“It’s exclusive.”
She glanced back, the light turning his gray eyes nearly silver.
“Because that makes it better?”
“I didn’t say better.”
She let her fingers drift across the velvet. Plush. Broken-in. Like a secret kept in fabric.
Her voice dropped, reverent, almost unwilling.
“What is this place?”
“It’s the pulse,” he said simply. “Where everything begins.”
His voice pulled her around to face him. Heavy with something deeper.
“My grandfather’s vision. He wanted more than business. He wanted connection. This is where he brought people who mattered.”
The sharp polish of Gideon Blackwell had slipped. Something raw flickered beneath his surface. A flash of something rare. Unguarded.
“He sounds… different.”
“He was.” Gideon stepped further into the room, reverent. “Richard Blackwell II saw wealth as a way to build something lasting. Legacy, not power.”
She trailed her fingers along the bar’s edge. Her hand paused on a small engraved plaque:
For the ones who matter.
The reply settled deep, quiet, like the thud of something familiar.
“It’s… beautiful,” she said. Her eyes moved over the room, but the word landed elsewhere. Aimed at something she hadn’t named.
He tilted his head, gaze narrowing with interest. “Not what you thought I’d show you?”
She gave a breath of laughter, light but honest.
“No. I expected… more gold-plated ego. A lot less soul.”
What he gave in return wasn’t a smirk.
It was something real.
“Gold-plated ego is the family specialty.” His fingers skimmed an antique decanter—not in appraisal, but in memory. “But this room? My grandfather kept it untouched, even when the rest of them wanted another trophy.”
“And now it’s yours.”
“Not without a fight.” Steel underlined the softness. “They wanted the prestige. Not the responsibility. But it mattered to him. And he thought I’d make it matter too.”
She understood thatdeeply.
Her gaze dropped to the marble bar, catching fractured reflections of them both.
“He must’ve been proud.”
A pause stretched.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter.
