Chapter 112: The Art Gallery

Dominic had learned at least one useful lesson from being locked out of the villa.

Never assume a gift is actually yours until the paperwork says so.

Which was why, before making a single plan for the gallery, he asked a lawyer to verify exactly who owned it.

The answer arrived two days later.

Dominic Sebastian.

The land title was under his name. So was the structure standing on it.

Alexander hadn’t merely allowed him to use the gallery or purchased it through some Vance-controlled company that could eventually reclaim it.

He’d given it to Dominic.

Completely.

Dominic stared at the documents for considerably longer than necessary.

"Thank God."

Apparently, Alexander Vance had possessed enough foresight to protect Dominic from Alexander Vance.

That was almost funny.

Almost.

Once Dominic knew the property was unquestionably his, the gallery stopped looking like an expensive reminder of his former fiancé and started looking like an asset.

More importantly, it was an asset he could actually do something with.

Dominic gave himself a deadline.

There was no point waiting six months for people to stop talking about him. By then, they’d probably find someone more interesting to gossip about, which was arguably worse for marketing.

Good publicity was useful.

Bad publicity was survivable.

Being completely forgotten was terrible for business.

Besides, Dominic wasn’t planning to announce himself as the city’s newest artistic genius.

He wasn’t even exhibiting his own work yet.

The first objective was much simpler.

He had a gallery.

Other artists had finished work and needed somewhere to show it.

Surely money lay somewhere between those two facts.

Dominic began researching.

He studied how independent galleries charged artists, then looked into temporary exhibitions and commission arrangements. The existing floor plan needed some adjustment, particularly if he wanted part of the property available for workshops later, but the structure itself was already suitable.

For once, Dominic resisted the urge to call someone and ask them to solve everything for him.

He hired professionals where professionals were actually necessary, then made himself understand what they were doing.

That distinction was annoyingly important.

Within weeks, workers were moving through the gallery.

Dominic spent much of that time in the back, where he set up an easel near the windows and started painting again.

Construction noise made concentration impossible at first.

Noise-canceling headphones solved that problem.

After that, something unexpected happened.

Dominic settled into a routine.

He arrived in the morning, checked on the renovation, then disappeared behind his easel whenever nobody needed him.

Some days he painted for an hour.

Other days he looked up and realized he’d missed lunch.

His phone stayed nearby, but he stopped checking it every few minutes. He wasn’t drinking simply because the evening felt too long anymore either.

Even his hair bothered him less while he was painting.

The dermatology treatments continued, of course. So did therapy.

But somewhere between those appointments, the gallery gave him somewhere to go that wasn’t Sebastian Group, Victoria’s house, or another place where people already knew exactly who Dominic Sebastian was supposed to be.

Here, he was building something.

Small, perhaps.

But his.

Victoria occasionally appeared carrying food.

The first time, Dominic eyed the containers in her hands suspiciously.

"What?"

"You brought lunch."

"You forgot to eat."

"How do you know?"

"You didn’t answer my message."

"I was painting."

"I gathered."

She set the food on a nearby table, then looked around.

The gallery was still partially under construction, but enough had changed that its eventual shape was becoming easier to imagine.

"You’ve made progress."

Dominic removed his headphones.

"Don’t sound so surprised."

"I wasn’t."

"You were thinking it."

Victoria smiled.

Dominic opened one of the containers.

She didn’t offer advice.

That was probably the strangest part.

Months earlier, Victoria would’ve inspected everything and immediately begun telling him what needed changing. Now she simply asked when he expected to open.

"Soon."

"How soon?"

"Once the permits are finished and I have enough artists committed for the first exhibition."

"Your paintings?"

"Not yet."

Victoria glanced toward the canvas behind him.

"Why not?"

"Because I’m not opening a gallery just to force people to admire something I painted on vacation."

"You liked that painting."

"I do."

Dominic hesitated.

"I might display one."

Not as the centerpiece.

Just somewhere among the other work.

Something that showed the gallery didn’t have to belong exclusively to established artists. People who’d only recently picked up a brush deserved somewhere to start too.

Victoria seemed to understand.

"I think that’s a good idea."

Dominic looked at her suspiciously.

"No criticism?"

"Would you like some?"

"No."

"Then eat your lunch."

He did.

Victoria left less than an hour later.

Sitting in the car, she found herself looking back at the gallery through the window.

Italy had been worth every cent.

Not because Dominic had miraculously returned as an entirely different person.

He hadn’t.

He still had therapy appointments. His hair remained a source of anxiety whenever he thought about it too long, and some days were considerably worse than others.

But he was doing something that didn’t involve Alexander or reclaiming Sebastian Group.

Perhaps that meant Victoria could finally stop treating her son’s life as a problem she needed to manage.

Dominic was in his mid-thirties.

It was probably time.

More importantly, Victoria needed to figure out what she intended to do with her own life now that controlling Dominic’s was no longer a full-time occupation.

She was still considering that question when she arrived home.

A courier had delivered a package while she was gone.

The envelope was thick enough to suggest either a lawsuit or something equally unpleasant.

Victoria carried it into the sitting room and opened it.

She read the first page.

Then the second.

By the time she reached the signature at the bottom, she was no longer surprised.

Conrad Sebastian.

Victoria leaned back.

"Well."

After all these years, her husband had finally decided he wanted a divorce.

She looked at the rest of the documents.

Then she reached for her phone.

Her contact answered on the third ring.

"Victoria?"