"You're absolutely right. More blocks means bigger tower."
Sebastian started building again, hyper-aware of Nora's presence across the room. "Hey, Lily, should we ask Mama if she wants to help?"
Lily looked up. "Mama, come play."
Nora turned, and Sebastian saw the evidence of tears she'd been hiding. His heart clenched. "I don't want to interrupt you."
"Please," Sebastian said quietly. "Join us."
Nora walked over slowly and sat on the floor beside them, keeping a careful distance. Lily immediately crawled into her lap, offering her a block. "Mama build, too."
"Okay, sweet girl. Where should this one go?"
They built in silence for several minutes, Lily directing the construction with the authority of a tiny architect. When the tower finally toppled—this time from structural instability rather than deliberate destruction—Lily clapped her hands with delight.
"Big crash!"
"Huge crash," Sebastian agreed. "Should we build it again?"
But Lily had already moved on, distracted by a board book about trucks. She settled into Nora's lap with it, content to flip pages and provide sound effects. Sebastian watched them together: the ease of their relationship, the way Nora automatically adjusted to accommodate Lily's squirming, how she pressed absent kisses to her daughter's curls while Lily babbled about big truck and beep beep.
This is what he'd missed—not just the milestones, but these quiet moments, the ordinary magic of being present.
"I'm sorry," Nora said suddenly, not looking up from the book.
"For what?"
"For what your mother said, for the position this puts you in, for—" Her voice caught. "For everything being so complicated."
"Nora, look at me."
She did, reluctantly. Her eyes were red-rimmed, exhausted. "Nothing about this is your fault," Sebastian said firmly. "Not my mother's judgment, not the complications, nothing. You tried to tell me. I refused to listen. That's on me."
"I... I could have tried harder."
"How?" Sebastian leaned forward, careful not to disturb Lily. "You called, I blocked you. You came to my office, security removed you. You wrote a letter I never saw. What else could you have done? Shown up at a board meeting? Hired a skywriter?"
Despite everything, Nora's lips twitched. "I considered the skywriter."
"I wouldn't have blamed you." Sebastian paused. "I broke up with Vanessa this morning."
Nora's eyes widened. "Sebastian—"
"It wasn't because of you—well, it wasn't just because of you." He ran a hand through his hair, trying to articulate something he barely understood himself. "It was because I've been living someone else's life, making choices that looked good on paper but felt wrong in every way that mattered. Vanessa deserved someone who loved her, not someone who was with her because his mother approved."
"What did she say when you ended it?"
"That I was being impulsive, irrational, throwing away everything for a child I just met." Sebastian smiled without humor. "She wasn't entirely wrong about the impulsive part, but meeting Lily didn't change my mind about Vanessa. It just made me stop pretending I was happy."
Lily had abandoned her book and was now playing with Nora's necklace: a simple silver chain with a small pendant. She tugged on it, examining the way it caught the light.
"Shiny, Mama."
"Very shiny," Nora agreed softly.
Sebastian watched them, memorizing the moment: the afternoon light streaming through the window, Lily's chubby fingers on the necklace, the way Nora's hair had escaped its ponytail, falling around her face.
"I want to be part of her life," he said, really part of it, not just weekends or holidays. "I want to know her favorite foods and what makes her laugh and how to calm her down when she's upset. I want—" He stopped, the enormity of it overwhelming. "I want to be her father in every way."
"You are her father."
"But I don't know how to do this. I don't know anything about children. I've never changed a diaper or handled a tantrum or—"
"Neither did I," Nora interrupted. "When I found out I was pregnant, I was terrified. I'd never even babysat. I learned everything from books and trial and error and a lot of crying at 3:00 in the morning."
"You make it look easy."
"It's not easy. It's never easy, but it's worth it." Nora looked down at Lily, who'd fallen into that semi-drowsy state toddlers got when they were content. "She's worth everything."
Sebastian wanted to reach out, to close the distance between them, to tell Nora that she was worth everything, too, but the words stuck in his throat, complicated by history and hurt, and the fact that he'd already damaged this relationship once.
"I want to support you," he said instead. "Financially, yes, but also... I want to be present. I want to learn. I want you to teach me how to be what she needs."
"Sebastian, you don't have to—"
"I know I don't have to. I want to." He met her eyes. "And not because of obligation or guilt, though God knows I have plenty of both, but because somewhere in the last few hours that little girl became the most important thing in my world, and you—" He stopped, choosing his words carefully. "You're the person who made her who she is. You're an amazing mother, Nora. I see that. Anyone with eyes can see that."