The night Victor Hale collapsed down the marble staircase, he still believed he was in control.
Minutes earlier, he had been standing at the top of his world—literally and figuratively. His fingers were clenched around his phone, knuckles white, as his ex-wife Rachel Hale shouted through the line.
They were arguing about money, custody, and their ten-month-old twins, Evan and Nora. To her, the babies were leverage. To Victor, they were responsibilities to juggle between flights, contracts, and boardrooms.
Even as he fell, it felt like just another problem to manage.
Victor had always controlled everything—companies, negotiations, people’s time. He paid for perfection: the mansion, the imported marble, the expensive cribs upstairs. In his mind, that was what made him a good father. Love and warmth were abstract ideas, not skills he’d learned.
