Chapter 60
"What's wrong with him? Where's Charlotte? Where's James?" Isabella's voice was still cool and hard, but her words came faster without her realizing it.
"Ms. Johnson has been sent away. Mr. Sinclair stayed here three days, but Jasper wouldn't let anyone near him. He just kept calling for you… Mrs. Sinclair, please, I'm begging you. Even if it's just a video call, please let the boy see you."
Isabella could hear a child crying faintly on the other end of the line, that thin, desperate wail bleeding through the static. Her eyes burned at once.
That kind of pain, tied straight into her bones and blood, was something no logic could cut away.
"Send me the hospital address."
She hung up and snapped her laptop shut.
Then she lifted her gaze to the mirror. The woman staring back at her carried a sharp, cold beauty.
'Isabella, you're just going to see your son, nothing more than that.'
'If you dare soften toward that man in the slightest, you don't deserve the freedom you have now.'
In Novaria, just before dawn, the air was heavy with a raw, damp chill.
By the time Isabella pushed open the heavy automatic door outside the intensive care unit, coat wrinkled from travel and hair smelling faintly of the night air, the sight that greeted her blew straight through the careful shield of reason she'd pieced together.
The hallway lights were a harsh, clinical white. On the bench beneath them sat the man who had once ruled boardrooms and headlines, the man whose arrogance had seemed impossible to crack. Now James was slumped forward, elbows on his knees, hands buried in his hair. His suit, normally pressed within an inch of perfection, was rumpled and creased.
At the sound of footsteps, his whole body jolted. He lifted his head slowly.
Their eyes met.
"Isabella…"
She didn't spare him so much as a glance. She walked right past his tall frame, pushed the door to the room open, and strode in with a chill clinging to her like a second skin.
Jasper had lost weight.
The little boy who'd always looked like he'd been carved from porcelain, who could be fussy but was still their sweet, soft child, now lay on the bed pale as paper. His lips were cracked and peeling. Fever had turned his breathing shallow and uneven. A thin arm lay on the sheet, an IV taped to his small hand, the clear line gleaming under the overhead light with a kind of brutal, antiseptic white.
"Mom… Mom, don't go…" Jasper twisted restlessly in his sleep, whimpering. His thin fingers clawed at the air, desperate, like a drowning child reaching for one last rope.
"Mom's right here." Isabella's voice broke mid-sentence. Tears surged up without warning.
She reached out with a shaking hand and gently closed her fingers around Jasper's cold little hand. The pain that shot through her, straight down to the marrow, was like a hundred arrows slamming into her at once, ripping apart the hard shell she'd fought to keep intact these past few days.
"Jasper, Mom's back. I'm sorry. This is on me."
She bent over him, pressed her trembling lips to his burning forehead. This was her baby, the child she'd clung to through countless sleepless nights, the only warmth she'd had while she cried herself hollow.
Tears slid down her cheeks and fell onto Jasper's parched lips.
Maybe it was that infamous bond people liked to call mother and child. The boy who'd been trapped in some feverish nightmare suddenly quieted. He leaned in toward Isabella like he'd caught the scent he knew best in the world, nestling his head closer to her chest. His dry lips moved faintly. "Mom… smells nice…"
Out in the hallway, James watched through the observation window, his reflection faint in the glass as he stared at the scene inside.
Light crept up over the horizon.
Inside the room, the monitor ticked steadily, its beeps no longer frantic.
With Isabella spending the whole night by Jasper's side, cooling his skin with damp cloths, whispering to him, never once closing her eyes, his temperature finally slid back to normal.
When he woke and saw the familiar face at his bedside, he stared, stunned. Then he launched himself straight into her arms and broke down.
"Mom! I thought you didn't want Jasper anymore! Ms. Johnson said you had another baby and you didn't want me."
Isabella clutched him tight, her chest twisting so hard it hurt to breathe. Charlotte, you're truly unforgivable.
"No way. Mom will always want Jasper. Just you. No one can replace you."
The door opened with a soft click.
James walked in carrying a tray with a bowl of plain congee. He hadn't bothered to shave; dark stubble shadowed his jaw. The cool, untouchable polish he always carried had been replaced by something darker, a tangle of emotions in his eyes.
The second Isabella saw him, her arms tightened around Jasper. Her gaze went flat and wary.
James stopped about six feet from the bed. "His fever's down?"
"Since Mr. Sinclair has been here three days, why bother asking?" Isabella gave a short, sharp laugh. Her words cut. "If this is what you call taking care of him, then clearly the Sinclair Family's standards are too high for my son. His life's too cheap to carry that weight."
Once, a comment like that would have had James turning on his heel, face like ice.
Now, he only lowered his lashes and stared at Jasper's hand curled into the fabric of Isabella's shirt. Something in his chest felt hollowed out, like someone had scooped a piece of him away.
"Isabella, we should talk."
"There's nothing for us to talk about. When Jasper's discharged, I'm taking him with me." She didn't look up, just kept wiping Jasper's hands with tender, efficient motions.
"Okay." James spoke suddenly. Just one word, but it hit the room like a dropped weight.
Her hand stilled. She glanced up, startled, and met his dark gaze.
In her mind, a man like James—obsessed with control to the point of pathology—would have come armed with lawyers and court orders, ready to fight over custody, ready to throw The Sinclair Group's money and power in her face.
But he'd just said 'okay'?
"What do you mean?"
James set the tray down and walked over to the window. His back looked different somehow, stripped of its usual confidence, thinned out by something like defeat.
"Nia's told me a lot. These past three days, I've seen a lot too." He turned back toward her. His voice was rough. "The Sinclair Family is a battlefield for me. For Jasper, it's a cage. I can't give him the security he needs. I can hire the best bodyguards in the whole Amber District, but they can't stop the malicious things people say."
His mouth tipped up in a humorless curve, a smile with nothing warm in it, only bitterness.
"The doctor said this is all in his head. A heart issue, not just a medical one. If you're willing, when he's discharged, you can take him with you. Let him live with you for a while. As for custody, if you want it, you can take the lead there too."
Isabella went completely still.
She had never imagined that the same man who'd forced her to give in for three years over a single life owed to the Johnson Family, the hard-edged CEO who'd never once backed down, would be the one to offer up Jasper's guardianship now.
This didn't feel like anything James Sinclair would ever do.
"Are you out of your mind?" Her disbelief came out sharp. "Hasn't the Sinclair Family been counting on him to take over everything? Your parents—"
"I'll handle them." He cut her off. A flash of cold resolve passed through his eyes. "Isabella, I know I was an asshole. I used to think that if I gave him the best of everything, if I paid back the Johnson Family and protected that debt, things would stay balanced. I was wrong."
He took one step closer. His gaze fixed on her, intense and unblinking.
"I almost destroyed your reputation. I almost got my own son killed. After that, I don't have the right to fight you. If you can make him happy, let him grow up like a normal kid, whatever you want, I'll give it."