Vance did not have the patience to wait for his elite legal team to carefully formulate a calculated, risk-averse strategy.

Early the very next morning, he parked his discreet car across the street from the highly prestigious, ivy-covered preschool in upper Manhattan.

He watched quietly from the dark shadows of the trees as Maddie walked gracefully out of the heavy, wrought-iron security gates.

She had just dropped the twins off for their morning classes, and he could see her tense shoulders finally relaxing as she pulled her warm coat tighter against the wind.

Vance stepped slowly out of the shadows, deliberately blocking her path on the quiet, leaf-strewn concrete sidewalk.

Maddie froze instantly in her tracks, every single ounce of color violently draining from her beautiful, tired face.

She looked exactly like a terrified, trapped animal desperately calculating its only viable route of escape from a dangerous predator.

Vance raised his hands slowly and non-threateningly, quietly begging her in a broken voice to just give him five uninterrupted minutes to speak.

Maddie’s voice shook violently when she finally spoke, but her beautiful storm-gray eyes were filled with a fierce, burning, and entirely justified hatred.

She coldly told him that he had permanently lost the sacred right to speak to her the moment he sent that cowardly text message three years ago.

Vance desperately tried to explain himself, swearing on his own life that he had absolutely no idea about the babies when he walked away.

He swore with tears welling in his eyes that if he had known she was pregnant with his children, he would have never, ever left her side.

Maddie let out a bitter, incredibly hollow laugh that physically cut through Vance’s chest much deeper than any sharpened knife ever could.

She forcefully reminded him that he did not abandon her because she wasn't pregnant, but because she was broken.

He had cowardly left her because the endless fertility treatments, the hormones, and the tears were simply too messy and inconvenient for his perfectly curated corporate life.

She pointed a violently shaking finger directly at his chest, hot tears of long-suppressed grief finally spilling over her dark eyelashes.

She aggressively told him that her beautiful children did not need a cold, absentee billionaire in their lives.

They desperately needed the fiercely devoted mother who had literally fought through hell and near-death to keep them alive while their father was busy buying luxury yachts.

Suddenly, a small, incredibly sweet voice called out from the open space behind the heavy iron gate.

It was Leo.

The little boy had somehow slipped away from his distracted teacher and was standing there holding a small, bright blue toy car.

Leo looked directly up at Vance, his massive, striking gray eyes blinking rapidly in innocent, beautiful confusion.

The tiny boy tilted his head to the side, studying the tall, crying man, and spoke a single, deeply curious sentence.

He quietly asked if Vance was a bad man.

Vance dropped heavily to his knees on the freezing, hard concrete, completely and utterly unable to draw a single breath into his lungs.