Saturday night. The estate was quiet.

The twins had been asleep for hours. Aunt Estella had retired to her room with a cup of tea and a book she’d been working through for weeks. The house had settled into its bones, the way it did when everyone was where they belonged. Down the hall, Lily was curled around Petal. Leo had the whale against his chest and the Lion in the crook of his elbow, the mended arm visible, the new button eye catching the faint glow of the nightlight.

Franz had been restless for days.

Arianne had noticed. The scripts he’d already memorized, reviewed again. The extra time in the twins’ playroom, long after they’d stopped playing. The way he stayed up later than usual and woke earlier, his side of the bed empty before the sun had fully risen. He was dreading something. She knew what it was.

His filming schedule started in four days. The second season of The Second Cut. He’d be on set for weeks, leaving before dawn, returning after dark, sometimes not returning at all if the shoot ran long. He’d done this before. He’d been doing this for over a decade. But something was different now. She could see it in the way he lingered in doorways, the way his hand found hers more often, the way he looked at her like he was already memorizing her for the absence to come.

Tonight, he’d given up on the scripts entirely.

They were in his bedroom. Arianne was propped against the headboard, a book open in her hands—an actual book, a novel she’d found in the estate library, something with a cracked spine and a dedication written in someone else’s handwriting. Not reports. Not quarterly assessments. Fiction. She’d been reading it for a week, a few pages at a time, the way she used to read before her life became a series of documents that required signatures.

Franz’s head was in her lap.

He’d lain down an hour ago, his body stretched across the mattress, his head settled on her thighs. His eyes were closed but he wasn’t sleeping. He was present in the particular way he was always present—aware of her, aware of the room, aware of the quiet ticking of the clock on the nightstand.

Her fingers were in his hair.

She hadn’t noticed when she’d started doing it. The motion was unconscious—her hand drifting from the pages of her book to his head, her fingers threading through the dark strands, stroking slowly from his temple to the crown. The strands were soft. He’d washed it that morning, and it still held a faint trace of whatever soap he used. He sighed and leaned into her touch.

She turned a page. Kept reading. Her other hand rested on his shoulder, her thumb brushing the fabric of his shirt.

"You’re so beautiful."

She looked down. His eyes were open, staring up at her face. The words had come out blunt, unpolished, as if he’d been thinking them for a while and finally decided to say them aloud.

Her hand stopped in his hair. "Are you testing your charm on me again?"

He chuckled. The sound was low, warm, vibrating against her thighs. "I’m never certain if it works on you."

She raised a brow. Said nothing.

"Do you like my face the most?" he asked. "Is that why you married me? For my face?"

"I’ve seen a lot of beautiful men."

He frowned. An exaggerated frown, the kind that was half performance and half genuine. "I’ll work hard to keep my handsome face. To keep your attention. I’ll moisturize. I’ll sleep eight hours. I’ll—"

"You’re worrying too much." She saw through him. She always had. "Is this about filming?"

His expression changed. The playfulness drained away, leaving something quieter. Something truer.

"I’m not willing to be parted from you for too long." His voice was low, serious. "The thought of being on set for weeks—of coming home to an empty trailer or a late-night drive—it’s eating at me. I’ve been dreading it."

She closed her book. Set it on the nightstand. "You’ve been an actor for over a decade. Being away isn’t new to you."

"It’s different now. I have a wife. I’m not coming home to an empty apartment. Someone’s waiting for me." He looked up at her. "Someone I want to come home to."

He paused. "Being a celebrity is starting to have more cons than pros. I want to be Franz Rochefort. Your husband. That’s all. Noah Hart can do the interviews and the red carpets and the press tours. I just want to be here. With you. With the twins. In this house."

He reached up. His fingers brushed her jaw. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

"In the public’s eyes, Noah Hart is just your boyfriend. I want to upgrade his status. Husband. Within a year. Then I could use excuses to spend more time with you. Spousal obligations. Family commitments. No one would question it."

Arianne caught his hand. Held it. "That’s unprofessional. You have a contract. Commitments. A crew that depends on you. You can’t rush a public narrative just to spend more time with me."

"I know."

"You can always come home to me. I’ll wait for you. No matter how long it takes. A late shoot. A long shoot. Weeks. Months. I’ll be here when you get back. That’s not going to change."

He stared at her. Something moved in his face—not quite relief, but something adjacent to it. He pressed his face against her stomach, his arms wrapping around her waist, his breath warm through the fabric of her shirt.

Inside his mind, a thought surfaced. I wish you were pregnant now. He didn’t say it. He knew she wasn’t. He knew the timing wasn’t right. He knew the filming would make everything harder. He just wished it anyway, silently, the way he’d wished for her for years before he’d finally been allowed to have her.

They lay like that for a long time. Her fingers resumed their motion in his hair. His breathing slowed. The clock ticked on the nightstand.

Then he spoke. His voice was muffled against her stomach.

"Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask me anything."

He didn’t lift his head. "If Alex and Layla hadn’t died—would you have come back? Eventually?"