CHAPTER 31
Edoardo
I got the call at seven in the morning and was on a train to Paris within the hour. A major water leak had struck our main warehouse, the central hub holding the bulk of inventory for all three of my Paris galleries.
“Move the major affected pieces to my house.” I tell Tanin, my head of security, the moment I step into the controlled chaos, my voice steady despite the thrum of adrenaline beneath it.
“Everything else goes to the galleries and the hotel suite our zone director secured. Coordinate with Philippe. He’ll oversee intake.
And loop in Lisa for placement and climate controls. ”
He nods once, already turning to set the plan in motion.
Within hours, the operation is fully underway.
Art handlers, conservators, and logistics teams move with disciplined urgency.
They’re followed by insurance assessors, curators, and registrars.
Crates are sealed, humidity levels monitored, condition reports updated in rapid succession.
My security teams from Brussels and Milan are flown in to reinforce the perimeter as our usual protocols, meticulous, air-tight, fractured the moment the warehouse was compromised.
Now inventory is dispersed across the city, each location a temporary heartbeat in a system fighting to stabilize itself.
Fourteen hours later, everything is finally and mercifully under control.
“Mr. Contalouni,” the insurance lead says, pulling my attention back to the table.
I drag my focus from the blur of activity beyond the glass walls to the documents spread in front of us.
“This is the latest assessment as of an hour ago. Please sign here.”
I pass the report to Lisa. She reviews it with her usual surgical precision. At her small nod, I skim the key figures and sign.
“We’ll circle back later,” he says, gathering his folders, “but I’ll leave Fran?ois and my team on-site if you need anything.”
“Thank you,” I reply, standing and sending him off with a handshake.
“Please send Tanin in.” I tell my secretary.
A moment later Tanin steps inside, closing the door quietly behind him.
“So,” I say, leaning against the edge of the table, “tell me.”
His tone is steady, controlled. “We believe the warehouse may have been targeted. The water break doesn’t appear accidental.”
“Did our security system pick anything up, cameras, biometrics?”
“No,” he answers. “Appears that it occurs offsite. A nearby water main. We don’t have coverage.”
My jaw tightens. “Competition? Another gallery trying to destabilize us? Or thieves? Or someone testing whether we’ll pay for ‘protection’?”
“I doubt any organized group would take that risk,” he says. “Your reputation and our security presence are well known. The authorities keep this district tightly monitored. Organized crime is unlikely.”
“So, we’re looking at competition or attempted burglary,” I conclude. “Spare no effort, no budget. Find the source and shut it down. Bring in the police or any local authorities you deem necessary.”
I pause, then add, “And make sure we don’t dilute security coverage at the other galleries or at my family’s homes. Bring in additional personnel if you need to.”
He nods once. With Tanin, that’s as good as a signed contract.
He’s never been a man of many words - one of the best hires I’ve ever made, recruited out of Mossad through a family connection.
His uncle worked for my parents for years before retiring and personally vouched for him.
I trusted him the moment we met. Over time, he’s become something closer to family than staff, more like a cousin than an employee. My whole family treats him the same.
Lisa and Tanin leave, the door closing softly behind them. Only then did I notice the fatigue, how it pressed behind my eyes and settled into my shoulders. Three espressos and a bottle of juice since dawn. Liquid momentum. Nothing more.
But the thought that kept circling refused to let me rest:
it wasn’t an accident. And it hit the hub. Whoever did this had to be big enough and bold enough to risk destabilizing us.
And they had aimed for the center of gravity.
I immediately called each zone director in turn, requesting lists of every warehouse that functioned as a multi-gallery hub, every site critical to operations.
I wanted patterns. Vulnerabilities. Possibilities.
If this was an isolated incident, we’d contain it.
If not, I needed a strategy before the next move was made.
I was still turning scenarios over in my mind when my phone buzzed.
Caroline. Midnight already.
“Hi, how are you doing?” her text reads.
She’d checked in earlier, but I hadn’t told her the breach might be deliberate. I stared at the screen a moment before replying.
“Thanks. Things are under control,” I reply. “How was your day?”
“On my way home. I’m sorry about today. Did insurance say anything decent?”
“We’re insured to the teeth, so that part’s fine. Clients and deliveries are the real concern—but that’s tomorrow’s problem.”
“I’m sorry. Is there anything I can help with?”
I leaned back, rubbing my eyes.
“I’ll be here a few days getting everything sorted. When are you flying out?”
“My flight back to New York is Sunday.”
It’s already midnight Thursday.
“I hate that I’m going to miss you for another week.”
“I know. But I’ll come back a day or two earlier so we can spend time together. And I can have Michael prepare your Latin outfits for my birthday party if you like.”
I smile despite myself. “I like both ideas - you coming back earlier and Michael’s help.”
The typing indicator appeared. Vanished. Returned. Hesitation, even across pixels.
Finally, her message comes through.
“Do you want me to come tomorrow evening? I don’t want to intrude with everything going on. But I could be there and fly to New York from Paris.”
Despite the mess surrounding me, despite the workload waiting to bury me alive over the next few days, something warm and steady unfurls in my chest.
I call her immediately.
She picks up on the second ring. “Hey - ”
“Come visit me,” I say softly, cutting in before she can second-guess herself.
“You never have to ask, Cara. Having you next to me isn’t an intrusion.
It’s… the only thing that makes days like this feel manageable.
” I let out a small breath, a smile tugging at my mouth.
“I can’t wait to see you tomorrow night. ”
There’s a pause on the line - not awkward, but full, like she’s smiling too.
“Okay,” she says, voice gentler now. “Then I’ll be there.”
After we hang up, I remain still for a long moment, the phone resting loosely in my hand as the quiet folds back into the room. The adrenaline that carried me through the day begins to ebb, leaving behind a strange, suspended calm.
My mind drifts back to the morning, the violence of the ringing phone, the abrupt jolt from sleep into crisis.
She had barely been awake, her hair still rumpled with sleep, yet she moved with that efficient precision I’ve come to know so well.
While I stood at the sink trying to gather my thoughts, she packed a bag, called the car, booked the train.
No fuss. No panic. Just steady competence wrapped in quiet care.
No barrage of messages, no anxious demands for updates. Only the occasional check-in, light as a touch on the shoulder. She has a way of making space instead of noise, of being present without ever crowding the air.
I know better than anyone how relentless her own world is right now. She’s rebuilding an entire regional office from the ground up, chasing growth across continents, living in the narrow margins between flights, meetings, negotiations. Her days are as unforgiving as mine, her stakes just as high.
And still, her instinct is to come. To stand beside me. To share a burden I never asked her to carry.
The realization lands quietly but deeply, like something settling into place.
I lean back, letting the exhaustion finally seep into my bones. It feels different now, not the sharp edge of depletion, but a softer kind of weariness, steadied by the thought of her.
Ten minutes. That’s all I allow myself before pushing back to my feet and returning to the warehouse floor.
The air still carries the faint scent of damp wood and burnt coffee, but the tension has loosened.
Voices are lower now, movements more measured.
An hour later the last crates are sealed, manifests finalized, forklifts gliding in smooth arcs under the fluorescent lights.
The emergency is no longer a storm, just the long work of recovery.
The next day dissolves into a blur of calls, briefings, signatures. And then, just after eight in the evening, Caroline walks in.
Jeans, a soft T-shirt, a baseball cap tugged low, she looks more like a recent graduate than the CEO who’d walked out of a boardroom hours earlier.
She doesn’t need to say anything, doesn’t even need to touch me.
The moment I see her, something inside me unclenches, a warmth spreading through my chest that feels deeper than relief, deeper than comfort.
Caroline notices everything, of course. The untouched food on my desk.
The stack of files. The fatigue I haven’t acknowledged.
Without a word, she sets down a takeout bag.
The familiar smell of lasagna from L’Artusi, my favorite, spills into the room, grounding and impossibly kind.
A small gesture, but it lands with surprising force. It’s care, made tangible.
Saturday and Sunday pass in a rhythm that feels almost surreal - crisis threaded with quiet companionship.
While I move between directors and curators, coordinating fulfillment schedules and client notifications, she sits beside me cross-checking catalogues, verifying inventory updates, flagging discrepancies before I even notice them.
We were fortunate that none of the rarest pieces were in the affected zone, but still the administrative aftermath is relentless. Drafting notices to clients who expect perfection as a birthright, who prefer not to see the machinery behind it, feels like navigating a maze of glass.
At some point, Caroline rolls up her sleeves, literally, and joins the warehouse team, helping sort paperwork, checking shipment status, even hauling debris into disposal bins.
She takes coffee breaks with the staff, laughing easily, listening more than she speaks.
Within hours she looks less like a visitor and more like she’s always belonged here.
Watching her, I feel a quiet deepening, a tenderness. Because in the middle of damaged pipes, security briefings, and endless paperwork, one truth keeps surfacing with startling clarity: the moment Caroline walks through that door, I steady. I anchor.
And it surprises me how absolute the feeling is. The world can tilt, plans can fracture, pressure can mount from every side, and yet it doesn’t reach the center anymore.
Somewhere in the chaos, I realize one constant that remains quiet but luminous and unshakable: being with Caroline is being home.