Chapter 6 - THE LITTLE BOY WHO LEARNED HE WAS UNWANTED
Nathan had seen the photograph.
Sophia read the teacher's message three times before she could move.
Then she grabbed her coat.
By the time she reached the school, several parents were standing outside the entrance, speaking quietly over their phones.
One woman recognized her.
Sophia saw the recognition spread across the woman's face.
She kept walking.
Nathan was sitting in the school counselor's office.
His backpack rested beside his sneakers.
He wasn't crying.
That frightened Sophia more than tears would have.
“Hi, sweetheart.”
Nathan looked up.
“Mom, are you famous?”
Sophia knelt in front of him.
“No, baby.”
“Then why is my picture everywhere?”
She took his hands.
“Something private happened a long time ago, and somebody decided to tell strangers about it.”
Nathan frowned.
“Is Mr. Blackwood my dad?”
Sophia closed her eyes briefly.
She had rehearsed this conversation in her head for years.
She had imagined a quiet evening.
A familiar room.
Enough time to answer every question.
Not a school office after children had been passing around a photograph.
“Yes,” she said softly. “He is.”
Nathan stared at her.
“Really?”
“Really.”
He looked down at their joined hands.
“Does he know?”
“He found out recently.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Sophia felt tears gather.
“Because I wanted to understand how things would work before I told you. I wanted you to feel safe.”
Nathan thought about that.
Then he asked the question she had been dreading.
“Did he not want me?”
Sophia's heart broke.
She pulled him gently into her arms.
“When I found out I was going to have you, your dad was scared. He made a decision that hurt me very much.”
Nathan leaned back.
“About me?”
“Yes.”
“But you wanted me?”
“More than anything.”
He wrapped his arms around her neck.
“Okay.”
She held him until his breathing slowed.
Then Nathan whispered something that nearly brought her to her knees.
“Can I still be Nathan Laurent?”
Sophia kissed his hair.
“Always.”
Xavier arrived at Vivien's house that evening.
Sophia had agreed to let him come, but only after Nathan said he wanted to ask him something.
The billionaire stood in the living room looking less confident than Sophia had ever seen him.
Nathan sat beside her on the sofa.
His little brass compass rested in his palm.
For a moment, nobody spoke.
Then Nathan looked up.
“Are you really my dad?”
Xavier sat in the chair across from him.
“Yes, Nathan.”
“Like, for real?”
“For real.”
Nathan considered that.
“Why didn't you come before?”
Xavier glanced at Sophia.
She gave him no rescue.
He turned back to his son.
“Because I made a very bad decision before you were born. I was afraid of changes in my life, and I hurt your mom.”
Nathan's fingers tightened around the compass.
“Did you know about me?”
“I knew your mom was going to have a baby. But I didn't know she had decided to raise you. I should have found out. I should have cared enough to ask.”
The room was painfully quiet.
Nathan looked toward Sophia.
“Did Mom do something bad?”
“No,” Xavier answered immediately.
“Nothing?”
“Nothing. Your mom was brave when I wasn't.”
Nathan studied him for a long moment.
Then he asked, “Are you going to go away again?”
Xavier swallowed.
“I want to stay. But your mom and you get to decide how we do this.”
Nathan nodded slowly.
“Can I think about it?”
“Of course.”
“Okay.”
He climbed off the sofa and went upstairs.
Sophia watched Xavier stare at the empty space where Nathan had been sitting.
“He didn't hug you,” she said.
“I know.”
“Don't ask him to.”
“I won't.”
She sat opposite him.
“He's seven, Xavier. He doesn't need promises about forever. He needs to know you'll show up when you say you will.”
Xavier nodded.
“I understand.”
Sophia wasn't certain he did.
But at least he was listening.
The public scandal grew worse.
News programs discussed the affair.
Commentators debated whether the CEO could be trusted to lead a company supplying technology to children.
Someone photographed Sophia entering a grocery store.
Someone else posted her old employment history online.
A television reporter described her as a former girlfriend seeking financial compensation.
Sophia hadn't even asked Xavier to pay for Nathan's lunch.
The lie humiliated her.
But she was angrier about what it did to her son.
Nathan stopped wanting to attend school.
He asked whether people would always stare at him.
He stopped carrying his compass because another child had jokingly called it his billionaire inheritance.
Sophia put it safely in the drawer.
And for the first time in seven years, she wondered whether keeping Xavier out of their lives had been the only way to protect Nathan.
At Blackwood Dynamics, the board held an emergency meeting.
Victor Sloan stood beside a screen showing the company's falling stock price.
“We have two separate problems,” he announced. “A personal scandal and an exaggerated product concern.”
Xavier's eyes narrowed.
“The tablets are overheating.”
“Under unusual conditions.”
“Conditions students can reproduce in ordinary classrooms.”
Victor gestured toward the board.
“We've already paused shipments. There is no justification for a broader recall before the investigation concludes.”
“There may be.”
Victor's voice sharpened.
“Your judgment is compromised because the child's mother is involved.”
Xavier rose.
“Leave Sophia out of this.”
Victor opened another presentation.
“Unfortunately, I can't.”
An old technical authorization appeared.
The document approved a manufacturing revision to the B-12's thermal protection system.
The original protective cutoff would be removed.
In its place, the company would use a less expensive alternative.
Xavier stared.
“Who authorized this?”
Victor enlarged the final page.
The date was four years earlier.
The approving executive's name appeared in bold letters.
Xavier A. Blackwood.
Xavier didn't speak.
Victor continued.
“You approved the cost-reduction program. The modification was included in the final purchasing package.”
“I never approved removing a safety safeguard.”
“You approved the package.”
Xavier searched his memory.
Four years earlier, the company had been expanding rapidly.
He had signed hundreds of procurement authorizations.
Most were prepared by Victor's team.
He remembered the cost-reduction initiative.
He remembered congratulating Victor on bringing expenses under control.
But he hadn't personally examined every engineering modification.
Victor saw the recognition on his face.
“There it is,” he said quietly.
Xavier looked at the board.
“I want the original engineering assessments.”
Victor folded his hands.
“Of course. But the signed authorization is yours.”
Several directors exchanged troubled glances.
One finally spoke.
“If these devices are unsafe, responsibility doesn't stop with Victor.”
Xavier nodded.
“No. It doesn't.”
The director looked surprised.
Victor wasn't finished.
“I also have evidence that the entire original design was acquired legally from Sophia Laurent.”
He placed the disputed transfer agreement beside the manufacturing approval.
Two signatures.
Two decisions.
One corporate disaster.
“Perhaps,” Victor said, “we should consider whether Sophia's accusations are an attempt to shift responsibility.”
Xavier's face hardened.
“Her signature may have been forged.”
“Then prove it.”
The boardroom fell silent.
Victor looked directly at Xavier.
“You can accuse me of anything you like. But that manufacturing authorization isn't forged.”
Xavier stared at his own signature.
He remembered the years he'd spent believing that delegating responsibility meant he was free of it.
Now he understood the cost.
The original heat safeguard was gone.
Children were using the devices.
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And the man who had ordered the change wasn't an unknown executive hiding behind paperwork.
It was Xavier Blackwood himself.
