Beneath His Billion-Dollar Shadow

Eliana didn't sleep that night.

Not from fear, not from hunger but from the quiet knowledge that something was about to shift, and once it did—there would be no going back.

The painting still sat on the table, wrapped in brown paper, waiting for Dominic to take it. He hadn't touched it when he left just looked at her, nodded, and walked away like someone who'd spent years learning how to wait.

She respected that but still hated it at the same time because now, the decision was hers.

All hers and she had never trusted herself enough to make good choices not since the world crashed and left her holding a child in one arm and a funeral bill in the other.

The morning light fell across the apartment like a question.

Jasmine was still asleep, her small frame curled beneath Eliana's old college blanket. One foot peeked out, toes twitching like she was running in a dream.

Eliana stood over her for a long moment, then almost without thinking, she pulled open the drawer and took out the contract again.

She didn't sit, she just stood there, in her own living room, barefoot and tense, rereading the same two pages she'd read at least twenty times in the last few days.

Nothing had changed still six commissions, still no exclusivity, still up front and still hers, she ran her fingers along the edge of the paper like it might bite her.

Five thousand dollars. The number pulsed in her brain like a second heartbeat.

She glanced at the painting again, then at the window. Outside, the streets of Brooklyn stirred with their usual slow chaos—mothers hurrying their kids along the sidewalk, a trash truck rattling past, pigeons fighting over a bagel.

Normal life, hard life, her life.

She looked back down.

Then she signed.

The pen made a soft scratch against the paper nothing dramatic, no gust of wind, no burst of music, just a click as she set the pen down and stared at her name. Her signature looked oddly out of place on such expensive paper.

Eliana Brooks.

Just like that, her life had changed.

She sat there for a moment longer, the hum of the refrigerator suddenly too loud. Jasmine's soft breathing echoed from the couch where she still slept. Outside, a truck rumbled past, then faded into the distance.

Then she stood up and folded the paper, slid it back into the envelope, and tucked it under the check on the table.

For a moment, she just stood there, her hands on the back of the chair, her knuckles white.

She had said yes, now all that was left was to wait for him to return.

Jasmine woke a little before noon, rubbing sleep from her eyes and yawning dramatically. "You're still in yesterday's clothes," she said, voice croaky.

"I've been up," Eliana replied, pouring her tea. "And… I signed the contract."

Jasmine blinked. "Seriously?"

"Yep."

"No take backs?"

"No take backs."

Jasmine sat up, tugging her blanket around her shoulders. "Are you… okay with it?"

Eliana hesitated. "I don't know, but I think I'm ready to find out."

Jasmine gave a crooked smile. "Well, if you start living in a gold mansion and wear sunglasses indoors, I'm out."

"I'll try to stay humble."

They laughed quietly together. It felt good to laugh and a little terrifying.

Dominic returned just before sunset.

Eliana didn't hear him knock at first. She was painting nothing serious, just smudges of color on a spare canvas, trying to get her hands moving again. Then there came the knock, firm and rhythmic, like someone who didn't question if they would be let in.

She wiped her hands, opened the door, and there he stood, less polished today. A little tired still elegant in that offhanded way that money and discipline created, a charcoal coat and a deep navy scarf wrapped neatly around his neck.

She handed him the envelope.

He opened it without ceremony, glanced over the signed pages, then looked up.

"Thank you," he said simply.

Eliana crossed her arms. "I didn't do it for you."

He didn't flinch. "I know."

"Why me?" she asked.

His eyes lingered on hers. "why this question again, well…..maybe because you paint what others hide and because you don't know how much you matter yet."

Eliana didn't know what to say to that so she didn't say anything.

Instead, he reached into his coat and pulled out a new folder—thicker, heavier. "The first payment is processed," he said. "And this contains instructions for the first delivery, a new space has been arranged because your current studio doesn't have enough security."

"You just assume I'll move?"

"I don't assume," he said. "I prepare."

She narrowed her eyes. "Control freak."

He actually smiled. "Perfectionist."

She took the folder and set it on the counter. "I'm not moving studios at least not right away."

He nodded. "That's your choice but the other space is open and paid, use it when you're ready."

She didn't thank him. She wasn't sure if she could.

He turned to leave, then paused.

"There's no rush. Paint at your pace."

She tilted her head. "And if I never finish anything?"

"Then I'll keep waiting."

He walked down the hall without another word.

That afternoon, a man in a delivery uniform arrived with a key. 

The studio was unlike anything she'd ever stepped into not that night but the next day, when she finally got curious enough to go.

A studio that is fully paid for the next twelve months, no lease in her name, no landlord to chase her for rent.

Just hers, that alone made her feel dizzy.

The net day she get dress to check the place out, when she got there everything was clean and empty, sunlight poured through the huge arched windows. There were supplies already there—her favorites even the brushes she used and the exact kind of canvas she preferred.

It freaked her out, for a while, she just walked in circles. Touched the walls, then later sat on the floor.

How did he know?

Why did he know?

And how much more did he plan?

There were no answers so she did the only thing that helped her feel like herself again.

She painted. The first piece came in fragments, she didn't plan it, it just unfolded.

A woman sitting on the edge of a fountain, her back to the viewer, surrounded by tourists taking photos and laughing but she was still completely still. Her hands in her lap, and her head tilted toward the sky.

Eliana didn't know what the painting meant but she knew it felt right.

After two days, she finished it.

Dominic didn't come but she left him a message.

The next morning, the painting was gone.

And in its place was a single white rose and a typed note that read:

"Sometimes silence says more than sound."

At home, Jasmine was having a bad day, her hands were swollen her knees ached. She couldn't even grip her favorite pen.

Eliana helped her into the bath, washed her hair, held her hand through the flares, that night, they sat on the couch and watched cartoons.

Jasmine's head in her lap, Eliana's fingers lightly braiding her curls.

"I like that you're painting again," Jasmine whispered. "Even if it's weird."

Eliana nodded. "Yeah, me too."

Three days passed, then a week.

She finished the second piece and the third.

Each time she returned to the studio, something new waited.

It's either a note or a book. Once, a pair of noise-canceling headphones and a playlist labeled "For when you need to block the world out."

She didn't know what to make of it.

Dominic never asked questions. Never appeared uninvited, never demanded a timeline but he was always there—somewhere just behind the curtain of her days.

She felt him like a pressure in the room even when she was alone and that was the scariest part because part of her didn't mind.

Then came the night he called.

She didn't recognize the number at first.

"Hello?"

"Eliana."

Her spine stiffened.

His voice was low, clear, and unmistakable.

"I'm not calling about the paintings," he said.

She didn't answer.

"I'm calling to ask if you're okay."

She opened her mouth, closed it. Then finally said, "Why would you care?"

There was a pause. "Because I've been where you are."

"Doubt it."

"Eliana…"

"You don't know me."

"No," he said softly. "But I'd like to."

She hung up and cried in the dark even though she didn't know why.

The next painting was different.

Rougher. Louder.

It showed a girl screaming into the wind while holding a candle, the flame didn't go out and when she left that one in the studio, she added a note beneath it:

"You don't know me. But maybe someday."

And across the city, in a penthouse filled with shadows and windows that never opened, Dominic read the note three times, then folded it into a page of a book about storms.

He knew not to rush her.

But he also knew…She was already halfway to yes.