Chapter 1
“Then let me make sure it stays one.”
Marco appeared carrying a small medical case, but Adrian took it from him.
“I’ll handle it.”
Something changed in the room.
His employees glanced at one another.
They were subtle about it, but not subtle enough.
Apparently, Adrian Valentino kneeling on a kitchen floor to bandage his wife’s foot was as surprising to them as it was to me.
He looked toward the doorway.
“Give us a minute.”
No one questioned him.
Within seconds, we were alone.
The rain continued drumming against the windows.
Adrian opened the case.
“Sit.”
I stared at him.
His eyebrows lifted.
“Please.”
That word surprised me even more than the order.
I sat on one of the stools beside the island.
Adrian crouched in front of me.
For one absurd second, I thought about Cinderella.
Then I looked at the man kneeling at my feet and almost laughed at how badly the comparison fit.
Adrian was no storybook prince.
He was controlled, difficult to read, and so private that even after three years of marriage, I knew more about him from business magazines than from conversations at home.
Still, his hands were gentle.
He cleaned the small cut carefully.
I flinched.
His eyes lifted immediately.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No.”
“Elena.”
It had been months since I heard him say my name.
Maybe longer.
Something about the sound of it made my chest tighten.
“It stings,” I admitted.
His expression softened.
“Almost finished.”
I watched him secure a small bandage.
“You’ve done this before.”
His hands stopped for half a second.
Then he continued closing the kit.
“Yes.”
“With yourself?”
He glanced down at his arms.
I followed his gaze to the pale scars exposed beneath his rolled sleeves.
I had wondered about them many times.
I had never asked.
That had been part of our unspoken arrangement too.
No questions.
No expectations.
No intimacy.
Adrian lowered his sleeves.
“Mostly.”
The answer invited nothing further.
He stood.
“You shouldn’t walk barefoot until the cut closes.”
I almost smiled.
“You sound like a doctor.”
“I pay several doctors. Occasionally I listen to them.”
“That must be difficult for you.”
His eyes met mine.
For a moment, I worried I had crossed some invisible line.
Then, unexpectedly, the corner of his mouth moved.
Not quite a smile.
But close.
It disappeared so quickly I wondered if I had imagined it.
“I’m told listening is one of my weaker qualities,” he said.
I looked at him steadily.
“I wouldn’t know.”
The faint warmth vanished from his face.
He understood what I meant.
Three years of silence settled between us again.
Only this time, neither of us looked away.
Finally, Adrian pulled out the chair across from me.
Instead of returning to his employees, he sat.
“Why were you awake?”
The question was so ordinary that it felt intimate.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“Because of the storm?”
“No.”
He waited.
I wondered if he genuinely expected me to answer.
I wrapped both hands around my forgotten tea.
“It’s easier to sleep when you’re tired.”
“You aren’t tired?”
“I’m always tired.”
His gaze sharpened.
“Then why—”
“Not that kind of tired.”
Understanding slowly reached his face.
I looked toward the windows.
“I’m tired of days that all look the same.”
He said nothing.
That encouraged me more than interruption would have.
“I wake up in a home I didn’t choose. I eat breakfast alone. I walk through rooms that were decorated before I arrived. Sometimes I go to the library. Sometimes I visit my father. Sometimes I spend hours pretending I’m interested in choosing flowers for a table no one uses.”
“Elena—”
“You asked.”
He stopped.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “I did.”
My heart beat faster.
There were things I had wanted to tell him for years, but now that I finally had his attention, I almost lost my courage.
“I don’t expect romance from you, Adrian. I stopped expecting that a long time ago.”
His face became unreadable.
“But I thought eventually we might become friends.”
The words hurt more once they were spoken aloud.
“Or at least two people who knew something about each other.”
He looked down at his hands.
I had never seen Adrian Valentino appear uncertain.
Not in interviews.
Not at charity events.
Not across negotiating tables where men twice his age seemed nervous just sitting beside him.
Yet suddenly, uncertainty was unmistakable.
“I didn’t realize,” he said.
A small, tired laugh escaped me.
“How could you?”
His eyes returned to mine.
“I should have.”
That answer silenced me.
Outside the kitchen, faint voices drifted from the hallway. His employees were waiting.
Whatever crisis had brought Adrian home at one-thirty in the morning had not disappeared.
I slid off the stool.
“You should go back to work.”
He stood too.
“Elena.”
I paused.
“There is something happening with one of my companies.”
“I gathered that.”
“It may become inconvenient for a few days.”
“Inconvenient how?”
“Reporters. Questions. People calling the penthouse.”
I frowned.
“What happened?”
“A confidential archive was accessed tonight.”
“Was anything stolen?”
“We don’t know yet.”
“Then why are you warning me?”
He hesitated.
“Because one of the archived accounts has a connection to your father.”
The warmth I had felt moments earlier disappeared.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
“What connection?”
“I don’t know enough yet.”
I searched his face.
“Is he in trouble?”
“No.”
The answer came quickly.
Too quickly.
“Adrian.”
“I said no.”
“And you also said you don’t know enough yet.”
His jaw tightened.
The familiar Adrian was returning—the man who answered questions by closing doors.
Only tonight, I no longer wanted to let him.
“What company?”
He looked toward the hallway.
“Valentino Strategic Holdings.”
“And my father?”
“His former company appears in several old transaction files.”
My stomach tightened.
My father’s failed business had changed everything.
His debts were why I was here.
Or at least, that was what I had always believed.
“Were those files connected to what happened to him?”
“We don’t know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s the truth.”
I folded my arms.
“Then when you know more, I want you to tell me.”
He studied me.
Perhaps the old version of me would have accepted silence.
That woman had been afraid of disturbing the arrangement that kept her father secure.
I was suddenly tired of being her.
“If my family is part of this,” I said, “I’m not staying politely out of the way.”
A strange expression crossed his face.
Not anger.
Something almost like approval.
“All right.”
I blinked.
“All right?”
“I’ll tell you what I can.”
It was not everything I wanted.
But for Adrian, it felt enormous.
He turned toward the hallway, then stopped.
“Your tea is cold.”
I glanced at the cup.
“I know.”
“You always drink chamomile when you can’t sleep.”
I stared at him.
He had already taken two steps before I found my voice.
“You noticed?”
Adrian looked back.
For the first time that night, the distance in his expression seemed almost painful.
“I noticed more than you think.”
Then he walked away.
And I remained in the kitchen, listening to the rain and wondering whether indifference had ever been the right word for my husband.
The next morning, I woke to the smell of coffee.
That alone was unusual.
The penthouse staff knew I preferred tea.
I walked carefully into the dining room, expecting to find someone preparing breakfast for one of Adrian’s meetings.
Instead, Adrian sat at the table.
He wore a white shirt with the sleeves buttoned properly this time, his dark hair still slightly damp.
A tablet rested beside his plate.
He wasn’t looking at it.
He was waiting.
“For me?” I asked.
His eyes moved to my bandaged foot.
“How does it feel?”
“Like I survived a terrifying encounter with decorative pottery.”
His mouth almost curved again.
“Sit down.”
I did.
Someone had prepared eggs, toast, fruit, tea, and coffee.
My place was set across from his.
For three years, that chair had mostly been decorative.
I poured tea.
Adrian watched me add honey.
“You take one spoon when you’re eating and two when you aren’t.”
I stopped stirring.
“You know that too?”
He reached for his coffee.
“I told you. I notice things.”
“From a safe distance.”
His hand paused.
I immediately wished I could take the words back.
Not because they were untrue.
Because this morning felt fragile.
Adrian set down his cup.
“You’re right.”
I looked up.
He was not defensive.
That made it harder to stay angry.
“I thought distance was simpler,” he continued.
“For whom?”
“For both of us.”
“That seems like a decision you made by yourself.”
“It was.”
“Why?”
He leaned back.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
“When we married, you didn’t want this life.”
“Neither did you.”
“No.”
The answer stung despite everything.
He noticed.
“I don’t mean that the way it sounded.”
“There aren’t many ways for it to sound.”
“I didn’t want a marriage arranged around financial problems and obligation.”
Neither had I.
Hearing him say it still felt different.
He rubbed a hand over his jaw.
“I knew you believed you were giving up something to protect your family. I didn’t know what right I had to ask anything else from you.”
“So you asked for nothing.”
“Yes.”
“For three years.”
His voice lowered.
“Yes.”
“And it never occurred to you that being ignored could hurt more than being asked?”
He looked at me for a long moment.
“No,” he said. “It should have.”
The honesty left me with nowhere easy to place my anger.
May you like
I looked down at my breakfast.
“I used to draw.”
