The heavy oak door of the Moreau study clicked shut behind us, sealing away the world of leveraged buyouts and corporate warfare. For a moment, we just stood in the grand, silent hallway, the only sound the distant, precise tick of a grandfather clock.
Then Val turned.
Her composure dissolved like morning fog. In its place was a grin so wide, so brilliantly unguarded, it could have powered the city. She didn't say a word. She just launched herself at me.
I caught her, her momentum spinning us half a turn. She buried her face in my shoulder, but I could feel the vibration of her silent, ecstatic laughter against my chest.
"He laughed," she whispered, the words muffled by my jacket. "He actually laughed. With you."
"I think he was laughing at me," I muttered, my arms tightening around her. "Something about my taste in chaotic, brilliant wives."
