Ella is too tired to brace herself for anything.
By the time she reaches her floor, the hallway feels like a long, muffled tunnel—her pulse still heavy from the gauntlet that was the Whitlow estate, Margaret’s polished judgment echoing in her ears. She digs for her keys, wanting nothing more than the quiet of her own space.
But when she turns the corner, she stops.
Julian is standing in front of her door.
Holding jasmine.
Not just a bouquet—an explosion of white blossoms, cascading from his arms like he emptied an entire greenhouse. The scent reaches her before his eyes do, sweet and soft and painfully familiar.
He looks out of place in the hallway—perfect suit, perfect posture, dark hair slightly messy as if he’d run his hands through it too many times. His expression shifts the moment he sees her: relief first, then a flash of uncertainty he tries—and fails—to hide.
“Ella,” he breathes, like her name alone steadies him.
She doesn’t move closer.
She doesn’t say anything.
Julian swallows, gripping the bouquet tighter. “I—I know it’s a lot.” His voice wavers, gentler than she expects. “I wasn’t sure what would help, so I just…brought everything.”
Ella looks at the flowers—the same jasmine he filled the gallery with, the same jasmine that made her feel like she was drowning in sweetness and apology.
A grand gesture. Again.
“Julian,” she says quietly, “what are you doing here?”
He steps forward, just enough that she feels the warmth radiating off him. “I heard what happened at the event. And at my mother’s. I should’ve been there. I should’ve—” He exhales sharply, jaw tensing. “I’m trying to fix it.”
She hugs her coat tighter around herself. “With flowers?”
“No,” he says, and for the first time, something raw breaks through the smooth composure he always carries. “With whatever it takes.”
The words linger between them, sinking into the silence of the hallway.
She studies him—really looks at him. The tension around his eyes, the restless shift of his shoulders, the vulnerability he hides beneath expensive fabric and stubborn pride.
It would be so easy to step into his reach.
So easy to let the jasmine and his voice and his presence soften her anger into something like forgiveness.
But Ella has learned—slowly, painfully—that easy isn’t the same as right.
“Julian,” she says again, softer this time, “you can’t keep appearing like this. With flowers. With grand gestures. It doesn’t… erase things.”
He flinches—not outwardly, but in the way his breath hitches, almost silent.
“I know.” His voice sinks, rougher. “But I can’t just do nothing.”
She feels the ache of that. The sincerity. The desperation.
But she also feels the exhaustion pressing onto her shoulders.
Ella nods toward the bouquet. “They’re beautiful. But what I need isn’t something you can buy.”
Julian’s gaze drops, then lifts again, steadier now, determined in that way of his that both terrifies and tempts her.
“Then tell me,” he says. “Tell me what you need, Ella.”
A simple question.
A devastating one.
Because the truth is—she doesn’t know yet. Not fully. Not enough to say it out loud.
She steps past him, reaching for her keys. “I need space tonight.”
Julian doesn’t stop her. But the jasmine trembles slightly in his hands, like even the flowers feel the sting.
He nods once—slow, careful, wounded. “Okay.”
She unlocks the door.
But before slipping inside, she glances back.
Julian stands alone, swallowed by flowers and the hallway’s dim light—his carefully controlled world cracking at the edges, finally showing its fractures.
And for the first time, Ella wonders whether his gesture was meant to fix things…
or just to keep her from walking away.