Then, under the unstable roof of a street stand, trying to shield a few wilted flowers from the storm, he saw her.
Grace.
Beside her stood a thin woman with a tired but gentle face—her mother.
They were both soaked, both shivering, both trying to save the few things they had to sell.
Victor stopped in the rain and looked at them, unable to speak for a second.
Then he stepped closer.
“I found you,” he said, and his voice broke on the words.
Grace lifted her face and smiled as if she had expected him eventually.
“I knew you would come,” she said.
And in that rain-drenched moment, Victor understood something that changed him more than the miracle itself.
Destiny had not only sent Grace to save Sofia.
It had also sent him to Grace so that he could become the man he had never needed to be before.
The next day he returned, not with pity, not with a performance of charity, but with an offer made carefully and respectfully.