Married to a Scandal

~CHAPTER VI~

Luca's POV

The penthouse had never once, in eleven years, felt small to Luca. It felt smaller tonight, somehow, with exactly one more person standing in it.

Selene stood in the middle of his study. It was her study now too, technically, but she was inspecting the bookshelves as if she suspected they might be for show. She wore an ivory dress, one she had chosen for the reception. Her heels were finally abandoned by the door.

The moment they had walked in, she had changed, not out of clothes, but out of the version of herself that smiled for the cameras. This transformation was almost visible. Her spine remained straight, unwavering.

"We should establish terms," she said, "for living together."

"We already have terms. There's a document that several lawyers cried over."

"Those were contract terms. This is domestic terms." She turned, arms crossed, and he recognised the posture immediately. "Separate bedrooms."

"Already established."

"I mean it, Luca. Separate, not adjacent. Not connected by some tasteful door I'll discover in a month."

"Duly noted." He dropped into the leather chair by the window, unbuttoning his jacket, watching her work through the list she'd clearly been composing since the ceremony. "There are no doors connecting our rooms, so I'll just come to yours the traditional way, by knocking. Maybe I'll bring flowers, too."

"That's not what I meant."

"I know exactly what you meant." He smiled, the real one this time, the one that had nothing to do with cameras. "I'm choosing not to respect it. There's a difference."

Something flickered across her face. It was not anger, but something closer to recalibration, as if she had expected an argument and gotten a joke instead. She had not yet decided which reaction to prepare for. He was rapidly discovering that this shift in her expression was one of his favourite things to witness.

"No public displays of affection outside of required appearances," she continued, undeterred.

"So private ones are fine."

"There won't be private ones."

"Tragic. I'll grieve appropriately." He crossed one ankle over his knee, watching her the way he'd watch a negotiation he already knew the shape of. "Anything else, or are we simply reciting the greatest hits of the contract you already made me sign?"

"Meals separately, unless a function requires otherwise."

"Absolutely not."

That stopped her. "Excuse me?"

"Lorna makes dinner every night at seven o'clock, and she's been doing this for almost ten years. If you don't join, she’ll get upset, and then I’ll have to listen to her complain about it for a month, which makes me feel really young and not good. I don’t want to deal with that just so you can keep your boundary."

"That's not a boundary issue, that's a—"

"Non-negotiable," he said, cheerfully borrowing the word she'd used on him three separate times during their contract meeting. "You'll survive one shared meal a day. I have faith in you."

She opened her mouth to argue, but just then, Lorna appeared in the doorway, drying her hands on a well-worn apron. With a weary patience, she regarded the two of them—a woman who had been managing Luca Kensington's household since long before he could manage himself.

"Dinner is in ten minutes," she announced. Then, taking in the scene, Selene with her arms crossed and Luca trying to suppress a grin, she added, mostly to Selene, "Is he already being difficult?"

"He's establishing his position," Selene said dryly.

"That sounds like him," Lorna said, her mouth twitching into almost a smile. "Just so you know, he doesn't act like this all the time."

"No?"

"No." Lorna glanced at Luca, something unreadable passing between them—an old, easy understanding built over years he didn't discuss with anyone, least of all his new wife. "Give him time. Underneath all that, he's actually rather good at taking care of people. He just prefers no one notice him doing it."

"Lorna," Luca said mildly, "you're editorialising."

"I'm observing. There's a difference." She echoed Selene's own line back at him without seeming to realise it, and disappeared toward the kitchen before either of them could respond, leaving behind a silence that felt, to Luca's mild irritation, considerably heavier than it had a right to.

Selene watched him for a moment, something calculating behind her eyes—not quite suspicion, closer to recataloguing. "She's very fond of you."

"She raised me, more or less. My parents were occupied with other things." He said it lightly, the way he said everything he didn't want examined too closely, and stood, buttoning his jacket back into place out of habit rather than necessity. "Don't read too much into it. She's fond of anyone who doesn't actively set fire to the kitchen."

"That's not what she said."

"She exaggerates; it's part of her charm." He waved toward the door, using his usual skill to deflect, but tonight it felt off, leaving him uncertain. "Let’s go for dinner before she returns to lecture us."

Selene didn't move immediately. She was still looking at him with that same careful, assessing expression, the one that made him feel, uncomfortably, like a subject rather than a husband.

"For what it's worth," she said finally, "I don't actually think you're difficult."

"No?"

"I think you're difficult on purpose." She turned before he could answer, heading toward the dining room, leaving him standing alone in the study with the distinct, unfamiliar sensation of having been read correctly by someone he'd fully intended to keep at arm's length.

He followed her after he managed to put on a more relaxed expression.