He nodded and moved on, and Aria returned to her rounds with renewed determination to stay present.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket at 2 PM. A ssage from Damien: Everything’s arranged. Private dining room at Alinea, 7 PM tonight. Alexander has confird he’ll be there. Marcus will have security positioned throughout the restaurant. You’re safe.
Aria read the ssage three tis. Then typed back: Thank you. I don’t know if I’m ready for this, but I guess I’m going to find out.
His response ca imdiately: You’re ready. And if you’re not, we leave. No pressure to stay if it doesn’t feel right.
What if he’s wonderful? What if I like him?
Then that’s wonderful too. There’s no wrong answer here, Aria. Whatever you feel is valid.
She stared at that ssage for a long mont. Whatever you feel is valid. Sotis Damien understood her better than she understood herself.
The afternoon passed in a blur of patients and consultations and paperwork. Aria threw herself into work with perhaps more intensity than strictly necessary, using it as a shield against the anxiety building in her chest.
At 5 PM, she left the hospital and found Seb waiting by the car as always. He opened the door without comnt, his expression professionally neutral.
"Ho first, Miss Chen? Or would you like to go sowhere else?"
"The estate," Aria said. "I need to change and ntally prepare. Also probably have a minor breakdown in private."
Seb’s mouth twitched in what might have been a smile. "I’ll get you there quickly, miss."
The drive to the estate gave her ti to think. To really sit with what was about to happen and process the complicated tangle of emotions churning inside her.
Fear....that was obvious. Fear that Alexander would be exactly what her mother warned about. Fear that he’d be controlling or possessive or that eting him would sohow damage the relationship she had with i.
Curiosity....equally obvious. Twenty-five years of not knowing, and now she was hours away from answers.
But underneath both of those, sothing else. Sothing that felt almost like grief.
Because eting Alexander ant acknowledging that she’d grown up without a biological father. And while she’d had a wonderful childhood with a mother who loved her fiercely and a step father who loved her like his own, there was still sothing painful about recognizing what had been missing.
The car pulled up to the estate, and Aria made her way inside and straight to the bedroom. She stood in the closet for a long ti, staring at her clothes and trying to decide what one wore to et their biological father for the first ti.
Professional? To establish that she was an adult with her own life and career?
Casual? To show she wasn’t intimidated or trying too hard?
She finally settled on sothing in between....dark jeans, a silk blouse in deep green, a tailored blazer. Professional enough to command respect, casual enough not to look like she was performing.
She was applying minimal makeup when Damien appeared in the bathroom doorway.
"You look beautiful," he said simply.
"I look terrified," Aria countered, but she smiled slightly. "How obvious is the panic in my eyes?"
"Only to ." He moved behind her and rested his hands on her shoulders, eting her eyes in the mirror. "We don’t have to do this tonight. If you want more ti...."
"No." Aria’s voice was firm. "More ti just ans more anxiety. Let’s get this over with."
"That’s the spirit," Damien said dryly. "Approach family reunions like dental surgery."
Despite everything, Aria laughed. "Honestly, dental surgery might be less stressful."
She finished her makeup, checked her appearance one more ti, and turned to face Damien. "Okay. I’m ready. As ready as I’m going to be anyway."
He took her hand and they walked downstairs together. Marcus was waiting by the front door, his expression professionally alert.
"Everything’s in place," he said to Damien. "Security team is positioned. Your father arrived at the restaurant ten minutes ago and is waiting in the private dining room."
"He’s early," Aria said. Her stomach flipped with nerves.
"Probably as nervous as you are," Marcus offered. "For what it’s worth, Miss Chen....my team has eyes on him, and he looks genuinely anxious. Keeps checking his watch, straightening his tie. Not the behavior of soone planning anything hostile."
Aria nodded, absorbing this information. Her father was nervous. That made her feel slightly better....at least she wasn’t the only one freaking out.
The drive to Alinea took twenty-five minutes through evening traffic. Aria spent most of it holding Damien’s hand and breathing carefully, trying to keep her anxiety from spiraling into full panic.
"Whatever happens in there," Damien said as the restaurant ca into view, "rember that you control this situation. Not him. If you want to leave after five minutes, we leave. If you want to stay for hours, we stay. You decide. Understand?"
"I understand."
The car pulled up to the restaurant entrance, and Aria’s heart started racing in earnest.
This was it.
After twenty-five years of not knowing, after weeks of flowers and ssages and surveillance....she was about to et Alexander Wei, her biological father.
And whatever happened next could change everything.
****
The private dining room at Alinea was smaller than the main restaurant space but no less elegant. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the city lights. A single table sat in the center, set for three with crisp white linens and gleaming silverware. Soft lighting created an atmosphere that was intimate without being oppressive.
And standing beside the window, looking out at the city with his hands clasped behind his back, was a man Aria had never seen before but sohow recognized imdiately.
Alexander Wei.
He turned when they entered, and Aria’s breath caught.
She’d expected to see nothing of herself in him...expected that twenty-five years and her mother’s features would have dominated her genetics. But the mont their eyes t, she saw it.
Her eyes. The exact shade of dark brown, the exact shape. Her hands...long-fingered and elegant, currently clenched at her sides but identical in structure to his where they rested at his back. Even the way he held himself...straight-backed, contained, projecting confidence while clearly feeling nervous...mirrored her own unconscious posture.
This was her father. Not the abstract concept she’d been wrestling with for weeks, but a real person standing ten feet away looking at her with an expression of such raw emotion that it was almost painful to witness.
Reviews
All reviews (0)