He was completely, utterly broken.
When he saw me walking toward him, flanked by security, his bloodshot eyes watered. He looked at my pristine white coat, at the massive steel letters spelling my name on the wall behind me.
“Clara… please,” Thomas whispered, his voice trembling with a pathetic, raw desperation. He took a hesitant step forward, but the security guard put a hand on his chest, stopping him. “Clara, I’m your father. I… I made a terrible mistake. I was blind. But I’m destitute. The bank is taking my apartment tomorrow. Just… just sign a single recommendation letter for me. Introduce me to Elias Thorne. You have so much power now, so much influence. Please, save my life.”
I stopped a few feet away from him. I looked at the man who had pushed me into the freezing rain, who had tried to steal my mother’s legacy to build a TikTok studio. I searched my heart for a flicker of anger, or perhaps a lingering drop of hatred.
I found absolutely nothing. Only a cold, clinical, profound indifference. He wasn’t a monster anymore. He was just a sad, irrelevant man.
“I’m sorry, Thomas,” I said softly. My voice was calm, steady, and utterly devoid of empathy. I purposefully used his first name, drawing an immediate, unbreakable boundary between us.
