chapter 6

Aurora had not only been Damien's first love — she was the daughter of a longtime family friend of the Vances, a connection that guaranteed her a seamless invitation to a private dinner at the estate. Even so, the mood at the table remained suffocating.

Damien sat rigid, a hard crease pressed between his brows, his food untouched. His mind kept circling back to the same image: his wife walking out beside Michael Ashford without a single backward glance. What gnawed at him most was the contradiction of it. She had practically begged him to reconsider the divorce, and then turned around and left with another man.

Gerald Vance set down his cutlery and swept a confused look around the table. "Where is she? Why hasn't she come down?"

Damien kept his eyes on his plate, his voice flat and clipped. "We've already signed the paperwork. I intend to finalize the divorce as quickly as possible."

Gerald went completely still, his expression caving into open shock. "Why would you do that after everything I said to you?"

"Oh, Gerald, please." Diana exhaled softly, setting her glass down. "I told you years ago they were a terrible match. His grandmother practically engineered the whole arrangement herself." She reached for her water and continued in the same unhurried tone, "They can both find real happiness now. Honestly, it's a relief for everyone. You know perfectly well that Damien's heart has always been with Aurora."

Gerald's face tightened with visible disapproval. "Damien, a marriage is not something you throw away on a whim. She is also"

"Dad, the papers are signed and she has already cleared out her things and left," Damien cut in, a sharp edge bleeding into his voice. He had no interest in examining why the quiet, compliant woman he had married suddenly found the nerve to walk away.

"You are being completely reckless," Gerald said, his unease rising as he thought through the implications. "Your grandmother's health is still delicate. How do you plan to break news this significant to her without triggering a medical episode?"

"I will speak to Grandmother myself and tell her the truth," Damien answered with finality, brushing past his father's warning. "And I plan to formally announce my engagement to Aurora within the month."

Seated beside him, Aurora gazed at his sharp profile, her expression soft and thoroughly besotted.

"This is absolute madness," Gerald said, his voice climbing. "The press will tear your name apart the moment they think you discarded your wife after three years."

"My reputation will survive it. I never loved her to begin with," Damien replied without flinching, without remorse.

Aurora leaned her head gently against his shoulder, her voice taking on a soft, apologetic lilt. "Uncle Gerald, please don't be cross with Damien. If there is anyone to blame, it's me. Maybe I should never have come back at all. I could leave first thing tomorrow, Damien. Perhaps you should try to repair things with her. I absolutely refuse to be the reason this family fractures."

"Aurora, stop talking like that. None of this falls on you," Damien said firmly, his expression shifting the moment his eyes landed on her. He took her hand in his, and when he spoke of his marriage again, his voice went cold. "She and I are finished. You waited three years for me, and I won't let you keep living in the shadows for another day."

Across the city, the night air was unusually sharp and clear.

Inside L'Etoile, an ultra-exclusive glass-walled cafe suspended above the glittering skyline, the entire space had been emptied of the public and reserved for a private occasion. The ambiance was quietly spectacular.

Maureen sat tucked into a corner table, her gaze drifting over the city lights sprawling below. Despite the setting, a heavy, hollow weight pressed against her chest.

"Mike, are you genuinely trying to remind me how single I am right now?" she muttered, nodding toward the softly lit couples' booths arranged nearby. "I barely have the emotional reserves to sit in a place like this tonight."

Michael laughed quietly, rotating the coffee in his cup with practiced ease. "Direct your grievances to your second brother. Since he owns the place, he decided to shut it down entirely just to give you a proper welcome home. He also arranged a synchronized light and water display for exactly eight o'clock."

He glanced at his watch with a calm flick of his wrist. "Five, four, three, two, one."

Right on schedule, sweeping beams of violet and deep crimson flooded the glass facade of the building, washing their table in a rich, glowing warmth.

"Completely excessive," Maureen said, rolling her eyes. But something genuine and tender unfurled quietly in her chest.

"Considering the bizarre collection of gifts he's sent you over the years, a private light show is practically restrained," Michael said, smiling. He reached over and drew her into a steady, unhurried embrace. "There is an entire room of gifts waiting for you back at the estate. You need to remember that there are people who genuinely see your value. Don't give another thought to anyone who never did."

The back of Maureen's throat burned without warning, tears gathering before she could stop them. The sheer ferocity of her brothers' love for her was almost too much to hold.

At that moment, the glass doors at the entrance swung open.

Damien walked in with Aurora's hand locked in his. The cold air outside had driven her close against his side, her head tucked near his chest.

"Damien, look at the lighting! Isn't it gorgeous!" Aurora's voice rang out brightly across the quiet, open room.

He glanced down at her with a soft look. Her sweetness, that gentle and untarnished quality she always carried around him, was precisely what had drawn him in. His thoughts, unbidden, slid toward his ex-wife. She had been plain in every sense, dull and unremarkable, a woman who stirred nothing in him. Three years of marriage had produced exactly one thing he could credit her for: complete compliance. But blind obedience meant very little to a man whose heart had never been available.

As they moved toward the interior balcony for a better view of the display, the LED panel across the far wall shifted, the letters assembling smoothly into glowing words: "Happy Birthday, Maureen!"

"Oh, someone's birthday!" Aurora sighed with a faint, wistful pout. "I wonder who gets an entire private cafe just for themselves."

Damien went rigid. The realization landed with sudden, brutal clarity. Today was his ex-wife's birthday. And Michael Ashford had shut down one of the most prestigious venues in the city to celebrate it.

Before he could fully process it, a familiar voice cut through the ambient quiet of the room.

He turned and immediately located the pair near the panoramic windows. It was unmistakably her, standing beside Michael.

"Wait, is that Selene?" Aurora asked, her eyes wide with manufactured innocence. "Who is the man with her? They look incredibly close."

Damien's face hardened. The tendons on the back of his hand rose as his grip on the railing tightened. A corrosive wave of irritation moved through him. The paperwork is barely signed and she is already standing beside a prominent billionaire. Why did she play at being devastated by the divorce if she had this waiting in the wings?

As Maureen and Michael turned toward the exit, Michael rested a casual, guiding hand at her waist to steer her down the lounge steps.

"Selene!" The name left Damien's mouth like a command, hard and carrying across the room.

At the sound of his voice, every muscle in Maureen's body locked up. She turned with deliberate slowness, watching him cross the dim room toward her. Even now, the precision of his features had the power to catch her off guard. But the thirteen years she had devoted to loving this man were gone, completely extinguished. He had broken what could not be put back together.

"Who is he?" Damien asked, stopping a short distance away, his presence pressing in like a drop in temperature.

"Your memory is surprisingly selective, Mr. Vance," Michael said, positioning himself slightly in front of his sister, an unhurried smile on his face. "We've competed directly in the same market more than once."

"Selene, I'm not speaking to him," Damien said sharply, sidestepping Michael entirely. "Answer me."

"Our marriage is finished, Mr. Vance," Maureen said, her voice carrying none of its former warmth, each word landing with the weight of something permanently closed. "Who I spend my time with stopped being your concern the moment we signed those papers."

Damien stared at her. He could not reconcile the woman in front of him with the one who had spent three years folding herself quietly into his life.

"The divorce isn't even legally processed and you're already out in public with another man?" he said, his voice hardening into contempt.

Michael's expression closed off immediately. The audacity of it. He walked in here with his mistress on his arm.

Before Michael could speak, Maureen raised a hand to stop him. Watching her shield another man sent a fresh spike of fury through Damien.

"Mr. Vance, you didn't wait for anything before bringing your childhood sweetheart to the house," Maureen said evenly. The ambient light caught the dark fall of her hair as she held his gaze without yielding. A slow, cutting smile moved across her face, and for a moment she looked like someone he had never actually known. "I didn't say a word about your conduct. So by what logic do you think you have the right to police mine?"

She stepped closer, her voice dropping just low enough to be private. "Isn't that a rather pathetic double standard?"

Damien's mouth opened and produced nothing. The rebuttal he reached for wasn't there.

Aurora had been standing at the lounge entrance and moved quickly toward him to interrupt the silence. In her hurry, the heel of her shoe caught the edge of a decorative floor grate. She let out a sharp cry, her ankle turning beneath her as she went down hard against the polished marble.

"Damien! My foot, it really hurts!" she gasped, gripping her ankle.

The sound jolted him out of his stupor. He pivoted away from Maureen and crossed to Aurora, crouching down to help her up.

But when he finally got her to her feet and looked back across the room, the space near the windows was empty. Maureen and Michael were already gone.