After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 25

After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 25

That entire night, Elias’s sleep seemed to float in warm honey. What appeared again and again in his dreams was Ava’s final soft, firm embrace. He could even clearly recall the faint fragrance of her hair and the warmth of her body.

The next morning, Elias practically sprang out of bed. Sunlight came through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting golden patches on the floor. A smile he couldn’t suppress was on his face, and he couldn’t wait to see Ava.

However, when he opened the door of his apartment, ready to knock on the door opposite, he found Ava already standing there.

She wasn’t holding coffee or breakfast. She was holding a painting. The frame was simple white oak. On the canvas was the famous Venetian-style courtyard of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, surrounded by flourishing flowers and greenery. Sunlight poured down through the glass dome, the light and shadow mottled, quiet and full of life.

It was his work of art, standing before her own work of art.

“Good morning, Elias,” Ava said, her face carrying a practiced solemnity, though her eyes were bright and calm. “I thought all night. I may not be able to immediately return the kind of intense love you’ve carried for so many years. But…”

She took a deep breath, as if making a decision.

“But since I’ve decided to be with you, I will give myself to this wholeheartedly. I will make sure that every day in the future, you know clearly how much I cherish you.”

She gently held the painting out to him.

“I hope that in the days ahead, we can spend the rest of our lives as true partners.”

Ava finished in one breath, her heart pounding wildly in her chest. She looked at him nervously, waiting for his response.

But Elias only stared hard at the painting, then looked up at her. The Mercer family heir, always calm and self-possessed, able to move through Boston high society with ease, had reddened eyes in an instant, like a child who didn’t know what to do.

“I…” Ava grew anxious seeing him like that and wanted to say something to comfort him, but any words seemed pale.

Elias didn’t give her the chance to organize them. He abruptly placed the painting carefully on the entry cabinet, then pulled her tightly into his arms. His chin rested on the top of her head. His voice was muffled, thick with emotion and a trace of wounded complaint.

“Using art to express love is clearly something I should have done,” he said, tightening his arms as if he wanted to press her into his bones. “You did the thing I most wanted to do for you first. What am I supposed to do now?”

In his embrace, listening to the panic beneath his steady heartbeat, Ava couldn’t help but laugh. She hugged him back, her cheek against the fine texture of his cashmere sweater.

“Because I like you, Elias. So I wanted to paint for you. It has nothing to do with who should do what.”

When Elias had opened his eyes that morning, he had still felt that everything from the night before was too beautiful to be real. But now, the warm, real embrace and the painting filled with her feelings both told him that his long wait had finally reached its end.

Over the next few weeks, everything fell into place.

With Elias’s help, Ava’s children’s art studio soon attracted its first group of students, most of them families supported by his foundation. Lily also fully adjusted to life at her new school. She smiled more and more, and even began inviting classmates over to their home.

The noise of Boston seemed to be cut off on the other side of the Charles. Noah and Sloane didn’t appear again, as if they had vanished from their world completely.

One weekend afternoon, Elias watched Ava guiding Lily and her friends as they shaped clay. His eyes were so gentle they almost dripped water.

He walked over and lightly wrapped his arms around her waist from behind.

“The studio is running smoothly, and Lily is on summer break. How about we take a vacation?”

Ava turned her head, pleasantly surprised. “Where?”

“Nantucket,” Elias murmured by her ear. “The Mercer family has an old house there. It’s quiet in the summer. We can stay for a while and get completely away from everything here.”

Nantucket.

The name was like a salty sea breeze, instantly blowing away the last shadow in Ava’s heart. Growing up in Florida had etched a love of sun and sea into her bones. It was an island known for weathered shingle cottages, blooming blue hydrangeas, and quiet beaches.

A week later, they boarded the private ferry to Nantucket.

When the island’s iconic Brant Point Lighthouse appeared on the horizon, Lily cheered excitedly. Ava stood on the deck, the sea breeze lifting her skirt. She leaned against Elias’s shoulder and watched the old, resilient lighthouse standing quietly beneath the blue sky.

There was no oppression of Beacon Hill here. No shadow of the Whitaker family. No seven cold, empty chairs.

Only sunlight, waves, and the two people beside her whom she loved.

For the first time, this was a view she had chosen with her own hands.