The Day Our Promise Breaks

Chapter 628

The noise of the mall faded away, tucked behind the cozy nook of the café.

Charlie nestled up to Luna, clinging like a little kitten. She kept her head down, taking tiny, careful bites of the delicate pastries Charles had just brought over.

Across from them, Charles couldn't tear his eyes away from his daughter's face. He drank in every tiny shift in her expression, as if he could capture and hold onto this miracle—this reunion he thought he'd lost forever. He watched so intently he barely even blinked.

His phone, left on the table, lit up with a silent flash. A message popped up—it was from someone he'd stationed near Evelyn: They'd be at the mall entrance in just a few minutes.

Charles's heart tightened. An anxious, electric tension wound through him. He drew in a shaky breath, chest twisting with a riot of hope and dread.

He wanted so badly for Charlie, in the instant she saw Eve, to remember-to have those hidden memories come rushing back. To recall she once had a mother who loved her with everything she had.

Even if...

Even if that meant she'd also remember him-the father who let her down, who'd been cold and distant for those five lost years. Even if she hated him, resented him, never forgave him—that didn't matter.

All he wanted was for Charlie to find her way back to Eve. For Eve to have her daughter again.

his life trying to make it right, if

ice, wrapping around his heart. He was terrified that Charlie would look at Eve with

everything she'd suffered, possibly bear that kind of rejection from her own child? She loved Charlie so

Charlie pushed Eve away the way she'd pushed him, Charles didn't

roundabout way: letting Charlie "bump into❞ Eve, just

Charlie recognized her, if she reached for her—maybe, just maybe, there was

if she

secret away a little longer, at least

was over. He couldn't risk hurting her

crawled by, each

few minutes felt

by two cheerful girls Charles had arranged to be with her. They chatted easily, keeping

responded with a polite, slightly distant smile, letting herself be swept along with the crowd into

the entrance. She'd seen Evelyn's on Charles's

recognized her right awayphotel