Chapter 2 - THE SPARK OF LIFE
The sensation was not a gentle flutter. It was a violent, electric shock that tore through the deadened nerves of my right leg, a jagged spike of agonizing heat that made me gasp out loud. My hands gripped the armrests of my wheelchair so hard my knuckles turned white. I stared down at my foot, encased in an expensive, useless Italian leather shoe, and watched as the leather shifted. Just a fraction of an inch. But it moved.
The restaurant manager, a sleek man named Carlos who worshipped my wealth and despised poverty in equal measure, had finally lost his patience. He lunged forward, his manicured hands closing roughly around the little girl’s fragile shoulders.
"That is enough! You are trespassing, you filthy little—"
"Take your hands off her!"
My voice didn't sound like my own. It was a guttural roar, echoing off the Venetian plaster walls and silencing the clinking of crystal glasses and the soft murmur of the elite clientele. The entire restaurant froze. Carlos dropped his hands as if he had been burned, stumbling backward with wide, terrified eyes.
"Sir," Carlos stammered, his face draining of color. "I was only trying to protect your peace. She is a vagrant, she—"
"If you ever touch her again, I will buy this building, evict you, and ensure you never work in this city again," I snarled, my chest heaving. I looked down at the girl. Her name, I had learned from the whispers of the kitchen staff, was Sofia. She hadn't flinched when Carlos grabbed her. She simply kept her large, dark eyes fixed on my face, her tiny hand still resting on my knee. The heat radiating from her touch felt like the center of the sun.
"Did you feel it?" she whispered, her voice carrying a weight far beyond her five years.
"I... I felt something," I breathed, terrified to admit it, terrified that saying it aloud would break the spell and plunge me back into the cold, numb darkness I had lived in for half a decade.
María stepped forward, tears pooling in her eyes. "Alejandro?" she asked softly, using my first name for the first time in public. "What is happening?"
"Call Dr. Aris," I ordered my security detail, who had rushed over at my shout. "Tell him to bring his equipment to the mansion immediately. And Vargas—" I locked eyes with my head of security, a towering ex-military man who trusted no one. "You make sure this girl is protected. Whatever she needs, whatever her family needs, we provide it."
May you like
But Sofia slowly pulled her hand back. "I don't have a family," she said, wrapping her leftover food tighter in her ragged shawl. "And I have to go back to the station before The Scorpion finds out I was here."
Before Vargas could gently detain her, she slipped through the crowd like a phantom, her bare feet silent on the marble floor. I tried to command my legs to stand, to chase her, but the paralysis slammed back into place. Yet, deep within the marrow of my bones, a tiny, glowing ember remained. The impossible had happened.
