---- Chapter 12 Almeda Hughes POV: The sight of them, sitting in the middle of my newly born dream, felt like a violation. | stopped in the doorway, my arms crossed over my chest. Hector stood up as | approached, his expression unreadable. Jacob kept his head down, staring at his hands. "What are you doing here, Hector?" | asked, my voice devoid of any warmth. "We came to see you," he said simply. "To talk." "There's nothing to talk about. | told you, if you don't re-file-" He cut me off. "Jacob wants to apologize." He gently nudged his son. Jacob slid off his chair and walked towards me, his steps hesitant. He stopped a few feet away, his lower lip trembling. "I'm sorry, Almeda," he whispered, his voice barely audible. "I'm sorry | was mean to you. And I'm sorry about Buddy. | miss him too." He looked up at me, his eyes swimming with tears. "Please come home. I'll be good. | promise." He rushed forward and wrapped his small arms around my legs, burying his face in ---- my apron. For six years, | had yearned for this. For a single word of affection, a single gesture of acceptance. Now that it was here, | felt... nothing. An empty, hollow space where my heart used to be. The damage had been done. The well of my affection had run dry. | gently, but firmly, pried his arms off me and took a step back. "Lam not your mother, Jacob," | said, my voice quiet but firm "And that is not my home anymore." Jacob' s face crumpled, and a fresh wave of sobs shook his small body. | ignored him, my gaze fixed on Hector. "Get out of my restaurant. You are not welcome here. You are disrupting my business." Hector' s jaw tightened. "Stop being childish, Almeda. You've made your point. Now it's time to come home and be a family." A laugh, sharp and bitter, escaped my lips. "A family? You think this is a family? This was a business transaction, Hector. A six-year contract." He stared at me, a flicker of confusion in his eyes. "What are you talking about?" | took a deep breath, the truth finally rising to the surface. "| never loved you, Hector. | never wanted to be your wife. | ---- married you as a favor to Gladys. She begged me to give Jacob a stable home after Geneva died. | owed her my life, so | agreed. Six years. That was the deal. My debt is paid." The color drained from his face. He looked as if | had physically struck him. Jacob stopped crying, his eyes wide with shock. "That's... that's not true," Hector stammered, his voice losing its confident edge. "You... you can't mean that." "Every word," | said, my voice cold and clear. "This was never about love. Not for me." He took a step towards me, his hand reaching out as if to touch me, to convince himself | was real. "But... we... you and L | flinched away from his touch. "That was part of the contract. Nothing more." His face was a maelstrom of emotions-shock, disbelief, and something else... something that looked terrifyingly like pain. He stood there, silent, for a long moment. Jacob, however, recovered first. He ran to me again, grabbing my hand. "I don't care! | don't care why you came! Just please don't go! | need you!" | looked down at the child clinging to my hand, the child | had tried so hard to love, and felt only a profound sense of exhaustion. ---- "Sarah," | called over my shoulder to my manager, who was watching from a distance with wide eyes. "We're closing for the night. Please escort our guests out." | pulled my hand from Jacob's grasp and turned my back on them both. | walked towards the kitchen, not looking back, the sound of Jacob's desperate sobs and Hector's stunned silence fading behind me. | didn't stop until the kitchen door swung shut, leaving them, and the past six years, firmly behind me.