Aurora's POV
The house had a rhythm now and I had learned to move inside it.
Mornings were mine. I woke before Lucian most days or before he emerged from the study and I had the kitchen to myself for an hour with coffee.
Afternoons belonged to whatever work Lucian was doing behind closed doors, which I had stopped trying to map precisely. I understood that the empire Evelyn had referenced was not the Draven name, not Sebastian's carefully constructed legacy, but something Lucian had built independently and quietly over the better part of a decade. Lucian Draven had a specific yield and it was rarely the thing you actually wanted.
Evenings we spent in my same room.
On the sixth evening, I was on the sitting room floor with my sketchbook.
"You're holding the pencil wrong," he said.
I
