My Riley

Chapter Two-Riley

If Vincent Stanley was the kind of man who made a room feel smaller when he entered it, Riley Rosewood was the kind of person who made a room breathe.

He didn’t need to be loud.

He didn’t need to demand attention.

He didn’t even need to speak very much.

Riley simply had a presence.

Calm.

Warm.

Peaceful.

There was something about him that made people feel like they could take a breath.

At twenty-five, Riley Rosewood had already established a name for himself in the interior design industry.

Not because of his family.

Not because of connections.

And certainly not because he needed someone to open doors for him.

Riley had built his career himself.

He was an interior decorator, specializing in transforming houses, apartments, offices, hotels and commercial spaces into places that actually felt alive.

He could walk into an empty room and immediately see something that wasn’t there yet.

A different arrangement.

A different light.

A different color.

A different feeling.

That was Riley’s gift.

He didn’t simply decorate rooms.

He changed how people felt inside them.

His clients often said the same thing after working with him.

“Riley makes a place feel like home.”

And that was exactly what he wanted.

He didn’t believe beautiful spaces had to be cold.

He didn’t believe luxury had to mean uncomfortable furniture and rooms nobody was allowed to touch.

He believed a beautiful home should still feel like a home.

Warm.

Comfortable.

Personal.

A place where somebody could kick off their shoes, open the windows and breathe.

Perhaps that was because Riley himself loved breathing.

Not literally.

Emotionally.

He loved fresh air.

He loved open windows.

He loved sunlight falling across the floor in the morning.

He loved sitting outside with a cup of tea while the wind moved through the trees.

He loved quiet mornings.

He loved rainy afternoons.

He loved music when he could feel the vibration through the floor.

He loved plants.

Books.

Sketching.

And he loved spaces that didn’t make people feel trapped.

Riley had always been that way.

Even as a child.

He was never the loudest child in the room.

He wasn’t the one running around screaming.

He wasn’t particularly mischievous.

He was simply…

Riley.

Quiet when he wanted to be.

Cheerful when he needed to be.

And surprisingly stubborn whenever something mattered to him.

His mother often said that Riley had been born with sunshine in his chest.

His older brother disagreed.

“He was born stubborn.”

Riley would look at him.

“You’re just jealous.”

“Of what?”

“Everything.”

His brother would laugh.

“You see what I mean?”

Their mother would shake her head.

“You two never grew up.”

Riley loved his family.

He was the second child.

His mother had raised him and his older brother with a kind of fierce love that Riley never took for granted.

They weren’t a perfect family.

They argued.

They annoyed each other.

They had disagreements.

But they were close.

Riley still lived with them, despite having more than enough money to purchase his own home.

His mother liked having him around.

His brother pretended he didn’t care.

And Riley?

He simply enjoyed knowing that there was always somebody waiting for him at home.

His career was the one thing he had built completely on his own.

People who knew his family knew the Rosewood name.

But they didn’t necessarily know Riley.

And Riley preferred it that way.

He didn’t want someone to hire him because of his last name.

He wanted them to hire him because they had seen his work.

His portfolio spoke for him.

His designs spoke for him.

His work ethic spoke for him.

And after several successful projects, people began recommending him.

One client became two.

Two became ten.

Ten became dozens.

Soon, Riley had built a reputation.

Not an enormous celebrity reputation.

He didn’t care for that.

But a respected one.

People in the industry knew his name.

Architects knew him.

Property developers knew him.

Homeowners knew him.

And more importantly, his clients trusted him.

There was only one part of Riley that sometimes made strangers treat him differently.

His hearing.

Riley was deaf.

He had been diagnosed with significant hearing loss in both ears when he was young.

His mother still remembered the day they learned.

She had cried.

His father had asked questions.

Doctors had explained everything carefully.

Riley had bilateral sensorineural hearing loss, meaning the structures responsible for sending sound signals from the inner ear to the brain did not function normally in either ear.

Riley could hear some sounds without assistance, but speech and quieter sounds could be difficult to understand, especially when there was background noise.

So he used two hearing aids.

One in each ear.

They were small devices that sat behind his ears and helped amplify and process sounds.

They didn’t magically give him perfect hearing.

They weren’t a cure.

They simply helped his brain receive sound more clearly.

And because Riley had grown up using them, they were as normal to him as wearing glasses was to someone who needed glasses to see.

He didn’t hide them because he was ashamed.

He simply liked his hair long.

That was all.

Riley had silky, soft hair that fell around his face and covered his ears.

Sometimes completely.

His mother loved it.

His brother hated it.

“You need a haircut.”

“No.”

“Riley.”

“No.”

“You can’t see your ears.”

“That’s the idea.”

His brother rolled his eyes.

Riley smiled.

From a distance, the combination of his long hair, delicate facial features and calm expression could easily confuse people.

More than once, someone had looked at him from behind and assumed he was a woman.

Sometimes people would even call him “miss.”

Riley usually turned around with a smile.

“I’m actually a man.”

The person’s embarrassment would be immediate.

“Oh my God. I’m so sorry.”

Riley would laugh.

“It’s okay.”

His name didn’t exactly help.

Riley.

His mother had chosen it.

She had always wanted a daughter.

She had imagined having a little girl she could dress in pretty clothes, braid her hair and call by a soft, beautiful name.

Then Riley was born.

A boy.

A beautiful baby boy.

His mother looked at him and decided she wasn’t giving up the name.

So Riley became Riley.

His older brother still teased him about it.

“Mom wanted a daughter so badly that she just gave you a girl’s name.”

Riley shrugged.

“And she got a better child instead.”

His mother nearly choked laughing.

His brother stared at him.

“You’re unbelievable.”

Riley grinned.

But despite the teasing, Riley had never disliked his name.

It suited him.

Soft.

Uncomplicated.

Different.

Just like him.

His hearing never stopped him from living.

It only meant that Riley had learned to communicate differently.

When people spoke to him, he preferred them to face him.

If someone covered their mouth or spoke while looking away, he might miss parts of the conversation.

In crowded restaurants or noisy rooms, understanding speech could become difficult because the background sounds competed with the sounds he was trying to hear.

Sometimes he would ask someone to repeat themselves.

Sometimes twice.

Sometimes three times.

And occasionally, when someone became impatient, Riley would simply smile and say,

“I’m deaf, not psychic.”

That usually ended the attitude.

He had never been ashamed of saying the word.

Deaf.

It wasn’t an insult.

It wasn’t a weakness.

It was simply part of his life.

If somebody asked him, he answered.

If somebody wanted to understand, he explained.

If somebody was rude, he walked away.

Riley had learned early that he didn’t owe everyone an explanation.

But what people often noticed first wasn’t his hearing.

It was his personality.

Riley could change the atmosphere of a room without trying.

A tense meeting could be going badly, and Riley would say something so simple that everyone would laugh.

A nervous client could be overwhelmed by a hundred decisions, and Riley would calmly sit beside them and say,

“Okay. Forget everything for a minute. What do you actually like?”

A room full of people arguing over colors could become silent when Riley walked in.

Not because they were afraid of him.

Because somehow, he made people slow down.

He had a way of taking complicated situations and making them feel manageable.

“One thing at a time,” he always said.

That was Riley’s philosophy.

One thing at a time.

Life didn’t have to be rushed.

It didn’t have to be rigid.

It didn’t have to be perfect.

At twenty-five, Riley was comfortable with who he was.

He had his career.

His family.

His independence.

His little routines.

His plants.

His sketches.

His open windows.

And his hearing aids sitting discreetly behind his ears beneath his long hair.

He had built a life that felt like him.

Then one Monday morning, everything changed.

Riley was sitting at the dining table, drinking coffee while looking through several design proposals on his tablet.

His mother was preparing breakfast.

His brother was scrolling through his phone.

The morning was peaceful.

Until Riley’s phone vibrated.

He glanced down.

An email.

He opened it.

His eyes moved across the screen.

Then stopped.

He read it again.

His brother noticed.

“What?”

Riley didn’t answer immediately.

His mother turned around.

“What’s wrong?”

Riley looked up.

“Nothing.”

His brother frowned.

“Then why are you looking at your phone like that?”

Riley turned the screen toward them.

At the top of the email was a name.

STANLEY CORPORATION.

His brother’s eyebrows rose.

“That’s not nothing.”

Riley continued reading.

They wanted him to handle the interior design for one of their major properties.

It wasn’t a small project.

It wasn’t even an ordinary corporate office.

It was enormous.

Executive offices.

Private meeting rooms.

Reception areas.

Staff lounges.

Luxury suites.

Conference rooms.

Entire floors needed redesigning.

And the project came with one very important condition.

Riley would have to meet the owner.

His eyes moved down the email.

Then he saw the name.

Vincent Stanley.

Riley leaned back.

He knew that name.

Everyone knew that name.

Vincent Stanley.

The man behind Stanley Corporation.

The billionaire businessman.

The man people described as ruthless, terrifying and impossible to impress.

Riley stared at the name for a few seconds.

His brother looked at him.

“You know who that is?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to take the project?”

Riley looked at the email again.

Then he smiled.

“I think I will.”

His brother stared.

“You’re not nervous?”

Riley shrugged.

“Should I be?”

His brother laughed.

“Apparently, the man is terrifying.”

Riley took another sip of coffee.

“Then I’ll bring him a plant.”

His mother burst out laughing.

His brother shook his head.

“You’re going to get yourself killed.”

Riley smiled.

“Probably not.”

He looked toward the open window.

The morning breeze moved gently through his hair.

For a moment, everything was still.

Then Riley looked back at the email.

Vincent Stanley.

He had no idea that accepting that project would change his life.

He didn’t know that the man waiting for him at Stanley Corporation was nothing like the people he had ever worked with.

And Vincent Stanley certainly had no idea that the quiet, cheerful interior designer walking into his world would be the first person in years who wouldn’t be intimidated by him.

Two completely different men.

Two completely different lives.

And somehow—

they were about to collide.