The invitation had come two days later — handwritten in Christopher's distinct, restrained script.
For your eyes, Lady Serena.A quiet evening of art and conversation.
No seal, no signature.
And yet, she had known the handwriting at once — the deliberate precision, the slant that betrayed both discipline and impatience. The same hand that once drew invisible boundaries she couldn't stop testing.
The paper still smelled faintly of ink and cedar. She read the lines again, tracing the indentations with her fingertips as though she might feel the intent behind them.
A quiet evening.
With Christopher Cross, nothing was ever quiet.
The private gallery stood at the edge of the main street — discreet, refined, the kind of place that seemed to exist only in the corners of society's secrets. Men went there not to admire art, but to trade power in whispers and silences.
