Alejandro Cruz adjusted the knot of his tie by instinct and glanced at the reflection of his Rolex in the darkened dashboard glass. Traffic along Paseo de la Reforma crawled forward in bright, impatient pulses, the city stretching awake before the evening rush. Beside him, Renata Villarreal reapplied her lipstick with effortless grace, the kind that came from a lifetime of being admired without trying.

“I honestly don’t understand how you managed to get a reservation tonight,” she said, sliding her designer glasses back into place. “That restaurant is booked solid for weeks. My friend’s been trying for two months.”

Alejandro smiled faintly, eyes still on the road. “When you sign energy contracts for half the country,” he replied, “tables have a way of appearing. Miracles too.” The joke landed, though it sounded more tired than clever, even to him.

Renata laughed softly. She was light in every sense of the word—elegant, successful, independent, and, most importantly, uncomplicated. That was exactly what Alejandro had promised himself after the emotional wreckage of the year before. At forty, with a renewable energy empire built on solar fields and wind farms, he had learned to guard his private life as carefully as his investments.

No more promises. No more conversations about where life was heading in ten years. No subtle pressure about children, family dinners, or futures that felt like cages closing in.

The traffic light turned red, and Alejandro braked smoothly. The luxury SUV settled into silence, its engine humming low and controlled. Renata reached over and squeezed his hand. “I like this version of you,” she said thoughtfully. “You’re calmer. When we first met, you seemed… restless. Like a hurricane.”

Hurricane.

That was the word Lucía used too.

The thought tightened something in his chest before he could stop it.

Lucía Hernández—his former fiancée. The woman he had nearly married. The woman who smelled like fresh coffee in the mornings and sang under her breath while cooking, unaware anyone was listening. The woman who once looked at him with equal parts fear and hope and said she wanted a family, only to hear him answer with devastating clarity that he didn’t.

“I’m not made for that.”

There had been no screaming, no shattered dishes, no dramatic scenes. Just two adults realizing their futures no longer aligned. And yet, in the months that followed, Alejandro had felt an unsettling emptiness, like leaving a home you once loved and suddenly not knowing how to exist in the silence.

He lifted his gaze to distract himself—and then he saw her.

At the crosswalk, moving carefully among the crowd, was a woman with copper hair pulled into a simple ponytail. No makeup worth noticing, no elegance on display. She carried two babies—one secured in a blue carrier against her chest, the other wrapped in a soft pink blanket in her arm. The ease with which she balanced them made Alejandro’s mouth go dry.

He didn’t need to see her face.

He recognized her by the way her shoulders curved when she was tired, by the way she tilted her head slightly to listen, by the unconscious way she walked as if she were shielding something precious from the world.

Lucía.

Halfway across the street, one of the babies stirred and began to cry. Lucía stopped without hesitation, murmuring softly as she adjusted her grip and sang a quiet melody. Alejandro felt the sound strike him like a physical blow. It was the same tune she used to hum when she was nervous, the same one he’d heard a thousand times in his apartment without ever realizing it would one day haunt him.

The baby settled. Lucía resumed walking. Moments later, she disappeared into the crowd.

The light turned green.

Horns blared behind him.

Renata said his name, concern threading her voice, but it sounded distant, unreal. Alejandro blinked, pressed the accelerator, and moved forward on instinct alone. “Sorry,” he said, forcing steadiness. “Work stuff.”

It was a lie.

He wasn’t thinking about contracts, investors, or deals.

He was thinking about those babies—and about the timing he couldn’t ignore. The months since he and Lucía had parted aligned far too perfectly with the age of the twins she had just carried across his life.

And for the first time in a year, Alejandro felt the certainty he had avoided come rushing back, impossible to outrun.