Now, at 7:00 a.m., Sebastian stood on the balcony watching the sunrise over the ocean, still wearing his tuxedo pants and wrinkled dress shirt. He'd abandoned the jacket hours ago along with any pretense of rest.
A daughter. The words had cycled through his mind all night, each repetition making them more real and more impossible simultaneously. Somewhere in this hotel, four floors below, there was a 17-month-old child who carried his DNA, his features, half of everything he was, and he'd had no idea.
Sebastian's phone buzzed for the hundredth time. His mother, no doubt. She'd been calling since 3:00 a.m. when someone had apparently mentioned seeing him in intense conversation with some woman on the terrace. He'd ignored every call. He couldn't deal with Katherine Hale right now, couldn't stomach her judgments and manipulations and carefully worded disappointments. For the first time in his adult life, Sebastian didn't care what Katherine Hale thought. The only thing that mattered was room 412.
10:00. Nora had said 10:00. Sebastian checked his watch. Three hours. Three hours until he'd meet his daughter. Three hours to figure out what the hell he was going to say, how he was going to explain 17 months of absence, how he could possibly make up for—
"You're up early."
He turned to find Vanessa in the doorway, wrapped in a silk robe, her hair still perfect despite sleeping. She never looked disheveled; it was like she woke up already posed for a photo shoot.
"Couldn't sleep," Sebastian said.
"I'm not surprised. That was quite an event." Vanessa moved to the coffee maker, programming it with the precision she applied to everything. "Your mother called me at 6:00. Apparently, there's some issue she wants to discuss. Something about a conversation you had last night."
Of course. Katherine had gone around him straight to Vanessa.
"It's nothing," Sebastian lied.
"It didn't sound like nothing. She seemed quite concerned." Vanessa turned to face him, her expression carefully neutral. "Who was that woman on the terrace, Sebastian? And don't say 'someone you used to know.' I'm not an idiot."
The coffee maker hissed and gurgled, filling the silence.
"Her name is Nora," Sebastian said finally. "We were together before you and I met. It ended badly."
"How badly?"
"I blocked her number, refused to see her, cut her out completely." The words tasted bitter. "I thought I was making a clean break. Turns out I was just being a coward."
Vanessa's expression didn't change, but something flickered in her eyes. "And now she's here at our celebration. Wanting what? Closure? A second chance?"
"She's here because she needed to tell me something I should have heard two years ago." Sebastian met Vanessa's gaze directly. "She has a daughter, my daughter."
The coffee maker finished its cycle. The silence that followed was absolute.
"You have a child," Vanessa said it flatly, like she was confirming a business transaction.
"I didn't know. She tried to tell me, but I'd blocked every avenue of communication."
"So she raised our daughter alone for 17 months."
"Our daughter," Vanessa repeated, and there was something sharp in her tone now. "You mean your daughter with her?"
"Yes."
Vanessa poured coffee with steady hands, added cream, stirred. Everything controlled, everything measured. When she finally spoke, her voice was calm. "I assume you plan to meet this child."
"This morning. 10:00."
"And then what? You're just going to what? Play father? Disrupt your entire life for a woman who could be lying?"
"She's not lying." Sebastian knew it with absolute certainty. Nora had many qualities, but dishonesty wasn't one of them.
"You don't know that. You don't know anything except what some ex-girlfriend told you at a party." Vanessa set down her coffee cup with a sharp click. "This could be a scheme, Sebastian. A way to get money, to trap you into—"
"Stop." The word came out harder than he intended. "I know you're trying to protect me, or protect yourself, but Nora isn't like that. She never wanted my money. She wanted—" He stopped, the truth of it settling heavily. "She just wanted me, and I threw that away because I was too weak to stand up to my mother."
"Your mother who, by the way, is probably going to lose her mind when she finds out about this."
"I know."
"And me?" Vanessa's carefully constructed composure cracked slightly. "What about me, Sebastian? What about our engagement, our plans, the life we're supposed to be building?"
Sebastian looked at her—really looked—and saw what he should have seen months ago. They didn't love each other. They fit together on paper, satisfied expectations, looked good in photographs, but there was no passion, no depth, no real connection beyond mutual convenience.
"I think," he said slowly, "that we both deserve more than this."
Vanessa's eyes widened. "You're breaking up with me on New Year's Day because of some child you didn't even know existed until last night?"
"I'm breaking up with you because I'm engaged to a woman I like but don't love, because I've been letting other people make my decisions for too long. Because—" He stopped, the full weight of it hitting him. "Because I need to figure out who I actually am when I'm not performing for my mother or the board or the society pages. And I can't do that while pretending to be someone I'm not."
"This is insane." Vanessa's voice rose slightly. "You're throwing away everything—our relationship, your mother's approval, your reputation—for what? A chance to play house with some waitress and her baby?"
The contempt in her tone ignited something in Sebastian. "That waitress," he said quietly, "is worth ten of most people in our social circle, including me. And that baby is my daughter, which makes her the most important person in my world, whether I've met her yet or not."
Vanessa stared at him like he'd become a stranger. "Your mother was right," she said finally. "She warned me you had a tendency toward impulsive emotional decisions. I should have listened."
"My mother," Sebastian said, "doesn't get a vote anymore."