Chapter 10 - The Art of StayingSpring arrived in Chicago with a sudden, riotous explosion of green. The snow along Lake Michigan melted into gray slush, then vanished entirely, replaced by the brilliant blue of the water and the bright, sharp chatter of tourists crowding the Magnificent Mile.
Our lives had settled into a rhythm that felt less like a carefully choreographed corporate strategy and more like an improvisation. Dorian’s transition to chairman of the board at Cross Holdings had gone smoother than anyone anticipated, primarily because he had hired a co-CEO with a spine of titanium who openly mocked him whenever he tried to micromanage a quarterly report.
He was home for dinner by six every night.
Sometimes he still brought work home, but the laptop stayed shut until Clara was asleep, and the mysterious blue folders were kept out of sight.
On a warm Saturday in May, Eleanor hosted a family dinner at her home near Lake Geneva. It was a modest, rambling house filled with the smell of oil paints, turpentine, and roasting chicken—a sharp contrast to the cold, symmetrical perfection of the estate Dorian and I shared.
Clara, now eight months old and aggressively curious about the world, was currently attempting to dismantle a decorative wooden duck in the hallway while Caleb stood guard, looking like an elite bodyguard whose primary asset was a plastic rattle.
“She has your determination, Dorian,” Eleanor observed, handing her son a glass of sparkling water as we stood on the back porch overlooking the lake.
“She has her mother’s stubbornness,” Dorian corrected smoothly, glancing over at me where I was talking with Marcus about his community college syllabus.
“Takes one to know one,” Eleanor murmured, taking a sip of her own drink. She looked at Dorian with that sharp, assessing gaze that had intimidated half the corporate boardrooms in Wisconsin. “You look different, you know.”
“Different how?”
“Lighter. Like someone finally cut the anchor chain off your ankles.” She paused, her eyes drifting toward me and back to her son. “It suits you. Being human looks good on a Cross.”
Dorian smiled faintly, though there was no humor in it—only a quiet, settled acceptance. “It’s exhausting work, Mother.”
“Everything worth doing is.”
Later that afternoon, while Marcus was attempting to teach Caleb how to grill burgers without burning them to charcoal, Dorian and I walked down to the edge of the lake. The water lapped gently against the rocky shore, the afternoon sun casting long, golden ripples across the surface.
Clara was asleep in her stroller, exhausted from an afternoon of terrorizing the household pets and chewing on unauthorized paperwork.
Dorian stopped by the water’s edge, his hands in his pockets, watching the horizon.
“My father used to bring me down here when I was a boy,” he said quietly, his voice carrying over the sound of the waves. “Whenever a deal went bad or the markets dropped, he would stand right here and talk about control. How the market was a beast you had to starve or feed, but never let touch you.”
I stepped up beside him, slipping my hand through the crook of his arm. “Did he ever talk about anything else?”
“Not really.” Dorian turned his head, looking down at me with a soft, steady expression. “For a long time, I thought that was what made a man strong. Being untouchable.”
“And now?”
He lifted his free hand, gently cupping my cheek, his thumb tracing my cheekbone. “Now I know that being untouchable just means you’re alone.”
I leaned into his touch, feeling the warmth of his skin against the cool spring air. “You’re definitely not alone, Dorian Cross. In fact, between your mother, your uncle, your co-CEO, and a baby who currently screams every time I try to change her socks, I’d say you have entirely too many people in your business.”
He laughed, pulling me against his side so my head rested on his shoulder. “I wouldn't trade a single one of them.”
We stood there for a long time, watching the sun dip lower toward the tree line, painting the sky in shades of amber, violet, and deep rose. There were no hidden clauses, no secret trust accounts, and no unspoken fears waiting to ambush us in the dark.
There was only the lake, the wind, and the quiet, heavy certainty of a life we had chosen to rebuild from the foundation up.
“Come on,” I said, pulling back with a smile. “Let’s go rescue Caleb before Marcus burns the entire patio down.”
Dorian looked back at the house, where smoke was indeed beginning to drift lazily into the afternoon air.
May you like
“Some things,” he sighed, shaking his head with a grin, “even a board chairman can’t control.”
“Good,” I said, taking his hand as we turned to walk back up the hill. “Let’s keep it that way.”
