14. Leo
14
Leo
T he Maybach glides through Brooklyn like a black shark navigating a fish market.
Fucking traffic.
Every goddamn street looks the same.... brownstones bleeding into hipster coffee shops bleeding into bodegas.
I shift in the back seat, the custom leather sighing beneath me as my right leg sends a familiar, unwelcome throb up to my hip. My fingers wrap around the cane resting at my side.
Eleven fucking months since Chamonix, since the granite wall decided to rearrange my anatomy, and I still have to rely on a piece of shit carbon fiber cane like some geriatric reject.
Fuck Luca.
If he hadn’t pushed that insane line through the Serpent’s Coil, if I hadn’t felt that familiar, corrosive need to prove I was better, faster, more willing to dance on the fucking edge... maybe I wouldn’t have misjudged the wind shear.
Maybe I wouldn’t have clipped that rock .
Maybe I wouldn’t have spent six weeks in a Swiss hospital and the better part of a year fighting my way back from splattered fucking pulp.
A whole lot of maybes.
When are you going to stop second guessing yourself?
They told me I pulled the chute. Instinct, they called it.
Bullshit.
I remember the spin, the G-force crushing my chest, the black tunnel closing in.
I remember grabbing the handle.
Then nothing.
Just darkness.
Turns out, blacking out might have saved my life. My hand probably went limp, the weight enough to yank the cord as I rag-dolled towards the valley floor.
Landed like a sack of broken bricks miles from the target zone, but alive.
If you can call this goddamn purgatory of physiotherapy and investor panic ‘alive.’
Eleven months and my leg still feels like it belongs to someone else, someone weaker. And don’t even get me started on the damage to my upper body.
And the fucking irony?
Luca walked away clean.
Nailed the line, soaked up the glory while I was getting scraped off a mountainside.
Second place.
Again.
Never fucking again.
Not to him.
Not to anyone.
Darius expertly maneuvers the SUV to the curb in front of another anonymous brownstone. It’s a tree-lined street, with a stroller parked by the stoop .
Quaint.
Fucking quaint.
This is where the miracle PR worker operates? Out of her apartment?
Luca set this up.
Said she was the best, discreet, handled high-stakes reputation management.
Came highly recommended by someone, can’t remember who. Whatever.
After the last three agencies shit the bed, Maxwell it’s about demonstrating resilience, managing expectations, and leveraging the truth strategically. The other firms likely focused on spin and optics. I focus on substance presented effectively.”
Substance.
Interesting word choice.
She’s got balls, I’ll give her that.
Standing here in her apartment, facing down a billionaire demanding miracles, and she’s talking substance.
“All right, Taylor,” I say. “Let’s talk specifics. What’s your initial assessment? First steps?”
“Well, if you’ll have a seat, you can fill me in on the background a bit, and then we can come up with a plan.” She beckons at the couch again.
But again I stubbornly ignore her. “I’m happy to fill you in right where I am.”
And so we talk for a good twenty minutes. She asks sharp questions, listens intently, occasionally jotting notes on a tablet. She’s good. Focused, analytical, cutting through my impatience. The faint scent of baby powder persists, such a weird counterpoint to all this high-stakes business talk.
“Okay,” I say finally, checking my watch. “Do you have everything you need?”
“I do,” she replies.
“Good. If there’s anything more you need, contact either my assistant or Luca’s. Then send us a proposal. Detailed strategies, timelines, budget. You know, the works. My legal team will handle the contract.”
I need to get out of here. Standing this long is killing my leg. And being this close to her is... distracting.
More distracting than it should be.
That Vegas blank spot is suddenly itching like a phantom limb.
Did we or didn’t we?
“I’ll have something for you by tomorrow morning,” she says. She had remained standing the whole time as well. Professional courtesy.
“Excellent.” I turn to leave, and take a step, the cane finding purchase on the wood floor.
And then I hear it. A distinct, frustrated cry from a room off the living area. Sharp. Demanding attention.
What the fuck?
Sabrina visibly flinches, her professional mask cracking for a split second. Her eyes dart towards the closed door the sound came from before snapping back to me, her face paling almost imperceptibly.
Too late.
I saw it .
That scent. The play mat I saw earlier.
The sudden tension in her posture.
My gaze locks onto the closed door.
She has a kid?
Here?
Maybe driven by pure instinct, maybe by that prickling sense of something being off, I shift my position slightly to get a better view down the short hallway. The door to that room isn’t quite latched. It’s cracked open just enough...
And through the gap, I see movement inside. A crib against the far wall. A small figure pulling herself up, gripping the rail.
I approach the door. I expect Sabrina to try to intercept me, but she does nothing. She just stands there, frozen.
I reach the door and push it open with my cane.
In the crib, the kid turns her head slightly, catching the light spilling in from the hallway.
Her eyes find mine.
Green.
Piercing.
Startlingly familiar.
Eyes that are staring right fucking at me across the distance.
My eyes.
The air leaves my lungs. The room tilts. It’s like hitting the granite wall all over again.
Time slows.
Vegas.
Twenty months ago.
The kid looks about... a year old, maybe?
I do the math.
Fuck.
I turn slowly, deliberately, back to Sabrina. Her face is sheet white now, confirming everything.
She knows.
She knows I fucking see it.
The cane feels suddenly redundant. Raw adrenaline surges through me, overriding the pain.
“Taylor,” my voice is dangerously low, stripped of all pretense. “Who the fuck is in that room?”
Her composure shatters completely. Her carefully constructed walls crumble. Fear, raw and undisguised, floods her eyes. As do tears.
“She’s... she’s my daughter,” Sabrina whispers, her voice trembling, barely audible.
Her daughter.
With my fucking eyes.
The timeline fits perfectly.
And she’s fucking kept this from me for almost two years?
Rage, cold and absolute, washes over me, followed by a bewildering, possessive surge I can’t comprehend or control.
My child.
A child I never knew existed.
A secret she guarded for almost two fucking years while I was... while I was being me .
“ Your daughter?” I repeat, the words tasting like acid.
I take a step towards her, ignoring the sharp protest from my leg.
“Well that’s funny. Because she has my fucking eyes.” I lock my gaze onto hers, pinning her in place. “You want to talk about substance , Sabrina? Fine, let’s talk about substance. Why the fuck didn’t you tell me I had a daughter?”