Aria led them to the empty room with the northern light.
"Ah," Margaret said knowingly. "Mr. Blackwell said you were an artist. He had this room prepared specifically for you."
So he had known. He'd planned for this.
The thought made Aria's feelings toward her absent husband even more complicated.
She spent the rest of the afternoon setting up her studio. Organizing supplies, assembling the easel, arranging the space exactly how she wanted it. She hung her parents' wedding photo on one wall the only decoration in the entire penthouse that wasn't professionally selected and sterile.
Her mother's bright smile and her father's proud expression watched over her as she worked.
By the time she stepped back to survey the completed studio, the sun was setting, painting the room in shades of gold and amber. It was perfect. It was hers. In this palace of controlled perfection, she'd claimed one space that belonged entirely to her.
She was standing there, covered in paint from a test canvas she'd started, when she heard the front door open.
Damien was home.
Aria's heart rate kicked up inexplicably. She'd had the entire day to adjust to this new life, but somehow she'd forgotten that it came with a husband who would actually, eventually, come home.
She heard his footsteps moving through the penthouse, heard him call out: "Aria?"
She walked to the studio doorway, paintbrush still in hand, probably looking like a mess with paint on her hands and likely her face.
Damien stopped when he saw her. He'd loosened his tie and removed his suit jacket, which was draped over one arm. He looked tired shadows under his eyes, tension in his shoulders. But his expression shifted when he took in her paint-covered state.
"You've been busy," he observed.
She nodded, then gestured for him to follow her into the studio.
Damien stepped into the room and stopped, his eyes scanning the transformation. The supplies, the easel, the test painting she'd started a abstract piece in blues and grays that reminded her of his eyes.
"You set all this up today?" he asked.
She pulled out her phone: "You left me an unlimited credit card and an empty studio. What did you expect?"
The corner of his mouth twitched. "I expected you to go shopping for clothes. Maybe get your hair done. That's what most women would do with an unlimited credit card."
"I'm not most women."
"No," he agreed quietly, his eyes moving from the painting to her face. "You're not."
They stood there for a moment, the silence stretching between them. Not uncomfortable, exactly, but charged with unspoken things.
"I like the photo," Damien said, nodding toward her parents' wedding picture. "They look happy."
"They were. Very happy. For sixteen years."
"You were sixteen when they died?"
She nodded.
"Car accident," he said. It wasn't a question. He'd clearly read the report his people had compiled on her. "You were in the car."
Another nod. She didn't want to have this conversation, didn't want to relive that night.
But Damien surprised her by not pushing.
Instead, he said, "I lost my mother when I was eight. She didn't die she just left.
Dropped me at a fire station and never came back. So I don't know what it's like to lose parents who loved you. But I imagine it's both better and worse than what I experienced."
The admission was so unexpected, so raw, that Aria found herself staring at him. This was the first truly personal thing he'd shared with her. The first glimpse beneath the cold businessman exterior.
"I'm sorry," she typed. "That must have been devastating."
"It was a long time ago," he said, his walls going back up almost immediately. "Anyway. I came home because I realized I forgot to eat lunch and I'm starving. Margaret left food. Want to join me for dinner?"
The invitation was casual, almost awkward, as if he wasn't sure how to interact with her outside of establishing rules and terms.
Aria nodded. "Give me five minutes to clean up."
"Take your time," he said. Then, as he turned to leave, he paused. "Thank you."
She gave him a questioning look.
"For making this place look less like a showroom and more like someone actually lives here. The photo it's nice. Personal. This place could use more of that."
Before she could respond, he was gone, his footsteps retreating down the hallway.
Aria stood in her new studio, processing what had just happened. Damien had come home. He'd noticed her work. He'd shared something personal. He'd invited her to dinner.
It wasn't much. But it was something.
Maybe, just maybe, this arrangement didn't have to be completely cold and transactional. Maybe there was room for something more not love, she wasn't naive enough to hope for that. But perhaps mutual respect. Understanding. Even friendship.
Or maybe she was reading too much into one small moment of humanity from a man who'd made it clear he valued control above all else.
Either way, she needed to clean up and figure out how to have dinner with her husband.
Her husband.
The word still felt foreign, impossible. But it was her reality now. For better or worse. For the next three years, at minimum.
Aria washed her hands and face in the bathroom, changed into a clean shirt, and took a deep breath.
Time to face her first real dinner at home with Damien Blackwell.
Whatever happened next, she'd face it the same way she'd faced everything else in her life: with her eyes open and her spine straight.
Silent, maybe.
But never voiceless.
The dining room felt absurdly formal for just two people.
Aria stood in the doorway, taking in the long mahogany table that could easily seat twelve, the crystal chandelier overhead, the pristine place settings at opposite ends like they were heads of state about to negotiate a treaty.
Damien was already seated at the head of the table, his tie fully removed now, the top two buttons of his shirt undone. He looked up from his phone when she entered, and something flickered across his face surprise, maybe, at seeing her in casual clothes with her hair still damp from washing off the paint.
"This is ridiculous," he said abruptly, standing. "We're not having dinner at opposite ends of this table like strangers in a period drama."
He grabbed his plate and silverware and moved to one of the chairs in the middle of the table, then gestured to the seat across from him. "Sit here."
It was still a command, but a reasonable one. Aria took the seat across from him, close enough to have an actual conversation well, as much of a conversation as she could have but with enough space that it didn't feel uncomfortably intimate.