Updated Apr 16, 2026 • ~13 min read
Chapter 2: Now – Four Years Later
Luna
Luna’s trying to convince her three-year-old daughter that wearing shoes is non-negotiable when Sofia decides that this morning—of all mornings, when Luna is already running fifteen minutes late for work—is the perfect time to stage a protest about footwear, sitting cross-legged on their apartment floor with her arms crossed and her bottom lip jutted out in a pout that’s both infuriating and adorable in equal measure.
“Sofia Vega, shoes,” Luna says in her firmest mom voice, the one that usually works but apparently isn’t going to cut it today, and Sofia just shakes her head hard enough to make her dark curls bounce, those grey eyes—so like her father’s, though Sofia doesn’t know that and Luna tries not to think about it—bright with determined rebellion.
“No shoes,” Sofia declares with all the conviction of a tiny revolutionary, and Luna wants to laugh or cry or possibly both because she loves her daughter with a ferocity that sometimes scares her but also they really, really need to leave right now.
“Okay,” Luna says, switching tactics with the practiced ease of someone who’s been negotiating with a toddler for the past year. “How about this—you put on your shoes, and we can get pancakes this weekend. The good ones, with chocolate chips.”
Sofia’s eyes light up at the mention of chocolate chip pancakes, her favorite bribe food, but she’s learned to negotiate because Luna’s daughter is scary-smart and apparently inherited her father’s business mind along with his eyes. “And syrup?”
“And syrup,” Luna confirms, already pulling Sofia’s tiny sneakers out of the basket by the door. “Deal?”
“Deal!” Sofia announces, and finally—finally—she’s letting Luna shove her little feet into her shoes, sitting still long enough for Luna to tie the laces with the speed of someone who’s done this exact routine five days a week for the past six months since Sofia started at Carmen’s daycare.
They make it out the door with exactly three minutes to spare before Luna has to catch the subway if she wants any hope of getting to the office on time, Sofia’s small hand tucked trustingly in hers as they hurry down the stairs of their Queens apartment building, and Luna silently thanks whatever gods are listening that at least it’s not raining today because navigating the subway with a three-year-old and an umbrella is its own special circle of hell.
The daycare is six blocks away, run by Luna’s best friend Carmen Rodriguez in a bright, cheerful space that Sofia loves—the walls covered in children’s artwork and educational posters, toys organized in colorful bins that Sofia makes a beeline for every morning, and Carmen herself is usually already there with coffee brewing and a smile that makes everything seem less overwhelming.
“Mama, can we get pancakes today?” Sofia asks as they walk, looking up at Luna with those impossibly big eyes, and Luna has to crush down the guilt that comes every single time she has to say no, every time she can’t give Sofia something immediately because money is tight and weekends are for special things.
“Weekend, baby,” Luna reminds her gently, squeezing Sofia’s hand. “I promise. Saturday morning, just you and me, all the pancakes you can eat.”
“And syrup,” Sofia adds seriously, like she’s afraid Luna might forget this crucial detail, and Luna laughs despite the stress of running late and the exhaustion that’s become her constant companion since becoming a single mother.
“And syrup,” Luna confirms, and Sofia seems satisfied with this, skipping along beside her and chattering about her toys and her friends at daycare and a cartoon she watched yesterday, the kind of stream-of-consciousness rambling that three-year-olds are masters of and that Luna has learned to follow while simultaneously mentally running through her to-do list for work.
Carmen’s already at the daycare when they arrive, setting up the morning activity stations, and she takes one look at Luna’s face—probably reading the stress and exhaustion and barely controlled chaos written there—and shakes her head with the kind of fond exasperation that comes from twelve years of friendship.
“You need a day off,” Carmen announces as Sofia runs past them to join the other early-arrival kids in the reading corner, already absorbed in a picture book and completely done with her mother now that more entertaining options are available. “And a man.”
“I have Sofia,” Luna says automatically, the same response she’s been giving for three years to Carmen’s increasingly creative attempts to set her up with various eligible bachelors. “I’m fine.”
“You’re exhausted,” Carmen counters, pouring Luna a cup of coffee from the pot she keeps running specifically for frazzled parents doing drop-off. “When’s the last time you did something for yourself? Had fun? Went on a date?”
“Four years ago,” Luna mutters before she can stop herself, and then immediately regrets it because Carmen’s eyes go sharp with interest, smelling fresh gossip like a bloodhound on a scent.
“Four years—you mean the guy? Sofia’s dad?” Carmen lowers her voice on the last part because even though Sofia is three and probably not paying attention, Luna is paranoid about what her daughter might overhear and store away for later. “You never told me what happened with him.”
“Nothing happened,” Luna says, which is technically true—after that one night, absolutely nothing happened, no calls, no contact, nothing except a pregnancy and three years of solo parenting. “It was one night. He left. End of story.”
“Except it’s not the end because you have a whole child,” Carmen points out with her trademark lack of filter, and Luna loves her for it even when it’s inconvenient because Carmen is the one person who tells her the truth, who doesn’t let her hide behind her walls and her excuses. “Don’t you ever wonder—”
“No,” Luna lies, because she does wonder, thinks about Matthias more than she should, dreams about that night and what might have been if he’d called like he promised—but wondering doesn’t change anything, doesn’t pay her bills or raise her daughter, so she’s learned to shut it down. “I really have to go or I’ll be late.”
“Fine, run away from your feelings,” Carmen says cheerfully, completely unrepentant about the psychoanalysis at seven-forty-five in the morning. “But seriously, Luna—you can’t keep burning the candle at both ends. Something’s gotta give.”
“I’m fine,” Luna repeats, kissing Sofia goodbye (Sofia barely looks up from her book, already deep in daycare mode), and then she’s back out on the street, speed-walking to the subway station while trying not to think about Carmen’s words or Matthias or the fact that she can’t remember the last time she felt fine instead of just functional.
The commute into Manhattan is its usual nightmare of crowded subway cars and people who apparently never learned about personal space, and Luna zones out with practiced efficiency, reading her Kindle app on her phone (romance novels are her guilty pleasure, her escape into worlds where everything works out and people get their happily ever afters) until her stop in Midtown.
The building where she works is all glass and steel and modern design, home to a tech startup called Innovate Solutions that does something with data analytics that Luna doesn’t fully understand but that apparently has enough funding to pay her a decent salary plus benefits, and she’s been working here for two years as an executive assistant to the founders—not her dream job, but it pays well and has reasonable hours and lets her support Sofia without having to work three jobs like she did during college.
She makes it to her desk with ninety seconds to spare before nine o’clock, logs into her computer while simultaneously checking the calendar for today’s meetings (three conference calls, two in-person meetings, and approximately seven thousand emails to respond to), and is just settling into her morning routine when her boss, Jeremy Chen, comes out of his office looking like he’s either going to throw up or pass out or possibly both.
“Big news,” Jeremy announces to the office at large, his voice pitched high with excitement or terror or some combination of the two. “As of this morning, Innovate Solutions has been acquired by Wolfe Industries.”
Luna’s coffee cup freezes halfway to her mouth at the name, her heart doing something complicated in her chest, because Wolfe Industries is Matthias’s company, she knows it is, she’s Googled him enough times over the past four years (always late at night, always when she’s feeling weak and lonely, always deleting her browser history afterward like she’s looking at something shameful instead of just photos of Sofia’s father).
But there are thousands of employees at Wolfe Industries, she tells herself firmly, and just because they acquired her company doesn’t mean she’ll ever actually see Matthias, doesn’t mean anything except maybe better funding and job security—and she’s definitely not going to panic about this, not going to let four-year-old memories derail her perfectly functional life.
“The new CEO starts today,” Jeremy continues, and Luna can see several of her coworkers exchanging nervous glances because new CEOs usually mean reorganization and layoffs and all sorts of changes that make people nervous about their jobs. “He’s coming in at ten to meet everyone and assess operations. I want everyone on their best behavior—this acquisition needs to go smoothly.”
Luna nods along with everyone else, already mentally preparing for the kind of corporate meet-and-greet that she’s learned to navigate with professional smiles and appropriate small talk, and then she goes back to her emails because worrying about things she can’t control is pointless and she has actual work to do.
She doesn’t look up at ten o’clock when she hears the elevator ding, signaling someone’s arrival on their floor, too focused on coordinating a meeting schedule that requires her to somehow book three conference rooms at the same time, which is logistically impossible but apparently still her job to figure out.
She doesn’t look up when she hears Jeremy’s overly enthusiastic greeting voice, the one he uses when he’s nervous and trying too hard to impress someone important.
She doesn’t look up until Jeremy says, “And this is Luna Vega, she’s our executive assistant, she’ll be supporting you directly during the transition,” and Luna’s head snaps up from her computer screen on pure reflex—
And locks eyes with Matthias Wolfe.
Time stops.
Luna stops breathing.
The entire world narrows to Matthias standing in front of her desk in an impeccably tailored charcoal suit that probably costs more than her car, looking exactly the same as he did four years ago except maybe his hair is slightly shorter and there are faint lines around his eyes that weren’t there before, and those eyes—those grey eyes that she sees every day in her daughter’s face—are wide with shock, his mouth actually falling open slightly in an expression that would be comical if Luna could process anything beyond the rushing sound in her ears.
“Luna?” Matthias says, and his voice is exactly the same, that slight accent wrapping around her name like a caress, and Luna feels four years of carefully constructed walls start to crumble.
“Mr. Wolfe,” she manages to say, proud that her voice comes out relatively steady when her hands are shaking in her lap where no one can see them, and she stands up on autopilot because it seems like the professional thing to do even though her legs feel like water.
“You… work here?” Matthias asks, still staring at her like she’s a ghost, like she might disappear if he blinks, and Luna wants to laugh or scream or possibly run away but instead she just nods.
“I’m your new assistant, apparently,” Luna says, and somewhere in the back of her mind she’s aware that Jeremy is looking between them with confusion, probably wondering why his new CEO and the executive assistant are having some kind of silent breakdown, but Luna can’t focus on that because Matthias is here, is real, is standing three feet away from her and looking at her like—
Like what? Like he’s happy to see her? Like he regrets disappearing? Like he’s wondering why she never called him except she didn’t have his number and he never called her even though he promised he would?
“We should talk—” Matthias starts, taking a step toward her desk, and Luna’s panic spikes because they absolutely cannot talk, not here, not now, not when Sofia exists and is a secret that Luna has protected for three years and she can’t, she just can’t—
“Professionally, I’m happy to assist,” Luna interrupts, her voice coming out sharper than she intended, colder, and she sees Matthias flinch slightly but she can’t afford to care right now, can’t afford to be soft. “Personally, there’s nothing to discuss.”
It’s not entirely true—there’s definitely something to discuss, a whole three-year-old something currently at daycare with her grandmother’s smile and her father’s eyes—but Matthias doesn’t know that, can’t know that, and Luna is going to keep it that way because she’s terrified of what happens if she doesn’t.
“Luna—” Matthias tries again, but Jeremy is clearing his throat meaningfully and there are other people waiting to meet the new CEO and Luna takes the escape route gratefully.
“I’ll pull together those reports you requested,” she says to Jeremy, already sitting back down at her computer and pulling up random spreadsheets that she doesn’t actually need, anything to avoid looking at Matthias, to avoid the way her chest aches just from being near him again. “They’ll be on your desk by noon.”
And then she keeps her eyes firmly on her screen, typing nonsense into a blank document because she needs to look busy, needs everyone to move along so she can have thirty seconds to fall apart in private—and eventually they do, Jeremy leading Matthias away to meet the rest of the team while Luna sits at her desk and tries to remember how to breathe.
Four years.
Four years of silence, of raising Sofia alone, of building a life without him.
And now he’s here, her boss, unavoidable, and Luna has absolutely no idea what she’s going to do.
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