i’s Pov
He called her on a Friday morning.
She was in her kitchen making tea when her phone rang and she saw Damien’s na on the screen, which was not sothing that had happened before. They communicated through Aria or through estate visits. He had never called her directly.
She answered.
"Are you free this morning," he said.
"Why."
"I need to talk to you about sothing."
She looked at her tea. "Is Aria alright."
"Aria is fine. She’s at the hospital." A pause. "This is about Aria. Not.....nothing is wrong. I need to ask you sothing."
i was quiet for a mont.
"Co here then," she said. "I’ll make tea."
He arrived at eleven.
She let him in and looked at his face and understood imdiately that whatever this was, it was costing him sothing to do it. Damien Blackwood did not make himself vulnerable easily. She’d observed that for months. He did it for Aria, carefully and in private, but it didn’t co naturally and she could always see the effort of it.
He was making an effort right now.
She made tea and put it on the table and sat down across from him.
He looked at the table for a mont.
Then he looked at her.
"I’m going to ask Aria to marry ," he said.
i looked at him.
She thought about a lot of things very quickly. She thought about a girl with a fake na and a desperate plan walking into a billionaire’s estate and sohow, impossibly, ending up here. She thought about hospital rooms and poisonings and kidnappings and the specific terror of the last year and whether a mother ever fully recovered from watching her child go through sothing like that.
She thought about Damien at the estate every single night. About the note he’d left on the bedside table. About the way he looked at Aria when Aria wasn’t looking back.
"Why are you telling ," she said.
He t her eyes. "Because she’d want to ask you."
"She doesn’t know you’re here."
"No." He paused. "But she’d want to. She cares what you think. About everything. About ." He held her gaze. "And I care what you think. About this."
i looked at him for a long mont.
"She almost died," she said. "Twice. Since being with you."
"Yes."
"Those things happened because of your world. The enemies that co with it."
"Yes." He didn’t look away. "That’s true and I can’t change it and I understand if that’s your answer."
"I haven’t given you my answer."
"No," he said. "You haven’t."
She looked at her tea.
She thought about what Aria had said in the hospital. My choices. My life. Mine. The certainty of it. The complete absence of doubt in her daughter’s voice when she talked about who she’d chosen and why.
She thought about the Vitalis Radix. About a plant that had saved her life and what it had grown into. About a man who had quietly arranged her treatnt and built a foundation around it and told no one until he was ready.
She looked at him.
"She is the most important person in my life," i said. "She has been since the mont she existed." She paused. "If you hurt her....not the world hurting her, not enemies and circumstances and the cost of a complicated life. If you hurt her...."
"I know."
"Let finish." Her voice was even. "If you hurt her I will not be forgiving about it. I want you to understand that clearly."
"I understand it," he said.
"Good." She picked up her tea. "Then ask her."
Sothing moved across his face. Not relief exactly. Sothing quieter than that.
"Thank you," he said.
"Don’t thank ." She looked at him over the rim of her cup. "Just don’t make regret it."
He almost smiled. "I’ll do my best."
"See that you do." She set her cup down. "Now. Do you have a ring or are you planning to show up empty handed."
He reached into his pocket and set it on the table between them.
i looked at it.
Simple. Single stone. The kind of ring chosen by soone who knew the woman it was for didn’t need anything to announce itself.
"My grandmother’s," Damien said.
i looked at the ring for a long mont.
"She’ll love it," she said.
"I think so too."
She slid it back across the table.
He put it back in his pocket.
They finished their tea and talked about other things.....Aria’s return to the hospital, Morrison’s latest update, sothing Alexander had said at the estate the previous week that had made Aria laugh until her ribs hurt. Ordinary conversation. The kind that existed between two people who had arrived at each other through extraordinary circumstances and were quietly, without making a thing of it, becoming family.
When he left she stood at the window and watched his car go and thought about her daughter at four years old at the kitchen table saying Mama I’m going to learn how to fix people with complete certainty.
She’d fixed more than people.
****
DAMIEN’S POV
Marcus looked at him across the desk on Monday morning.
"You need sothing," Marcus said.
"Why."
"Because you’ve been in this office for two hours and you haven’t touched the contracts on your desk and you keep looking at your phone." He paused. "You never look at your phone like that."
Damien looked at him.
"I’m going to propose to Aria," he said.
Marcus said nothing for three seconds.
Then: "When."
"That’s what I need your help with."
Marcus pulled out his notepad. Not the security notepad.....a different one. Damien had never seen it before. It was smaller. The cover was slightly bent from being in a pocket.
"Location first," Marcus said. "What does she actually like. Not what’s impressive. What’s hers."
Damien thought about it.
"The garden at the estate," he said. "In the morning. Early, before everything starts." He paused. "She has a bench she sits on. She’s there every morning with her coffee."
Marcus wrote that down. "Ti."
"Early. Before the household is up."
"Security."
"Invisible," Damien said. "I don’t want her to see anyone. I don’t want it to feel like an operation."
"It won’t look like one." Marcus kept writing. "Does she need anyone there. After. Soone to celebrate with imdiately or does she need the mont to be just you two first."
Damien looked at him.
Marcus looked up. "I’m asking because so people need to share it imdiately and so people need to sit inside it first. She’s...." He paused. "She’s private about the things that matter most to her. I’d guess she wants it to be just you first."
"Yes," Damien said. "Just us first."
Marcus nodded. Wrote it down.
"Weather," he said.
"Check the forecast for the next two weeks and tell the clearest morning."
"Done." He looked up from the notepad. "The ring."
"I have it."
Marcus studied his face. "Is it good."
"Yes."
"Okay." He closed the notepad. Put it back in his pocket. Looked at Damien across the desk. "She’s going to say yes."
"I know."
"I’m saying it anyway." Marcus stood. "Saturday morning. The forecast is clear. I’ll have everything ready."
He walked to the door.
"Marcus."
He stopped.
"Thank you," Damien said. "For all of it. Not just this."
Marcus looked at him for a mont.
"Saturday morning, boss," he said.
He left.
Damien looked at the contracts on his desk.
He picked up his pen.
For the first ti in two hours he could actually concentrate.
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