Chapter 10
Two years after the positive pregnancy test that upended our lives, we held a small gathering at our home to
celebrate Clara’s second birthday.
There were no board members. No corporate lawyers. No uncomfortable silences or hidden folders in
mahogany desks.
Eleanor and Marcus sat side by side on the back lawn, watching Clara chase a golden retriever belonging to one
of our neighbors with unbridled, chaotic enthusiasm. Caleb and Noah were grilling burgers by the pool—Caleb
arguing passionately about charcoal versus gas while Noah quietly ignored him and flipped the patties with surgical
precision.
Dorian stood near the kitchen doors, wearing a linen shirt with the sleeves rolled up, holding a tray of fresh
lemonade. He looked relaxed—not the manufactured, tense relaxation of a man on vacation, but the deep, settled
ease of someone who no longer felt the need to control the universe.
I walked up behind him, wrapping my arms around his waist and pressing my face against his back. He paused,
feeling my weight, and immediately turned around, setting the tray down on the nearest table.
“Everything all right?” he asked, his hands coming up to rest gently on my shoulders.
“Everything is perfect.”
He looked out over the lawn, where Clara had successfully tackled a soccer ball twice her size and was now
trying to bite it. “She has her mother’s tenacity.”
“And your stubbornness.”
“God help us.”
I laughed, leaning into his chest. “Do you ever miss it? Running Cross Holdings as sole chief executive?
Having absolute control over every lever?”
7
Dorian looked down at me, his expression clear and untroubled. “Sarah runs the company better than I ever did
because she doesn’t carry twenty pounds of familial baggage into every board meeting.”
“And you?”
“I spend my mornings reviewing investments, my afternoons advising the board, and my evenings right here.”
He pressed a kiss into my hair. “I spent thirty-five years believing that power meant holding everything together so
tightly it couldn’t break. I finally learned that the things worth having are the ones you’re willing to hold with an
open hand.”
Across the lawn, Clara fell over in the grass, sat up, looked around for three seconds to assess whether crying
was warranted, and then burst out laughing, running toward Eleanor instead.
Eleanor scooped her up with surprising agility, spinning her around while Marcus cheered from his lawn chair.
I watched them for a long moment, then looked back at my husband. The man who had once handed me
divorce papers because he didn’t know how to share his fear was now looking at his family with a look of
profound, unshielded peace.
“You know,” I murmured, “you still make terrible pancakes.”
Dorian’s lips twitched into a slow, knowing smile. “That, my love, is a malicious slander.”
“Ask Caleb.”
“Caleb has no palate.”
“Ask Noah.”
“Noah is diplomatic.”
“Ask Clara.”
Dorian looked over at our daughter, who was currently attempting to feed Eleanor a blade of grass. “She’s too
young to judge culinary technique.”
“Convenient.”
He pulled me closer, his arms wrapping entirely around me, shutting out the rest of the world. “I love you,
Alina.”
“I love you too, Dorian.”
Above us, the Chicago sky was vast and clear, stretching out over Lake Michigan in a brilliant canopy of late-
summer blue. There were no secrets waiting in the dark, no papers hidden in drawers, and no silence left between
May you like
us to be feared.
We had built our marriage twice. And this time, it was built to last.
