CHAPTER 9

ELENA

I could not sleep. I turned beneath the covers more times than I could count, my mind circling around whether Adrian's family would believe any of this, what they'd ask, what I'd say. A contract. A fake marriage. A job with an absurd salary attached to it. It was supposed to be simple. Nothing about it felt simple anymore.

I eventually fell asleep from exhaustion. When I opened my eyes again, sunlight was already cutting through the curtains, and for a moment I had no idea where I was. Then it came back all at once....the mansion, Elias, Adrian.

My body had woken at its usual hour regardless of how little I'd slept, the way it always used to when I still had Daniel's breakfast to prepare, his clothes to lay out, his day to organize before he even opened his eyes. Even now, that routine lived somewhere in my muscles I hadn't managed to get rid of. I pushed the thought away and got dressed in something comfortable.

I went to check on Elias before heading down. He was still curled beneath his blanket, one arm flung over his face. He looked so cute. I crouched beside the bed and touched his shoulder gently.

"Elias."

He startled awake, eyes wide, and scrambled backward against his pillows before he fully registered who was crouched there.

"Hey....it's just me remember?." I kept my hands raised, palms open. "You're okay."

He watched me, wary, chest still rising fast. I didn't reach for him. I sat down on the floor instead, giving him the space to decide on his own that I wasn't a threat.

"We need to get you ready for the day," I said, keeping my voice easy.

He studied me a moment longer, then shifted forward, closer to me.

"Good morning," I said, smiling.

He didn't answer....but he reached out and tugged at the sleeve of my shirt, as if testing whether it was real. Then, apparently satisfied, he held both arms up toward me.

It took me a second to understand what he wanted. When I did, something in my chest loosened all at once. Oh my God, he was soo cute...I lifted him carefully, and he settled against my shoulder like he'd done it a hundred times before, one small hand curling into the fabric near my collar.

"Alright," I murmured into his hair. "Let's find you something to wear."

He didn't fight the shirt I picked out, or the socks, or any of it....just watched me with quiet, careful attention.

---

The kitchen was already alive with staff by the time we came down....chefs moving between counters, someone arranging fruit into a pattern that made it feel like we were in a five star restaurant. 

Adrian stood near the dining table in a suit sharp enough to look tailored that morning, his attention fixed on his phone. He glanced up when we entered, and something in his expression shifted the moment he saw Elias tucked against my hip.

"Morning," he said, though I couldn't tell if it was meant for me or his son.

Elias squirmed to be put down, and the second his feet hit the floor, he crossed straight to his father and reached both arms up.

Adrian set his phone down without hesitation and lifted him, easy and practiced, settling him against his chest. "Did you sleep well?"

Elias shook his head against his father's shoulder.

"Good dreams?"

Another small shake ...a different answer this time, though I couldn't read what it meant.

"That's wonderful," Adrian said, quiet, almost gentle in a way I hadn't heard from him. He pressed his mouth briefly to the top of Elias's head, automatic, the kind of gesture that was heartwarming to see, especially for someone like Adrian Blackwood.

I stood there longer than I meant to, watching the two of them. The man I'd shaken hands with in that office,controlled, unreadable, offering marriage like it was a business deal... didn't entirely match the one holding his son with so much love.

Adrian caught me watching and set Elias down, straightening. Whatever softness had been there closed itself off almost as quickly as it had appeared.

"Good morning," I said again, since the first one had apparently gone unanswered.

"Good morning." His eyes moved over me once, then checked his watch. "Be ready in ten minutes."

"Ten minutes for what?"

"We're leaving."

My stomach dropped. His family. I nodded and hurried back upstairs, returning with my hair and makeup looking slightly better than before.

Adrian was already waiting in the foyer. His gaze moved over my face and stayed there a beat too long, though he said nothing. I felt suddenly, uncomfortably aware of how casual I looked standing next to a man dressed like he was about to close a merger.

He turned for the door before I could ask if I should change. I followed him out to a black car waiting at the curb, and once we were moving, I watched the city slide past the window, assuming we were headed toward whatever estate his family occupied.

We weren't. The car pulled up instead outside a fashion house with a name I recognized from magazine covers. Noirbios Atelier, the most popular fashion house in the whole of New York.

"Why are we stopping here?"

Adrian was already stepping out. I followed him through glass doors he walked through like he owned the building....and, for all I knew, he did.

A woman hurried over the moment we entered. "Mr. Blackwood. What a pleasure."

He gave a short nod, then gestured toward me. "My wife needs to be ready within the hour."

The woman's eyes flicked to me, surprised.

"We have somewhere to be," Adrian added. "Make her more beautiful than she already is."

I stared at him. It took me a moment to register that as a compliment.

"I'll be here," he said, before I could ask anything else. "Go with her."

I looked between them, still without a clear picture of what was happening, and finally gave in with a sigh. "Okay."

The woman smiled and took my hand. "This way, Mrs. Blackwood."

The name still didn't sound like it belonged to me.

An hour later, I barely recognized my own reflection. My hair had been styled simply, my makeup soft rather than dramatic, the outfit they'd chosen somehow both casual and unmistakably expensive. I still looked like myself.... just a version of myself I hadn't seen in years.

When I stepped back into the waiting area, Adrian was working on his laptop. His fingers stilled the moment he looked up.

He didn't say anything for several seconds. I shifted under the silence. "Is something wrong?"

He blinked, looked away, and cleared his throat before answering. "You look....nice."

"Thank you."

Bags began arriving behind me....one, then several more, carried by staff I hadn't even noticed hovering nearby.

"What's all this?"

"Yours," Adrian said, closing the laptop.

"There's too much."

"No."

"Mr Blackwood, I don't need all of it."

He stood, already reaching for two of the bags himself. "Call me Adrian and no objections."

I opened my mouth. He raised an eyebrow, and I decided the argument wasn't worth losing.

I reached for a bag anyway, he caught it before I could lift it. "I didn't ask you to carry anything."

Watching him load shopping bags into his own car was, somehow, the strangest normal thing I'd seen all day.

Once we were settled inside and moving again, silence stretched between us...long enough that I found myself studying the ring on my finger, it was beautiful....then the mountain of bags, then him.

"Mr. Blackwood."

He glanced up. "Adrian"

"Sorry, Adrian, If I'm supposed to be your wife, I should probably know something about you. And you don't know much about me, either."

"I know enough."

"You don't. What happens if your family asks me what your favorite color is?"

"I don't have one."

"Everyone has a favorite color."

"I don't."

"Fine. Favorite food, then."

"I can eat most things." A pause. "Except anything too sweet, too salty, too spicy, or too sour."

"So basically nothing."

The corner of his mouth twitched.

"See," I said, "this is exactly the problem. We need actual answers." I didn't wait for permission before starting my own. "Sky blue, That's my favorite color. I like almost any food except spaghetti."

"Who hates spaghetti?"

"It tastes like disappointment." That earned something closer to real amusement, gone as quickly as it appeared. "I love the rain. I hate people who chew with their mouths open. I love books, I love swimming but can't swim well.

I kept going until I'd given him a small, unremarkable handful of facts....the kind of thing a husband ought to know. When I finished, I looked at him, waiting.

"Your turn."

"I don't see the point of this."

"The point is our story, Adrian. How we met. How long we've been together. What made you decide to marry me." I counted the questions off on my fingers. "We don't have any of it."

He was quiet long enough that I thought he might refuse outright. Then: "We met in one of my hospitals."

"You have a hospital?"

"Yes."

"An actual hospital."

"Yes."

"How many do you own?"

"Irrelevant." He glanced at me. "You're doing your residency there."

My smile faded. "But I'm not."

"You will be." He said it plainly, like a fact already settled. "I've submitted everything. You'll sit the necessary exams, and once it clears, you'll start."

I couldn't find anything to say to that.

"You're serious?"

"Yes."

I looked down at my hands, at the years I'd spent convincing myself that dream belonged to a version of me who no longer existed. And here he was, discussing it like it was simply waiting for me to pick it back up.

"I don't know what to say."

"You don't have to."

"Why would you do this?"

He held my gaze. "Because like I've said before you shouldn't give up on your dreams because you're married to me."

I turned toward the window before he could see exactly how much that landed and how much that meant to me.

The car slowed, an estate rose ahead of us.... vast, elegant, and somehow it felt like a home other than a mansion.

My nerves came rushing back all at once.

"Elena." Adrian said. "Whatever happens in there, you'll be fine."

"Wait....what's supposed to happen in there?"

He was already walking. I hurried to catch up. "Mr Blackwood!"

He stopped.

"Sorry. Adrian." I searched his face for something, anything, that would tell me what I was walking into. His expression gave nothing away.

"What exactly is going on?"