“Enjoy, Mama.”

And now, here I was, living my dream, or what was supposed to be my dream. I stared at my painting again, clutching a tall glass of champagne and taking a deep breath. Rosie should’ve been here, but she’d taken a double shift at the café. She didn’t want to do it, but she was covering for a sick co-worker, and Rosie knew how it felt to get screwed over by illness. She didn’t want the girl, Elle, to get in trouble.

It was fine. I didn’t need anyone to celebrate with me. Besides, I had Brent.

A tall, beautiful woman in her early fifties approached me, wearing a black cocktail dress, a pearl necklace, and red lipstick. She smiled as she studied my painting on the wall.

“Nature or love?” she mused. She just wanted to start a conversation and had no idea I was the ELB who’d signed the bottom of the painting. Emilia LeBlanc.

“Definitely love. I mean, isn’t it obvious?” I quirked an eyebrow.

She laughed breathlessly, like what I’d said was utterly funny, and took a sip of her wine. “To you, maybe. Why do you think it’s love?”

“Because the person who painted it is obviously in love with the subject.”

“Why not the other way around?” She turned to me with a cunning smile. “See his face.” She trailed her manicured finger close to the canvas. “He looks happy. Content. Maybe he is the one who’s in love with the person who painted him. Or maybe they’re in love with each other.”

I blushed. “Perhaps.”

“I’m Sandy Richards.” She extended her hand to me, and I shook it.

Sandy looked like a rich woman, and not necessarily because of her outfit. There was an air about her. In that sense, she reminded me of the man in my painting.

“Emilia LeBlanc.”

“I knew it.” Then she pointed at the initials at the bottom of the painting.

There was no point denying it. Besides, I was proud of this painting. It was the canvas I painted on Christmas Eve. I’d thought about keeping it and making something else for the exhibition, but the truth was, I didn’t want Vicious’s face staring back at me every day. Every time I closed my eyes, he was there. I didn’t need another reminder of my obsession with him.

“Are you sure you want to sell it?” Sandy pressed the cold glass against her cheek, her eyes moving to the painting again.

I nodded. “Never been so sure of anything in my entire life.”

“He’s beautiful.”

“All beautiful things pass on,” I said. My own personal cherry blossom.

“I’ll buy it, then,” she said, hitching one shoulder up.

My mouth dried, and I blinked away my shock. “You will?”

“Sure. There’s something about him. Not in a model type of way. Just…interesting looking. But what I really like about this is that you captured the storm in his eyes. He’s smiling happily, but his eyes…they look tortured. So troubled. I love this. I bet this guy has a good story.”

“Nah, he’s an asshole.”

I heard the voice behind me and twisted immediately. Vicious was standing there, in one of his navy blue suits that made my heart thump and sparked a nagging ache between my thighs.

Disbelief washed through me. He’d made it to my exhibition. And…what on earth was he holding in his hand? It looked like some sort of a ticket.

I didn’t know how to react. I wanted to jump on him, to kiss him hard, to thank him for being there, but that’s not who we were. Not at this point, and maybe not ever. I reminded myself that last time I’d asked him what he wanted from me, his answer was to fuck me. I needed to be cautious with my heart this time.

Vicious walked over to us, ignoring Sandy, pushing his hand into my styled lavender hair, his lips ridiculously close to mine. The chatter around us stopped. I felt Brent’s eyes on us. Sandy’s eyes on us. Everyone’s eyes on us.

So this is what he had planned for Thursday. He knew. He wanted to be here all along.

“Ask me what I want,” Vicious murmured into my face.

The public display of affection from him—not sexual, not bullying, but pure, naked affection—filled my chest with warmth, but I tried to swallow down my hope.

“What do you want?” I turned my gaze to meet his, and suddenly, we weren’t in New York, in a gallery full of people. We were in my old room. Ignoring the party and the world around us, a world that we constantly disregarded when we were together.

“I want you,” he said simply. “Just you. Nothing else. Only ever you,” he breathed out in pain, closing his eyes. “Fuck, Emilia. You.”

I wanted to kiss him hard like in the movies, but this was reality, and I was an employee and an artist who still had to carry herself in a certain way. But I hugged him close to me and inhaled his unique scent, allowing myself to get drunk on it. I held back all the emotions that flooded me. The relief. The happiness. Wariness and love. So much love.

When we finally pulled away, I looked down to his clutched hand. “What’s that in your hand, Vic?”

“This? I saw something I liked so I bought it when I got here.” He opened his fist and showed it to me.

It was a receipt for my painting. My heart stuttered.

He squeezed my hand in his and smiled. “It’s gonna look so fucking epic in my bedroom, don’t you think? I could fuck you and stare at myself as I do it. That’s some Napoleon shit right there.”