The Gala, Reprise

Three months passed.

Seraphina flew back and forth between London and New York every two weeks. Luna started asking for her mummy the second the plane landed at Heathrow and crying every time Seraphina left. Seraphina held her tight each time and promised the same thing, over and over.

"Mummy is going to be home soon for good. I promise."

She did not know if it was true.

In New York, the Thursday dinners became a rhythm. Then twice a week. Then three times. Damien never asked for more than she offered. He asked for her opinion on a new building he was renovating. He asked about her collection. He told her about his week. He showed her photos of a painting he had bought at auction. He did not mention Luna. He did not mention the past. He did not ask when she was going to let him meet his daughter.

He waited.

His patience was starting to unmake her.

On a Tuesday in May, Elena called.

"The annual Cross Corporation gala is in three weeks. Same venue. The Met."

"Elena."

"I am not telling you to come. I am telling you it is happening."

"Why are you telling me."

"Because last year, a woman in a red dress walked into that gala and ended everything. I thought you might want to walk into this year's wearing whatever you want to wear."

"I do not know if I am ready."

"Aria."

"Elena."

"You are ready. You have been ready for six months. You are just waiting for permission."

Seraphina did not answer.

"Wear white," Elena said. "If you come."

She hung up.

Seraphina sat at her desk at The Plaza and stared at the wall for a very long time.

She did not tell Damien she was coming.

She did not tell anyone.

On the night of the gala, she dressed in her suite alone. Not white. White had been for the luncheon. For the vanishing of Vanessa. White had been the funeral of the woman Aria used to be.

Tonight, she wore gold.

Soft gold. Like champagne. A silk dress with a thin gold chain at the waist. Low neckline. Open back. Her hair loose. No jewelry at all except a small gold ring on her right hand that she had been wearing since she was twenty one. The ring her mother had given her. The only thing she had saved from the old apartment before Damien had locked her out.

She looked at herself in the mirror.

For the first time in three years, she did not look like a weapon.

She looked like Aria.

She sat down at the vanity and took a long breath. Thought about her mother. Thought about what her mother would have said, if her mother had still been alive, about a daughter walking back into a ballroom to face the man who had destroyed her.

Her mother would have said, go. Go and hold your head up. Go and let him see what he threw away.

Seraphina closed her eyes and listened, for one second, to the voice she had not heard in fifteen years.

Then she picked up her clutch and left.

She arrived at the Met at 9:47 p.m. Fashionably late. The room was already crowded. The orchestra was already playing. Seven hundred guests were already moving in their practiced waltz of air kisses and champagne.

She climbed the staircase slowly.

At the top, she paused.

The room noticed her, one table at a time. Heads turned. Conversations died.

She descended.

Across the room, by the north wall, a man in a black tuxedo turned his head.

Damien.

He saw her.

He dropped his glass.

It shattered on the marble. A thousand small shards scattered across the floor around his feet and he did not move. He did not even look down. He just stared at her as if he had forgotten how to do anything else.

She crossed the room.

People parted for her. Not because she was famous tonight. Because something was happening, and everyone in the room could feel it.

She stopped two feet from him.

"Damien."

"Aria."

"I am here as myself."

His eyes filled.

"I know."

"Dance with me."

He held out his hand.

She took it.

And for the first time in three years, Aria Sinclair and Damien Cross stood in the middle of a ballroom in New York with their hands clasped and looked at each other like people who had finally stopped running.

The orchestra played.

They moved.

Slowly. Carefully. Both of them like they were learning something for the first time.

His hand was on the small of her back.

Her hand was on his shoulder.

Neither of them spoke.

Seven hundred people were watching. Cameras were flashing. Somewhere in the crowd, Elena was sitting at a table pretending to talk to a senator while watching her son dance with his wife for the first time in three years. Somewhere else, three different journalists were typing into their phones. Tomorrow morning, every newspaper in New York would have a photograph of this moment on the front page.

Seraphina did not care.

For thirty seconds, she did not care about anything but the sound of the music and the pressure of his hand and the warmth of his shoulder under her palm.

There was nothing to say yet.