Crinkled. Damp in places. Held like it mattered more than anything else in the world.
That’s when he noticed her feet.
Bare.
Not the careless kind of barefoot you see in summer, kids running through grass without thinking—but raw, damaged. The soles were dark with grime, cracked in places, small cuts scattered across her toes. One of them still bled, the red already drying against her skin.
She had walked. Far.
And not recently.
Daniel felt something shift in his chest, something heavy and immediate.
“Sweetheart,” he said softly, stepping around the desk, “are you hurt?”
She looked at him then.
Really looked.
Like she was trying to decide whether he was real.
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