Vivienne smiled.
“I did.”
He frowned.
“And now?”
She opened the cupboard and took out two cups.
“Now I want tea.”
Gabriel stared.
She looked back.
“What?”
He shook his head.
“Sometimes I don’t understand you anymore.”
Vivienne considered.
Then said quietly, “You understood me very well when I made everything easy for you.”
He had no answer.
The next stage of Vivienne’s plan began with a property in Antibes.
The property was a waterfront villa overlooking a narrow stretch of Mediterranean coastline, with terraced gardens, pale stone walls, and a private path leading toward the sea.
It had originally belonged to an Italian shipping family.
Gabriel discovered it during the early years of his production career.
He told Vivienne they should buy it together one day.
At the time, the idea was ridiculous.
They could barely afford their Paris apartment.
But Vivienne loved old buildings.
She researched the property’s history, made preliminary inquiries, and eventually helped arrange a conservation assessment for its owners.
Years later, a development entity associated with Laurent Pictures and Beaumont Capital acquired an interest in the villa with plans to convert it into a luxury retreat for private events and film-industry clients.
Vivienne had not been involved in the acquisition.
By then, she and Gabriel were divorcing.
But her consultancy still held certain legitimately acquired intellectual property in the earlier conservation work, including detailed restoration plans that could not simply be appropriated without permission.
More importantly, the project had stalled.
Construction costs had risen.
A planning approval had been delayed.
The ownership consortium was struggling to agree on additional capital.
Henri Beaumont was losing patience.
Gabriel blamed the architects.
The architects blamed unrealistic budgets.
Camille blamed Gabriel’s refusal to listen to anyone who questioned him.
Vivienne knew the project well enough to understand its weaknesses.
She also knew that the villa had become a symbol of Gabriel’s ambitions.
He had once told her it would be the place where he finally proved he belonged among the people who had always considered him an outsider.
Now the property was threatening to become a costly embarrassment.
Vivienne could have ignored it.
Instead, she began studying it.
Her first move was entirely legitimate.
She contacted the owner group through professional channels and offered an independent technical assessment of the restoration strategy.
She disclosed her previous marriage to Gabriel and her prior involvement with the property.
The consortium’s lawyers considered the conflict.
Several investors expressed concern.
Others believed her expertise was precisely what the project needed.
Vivienne did not conceal the history.
She negotiated a defined scope of work, independent reporting arrangements, and restrictions designed to protect sensitive commercial information.
Then she went to Antibes.
She walked the property with engineers and conservation specialists.
The villa was beautiful.
Even neglected, it possessed an elegance modern developments rarely achieved.
Sunlight moved across its limestone terraces.
Olive trees grew along the upper garden.
A staircase descended toward the sea, partly hidden beneath flowering vines.
Vivienne stood near the balustrade and remembered Gabriel describing how they would entertain friends there one day.
She had believed him.
Now she looked at the cracked stonework and the uneven drainage near the eastern wall.
The building did not care who had promised what.
It needed repair.
She opened her notebook.
And began working.
Gabriel was furious when he learned she’d been retained.
He called her from Paris.
“You’re working on Antibes?”
Vivienne was seated in a hotel room reviewing structural drawings.
“Yes.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
“I wasn’t required to.”
“It’s my project.”
“You’re one participant in the ownership consortium.”
He laughed bitterly.
“Don’t play games.”
She set down her pen.
“What game?”
“You know exactly what you’re doing.”
Vivienne looked toward the balcony.
Beyond it, the sea was darkening into evening.
“I’m reviewing a restoration project.”
“After everything between us?”
She smiled faintly.
“Would you prefer I stop?”
There was a pause.
Then he said, “No.”
Vivienne closed her eyes for a moment.
There it was.
The answer she expected.
He needed her.
Not emotionally.
Practically.
Her involvement might save a project he could not afford to lose.
Gabriel continued more quietly.
“Can you actually fix it?”
She looked at the drawings.
“Possibly.”
“What would it take?”
“Realistic financing. Proper oversight. An amended scope of work. And somebody willing to tell the investors what the building actually needs instead of what they want to hear.”
He sighed.
“You’re enjoying this.”
Vivienne considered.
“Some parts.”
“Which parts?”
She smiled.
“The architecture.”
He was silent.
She knew he could hear the lie.
Or perhaps only half a lie.
Then he said, “I wish you were here.”
Vivienne looked toward the sea.
“I’m sure you do.”
By spring, Gabriel’s personal and professional lives had become entangled in ways that left him increasingly dependent on Vivienne.
Camille had begun sleeping in a separate bedroom.
She attended fewer company events.
Henri had started asking sharper questions about the Antibes project.
The financing consortium was considering replacing Gabriel as its managing director.
Vivienne’s technical assessment offered a viable route forward, but it also exposed the extent of earlier planning failures.
Gabriel needed her expertise.
He wanted her affection.
And he was increasingly frightened that she would leave him without either.
Vivienne understood the imbalance.
She sometimes felt powerful enough to become reckless.
At other times, she woke during the night with an uncomfortable suspicion that her revenge was consuming more of her life than her marriage ever had.
She continued the affair.
But she began asking herself questions she had avoided.
What did she actually want?
Gabriel back?
Camille humiliated?
The Antibes villa?
Proof that she’d never been inferior to the woman he chose?
The questions troubled her because none seemed sufficient.
She had built a successful life after the divorce.
Why was she risking her peace to return to a man whose weaknesses were no longer mysterious?
The answer came one evening when Gabriel arrived at her apartment carrying flowers.
He had remembered that she liked white peonies.
Years earlier, he’d forgotten her birthday.
Now he appeared with her favourite flowers and a bottle of the wine they used to drink together.
He smiled.
“I thought you’d like these.”
Vivienne looked at the flowers.
For a moment, she felt an old tenderness.
Then she recognised something beneath it.
A terrible satisfaction.
He was trying.
He was afraid of losing her.
He was doing for her what she had once begged him to do.
And that mattered to her more than the flowers themselves.
She accepted them.
But the recognition frightened her.
She was beginning to use his desire as proof of her own worth.
Just as he had once used her devotion.
Camille discovered the identity of Gabriel’s mistress through a photograph.
It was not an intimate photograph.
That made it worse.
A colleague forwarded her an image taken at a professional reception in Milan.
