Chapter 10
Days turned into weeks, and Clara threw herself into the cultural showcase project at CGE. For the first time, her work wasn’t buried or dismissed. She’d been given a small team, resources, even direct communication with Daniel—the CEO’s PA.?
Daniel always seemed to have timely advice, little nudges that guided her in making the right decisions. When she asked how he knew so much, he only smiled and said, “Mr. Cole values potential. He trusts you more than you realize.”
Clara often wondered about Adrian Cole, the elusive CEO she’d never met. Everyone spoke of him like a legend—He was ruthless, brilliant and untouchable. Yet he had chosen her, a nobody, to lead this project. The mystery gnawed at her.
Still, the work flourished. She secured patronage from an art foundation, convinced cultural centers to collaborate, even closed a deal with an European gallery. Her vision—to showcase art and culture as a living, breathing part of society—was taking form. And she loved every second.
Not everyone shared her joy.
Vanessa seethed with each passing day. Forced to assist Clara, she reported bitterly to Daniel, hating every moment. Watching Clara win over clients, watching her ideas praised—it burned.
In her mind, there was only one way to reclaim power. Adrian Cole. When he returned, Vanessa vowed to seduce him. Once she secured her place at his side, Clara would be crushed, Daniel would be irrelevant, and Vanessa would rule CGE.
“Enjoy it while you can, little nobody”, she murmured to herself. “Because when Adrian comes back, you’ll be nothing but a memory.”
-----
One evening, after Clara had finalized another contract, Ethan showed up at her office door to walk her home. She beamed when she saw him waiting, still in his logistics uniform.
“You didn’t have to,” she said.
“I wanted to,” he replied simply.
They walked side by side, their hands brushing until finally, he caught hers. Clara didn’t pull away. The evening air was cool around them. Clara found herself talking more than usual, words spilling freely.
“You know something?” she said softly. “For the first time in my life, I feel… like what I do matters. The project, the team, even Daniel’s guidance—it’s like someone finally believes in me.”
Ethan glanced sideways, his chest tightening. “You deserve that.”
She smiled, eyes searching his face. “And then there’s you. You don’t laugh at my dreams, Ethan. You don’t tell me I’m not enough. You make me feel… like I’m not invisible anymore.”
He stopped walking, her words settling into him like a weight he couldn’t shake.
“Ethan,” she began softly, “do you ever think about the future?”
He glanced at her, his expression unreadable. “Every day.”
“I mean… what we want. Where we’ll be in the future. Together.”
Something flickered in his eyes, something sharp that he smoothed over quickly. He stopped walking, turned to her, and took both her hands in his.
“Clara Bennett,” he said, steady and clear, “will you marry me?”
Her breath caught. “What?!!”
He took a breath, his jaw tightening like this moment carried the weight of his entire life. “I don’t want to keep waking up and wondering if you’ll still be here tomorrow. I want to know. I want to build something with you. So…” He dropped to one knee on the cracked pavement, “I can give you—myself. Every part of me. The good, the broken, all of me, for as long as I breathe. Marry me, Clara Bennett,” he said, his voice steady.
Her eyes widened. For a moment she thought he was joking, but then she saw the seriousness in his expression, the way his hand trembled slightly as he reached for hers.
“No ring?” she teased, trying to lighten the storm that was suddenly in her chest.
He gave a short laugh, almost pained. “Not yet. But if you say yes, I’ll find a way. I promise. Say yes,” he urged softly, eyes locked on hers. “Even if all we ever have is this—eggs and rice dinners, our apartment, this streetlamp—say yes.”
Clara’s throat tightened. She didn’t need a ring, not when his eyes held that kind of truth. Clara’s vision blurred with tears. Her life had been filled with rejection, humiliation, doors slammed in her face. And yet here he was, asking her to choose him, to choose them.
“Yes,” she whispered, then louder, with a shaky laugh. “Yes! Ethan Hayes, yes! I’ll marry you.”
She pulled him up and kissed him, laughing through her tears, clinging to him like the ground beneath her had finally steadied.
He pulled her into his arms, kissing her with a hunger that shook them both. It wasn’t just passion — it was relief, like he’d been holding his breath and she’d just given him air.
He kissed her, deep and certain, right there under the streetlamp.
-----
The next day, Ethan took her to the license office. The office smelled faintly of paper and ink, the kind of place where lives were reduced to signatures and stamps. Clara fidgeted on the hard chair as she filled out her form, glancing at Ethan every few seconds with nervous excitement.
“This feels so surreal,” she whispered, clutching the pen.
“It’s real,” he said, steady as always.
“This is crazy,” she whispered, chewing her lip. “We’re really doing this?”
Ethan smiled faintly, calm as always. “We are.”
Her pen hovered over the signature line. For a moment, Clara thought of all the times she’d been told she didn’t belong, that she wasn’t good enough, that she’d never build a life of her own. She thought of her former family. Margaret’s words echoed—You’ll ruin everything you touch Clara. Julia’s mocking laughter rang in her head and her father’s silence. She was about to make her own family. Then she pressed the pen down firmly.
Clara Bennett.
Her name looked small on the page, but to her, it felt like the boldest thing she’d ever written.
“Your turn,” she said, sliding the document over to Ethan.
Without hesitation, he signed his real name: Adrian Cole. He slid the certificate back before Clara could notice. He refused to lie, at this precious moment. He needed to ensure that Clara was a part of his future. Adrian felt relief at giving a piece of his truth. When the clerk stamped the paper and handed over their copy, he slid it neatly into his coat pocket.
Clara didn’t suspect a thing.
“Congratulations,” the clerk droned. “You’re legally married.”
Clara let out a soft laugh, half-sob, half-joy. She leaned against Ethan’s shoulder, whispering, “We’re really husband and wife now.”
“Yes,” he murmured, his voice low, unreadable.
“One day, when we have more, we’ll get a real ceremony,” she said, her voice full of hope. “But this… this is enough for me. You’re enough.”
Ethan only kissed the top of her head, his throat tightening around words he couldn’t say, a mix of tenderness and guilt in his chest. Because she wasn’t just married to Ethan Hayes, the poor logistic officer. She was now the wife of Adrian Cole, the richest man in the city.
And she didn’t even know it.
That night, they lay together, their whispers spilling into the dark. She told him of her dreams—to one day open her own gallery, to teach children art. He told her fragments of truth, how he’d lost his mother at eight, how he’d learned to survive by working harder than anyone else.
Clara stroked his cheek and whispered, “You’re stronger than anyone I’ve ever met.”
He looked at her in the moonlight, her eyes soft, her hair tousled, and thought he might break. She believed he was poor, yet she loved him. She didn’t want his money, his name, his empire—only him.
For Adrian Cole, the man who had built walls higher than kingdoms, that truth was both terrifying and liberating.
-----
Two days later, Ethan opened a small velvet box. Inside lay a sapphire ring, deep blue and shining, set in an elegant antique band. He handed it to her with a solemn expression.
Clara gasped, touching it with trembling fingers. “Ethan… how did you get this—this is… it’s beautiful.”
“It’s been in my family for years,” he said, truth laced inside the lie. “I want you to wear it.”
She blinked rapidly, moved beyond words. The sapphire caught the light in a way that seemed…impossible. The settings was intricate. “Ethan, this looks expensive. It looks like it belongs to a princess.”
He smiled faintly. “It belongs to my wife. It means nothing unless it’s with you.”
Clara’s heart nearly burst. She slipped it on, admiring how the stone caught the light. Never for a moment did she guess it was a priceless heirloom — or that her new husband wasn’t who he claimed to be.