it open.
"He is in the library," she said quietly, stepping aside.
Alexander hesitated at the threshold. His hands trembled as he slowly slipped off his woolen coat. I unbuckled Lila from the baby carrier, holding her against my hip. She blinked sleepily against the soft yellow glow of the chandelier, rubbing her nose against my collarbone.
"Together," I whispered to Alexander.
We stepped onto the hand-woven Persian rug. The suite was vast, with towering windows looking out over the rain-slicked trees of Central Park. Sitting on a velvet wingback chair by the dark oak bookshelf was a boy.
My breath hitched.
The photograph hadn't captured the sheer, devastating reality of him. He was tall for twelve, with long, gangly limbs that promised his father’s imposing height. His dark, unruly hair fell over a pale forehead, but when he lifted his face from the leather-bound book in his lap, the breath was knocked out of me.
He had Elena’s eyes. Not just green, but the precise, startling shade of crushed autumn moss, framed by thick, black lashes.
He looked at Alexander.
Alexander froze in the center of the room. The distance between them was less than fifteen feet, but it was filled with twelve years of forged death certificates, wire transfers, and stolen childhood.
"You're taller than the pictures," the boy said. His English was immaculate, colored with the lyrical cadence of high Swiss-French, his voice hovering precariously between childhood and adolescence.
Alexander tried to speak, but his voice broke. He cleared his throat, his chest heaving. "Leo..."
"Julian-Leo," the boy corrected coldly, setting his book down on the side table with methodical precision. He stood up, smoothing his tailored grey flannel trousers. He stood with his spine perfectly straight, hands folded behind his back—the posture of a child raised by expensive boarding masters rather than parents. "My mother called me Julian. The records say you chose the name Leo."
"Your mother... loved the name Julian," Alexander choked out, taking two stumbling steps forward. "Leo... I... I didn't know. God in heaven, I didn't know you existed. They told me she died alone. They told me she left."
Julian-Leo’s emerald eyes flickered with a sudden, razor-sharp venom. "They told me you received the bills from Geneva every quarter. They told me you paid for my tuition so long as I remained on the other side of the Atlantic."
"Who told you that?" Alexander’s voice was thunderous, vibrating with agonizing rage.
The boy tilted his chin, pointing his cold gaze toward the double doors of the suite’s master bedroom.
The brass handle turned.
Victoria Ward stepped into the drawing room. She was draped in an emerald-cut cashmere wrap, her silver hair styled in a flawless chignon, her face as smooth and unyielding as polished marble. In her hand, she held a crystal tumbler of amber scotch.
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"I told him, Alexander," Victoria said smoothly, taking a slow sip. "I thought it best the child understood the precise value his father placed on his existence."
***
