Page 65 of When Hearts Surrender

Broken pieces forming a beautiful whole.

“My family is a patron of the arts…including opera.” He gives me a droll look and I snicker, thinking of our conversation in his car the night I met him.

“The Frida Kahlos in your room are from this gallery too,” he murmurs, a half-smile on his face.

For a moment, the cold billionaire is gone and my heart flips.

“I never thanked you for that.”

“You don’t need to. What’s art for if not to be loved and admired?” There’s a thread of wistfulness in his voice. A deep longing.

“I’m glad you enjoy them,” he adds, his half-smile turns into a full-on grin.

Heat unfurls from my chest and spreads to my extremities.

My eyes catch on a rough sketch—a silhouette of a woman, very much like the one in my locket. But this one has faded features on it—like the artist attempted to draw the face over and over again but left only the outline intact.

“What’s this?” I frown, walking to the framed sketch. It looks old and doesn’t seem to be in a style I recognize.

There’s an aged parchment with masculine script on it inside the frame:

Your image dwells eternally in my mind. Though I could spend the rest of my life attempting to capture your likeness on canvas, nothing will ever compare, for my skills can never do you justice.

Yet I vow, one day, when we are reunited in another life, when my heart is made whole, I shall attempt to portray you once more, my love. Perhaps then, I will finally be able to capture your essence.

A sharp pain pierces my chest, my breath catching in my throat. The heartbreak in the words. The love in the sentences.

“It’s from Grandfather Silas,” Maxwell says quietly. “The one whose portrait we just discussed. I’ve always wondered who he was trying to draw. It’s obvious it’s not his wife.”

My heart rattles behind my rib cage as I stare at the letter and the painting, suddenly overcome with a sadness I can’t shake.

“I hope he got to finish his drawing of her,” I whisper.

Somehow, I don’t think he did. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I step back.

There’s so much history in this house, with his family. It’s so unlike my childhood, where I was taught the newer, flashier thing was better, where I saw my parents always striving to be in the forefront of the latest trends.

Perhaps it’s part of being in the fashion industry, to stay on top of things, to be a trendsetter. But it has always felt empty to me. Soulless.

And shouldn’t art, including fashion, have a soul?

“I love everything here. In the estate. I feel like I’m part of something and am about to write my story to add to the history books.”

Closing my eyes, I spin around and inhale the comforting scents of oil paints and canvas.

“I wonder what will be written in my pages.” I smile, thinking about my year of yeses mindset and how much I’ve already learned by making decisions for myself.

After a few beats of silence, I open my eyes, finding Maxwell staring at me, seemingly transfixed. His nostrils flare and he swallows, the muscles rippling in his corded throat.

“How do you see the positive in everything?” he rasps.

“I didn’t use to be this way,” I murmur, my voice shaky at the yearning I’m seeing on his face. “Until I started my year of yeses, I was complacent, always thinking about how I must follow the path my parents set out for me. But I realize, maybe I can’t choose everything in life, but there are still many things I have control over.”

I spin around once more, my chest feeling lighter. Being in the room with grand masterpieces of the past has given me some ideas for my impossible collection.

“What’s the alternative, Maxwell? We have to live life one way or the other.”

Grinning, I walk toward him, wondering if I should ask him a question that has been nagging me ever since the day when I went shopping for the wedding with my girlfriends.

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