Chapter 6 - The Master’s Prescription
Three months later.
The autumn sun cast a warm, golden light across the manicured lawns of the Vale estate. The dark, suffocating tension that had hung over the house for a year had vanished entirely, replaced by the crisp breeze off the lake and the quiet hum of a restored home.
In the sunlit garden terrace behind the main house, a long white table was set for lunch.
Dominic sat at the head of the table, wearing a dark blue suit without a tie, reviewing a set of legal documents. Beside him, in a wooden high chair, sat Noah—now ten months old, chubby-cheeked, healthy, and enthusiastically smearing applesauce across his tray.
The heavy glass doors opened, and Evelyn walked out onto the terrace.
She was dressed in a sleek, emerald-green wool dress, her hair styled in soft waves over her shoulders. But instead of the distant, clinical mask she had worn for months, her face carried a serene, quiet confidence that illuminated her features.
She carried a heavy brown leather folder in her hand, setting it down beside Dominic’s coffee cup.
“What’s this?” Dominic asked, looking up with a warm smile.
“The board approval from the Illinois Medical Disciplinary Commission,” Evelyn said, sitting down in the chair next to him. “My license was formally reinstated this morning. The state attorney dropped all previous administrative sanctions after reviewing the evidence of my father’s corruption.”
Dominic reached out, taking her hand into his, his thumb lightly stroking her wrist. “Congratulations, Doctor Hart.”
“Doctor Vale, actually,” Evelyn corrected smoothly, a genuine, radiant smile breaking across her lips. “If the paperwork we signed last week at the courthouse is still valid.”
Dominic let out a low laugh, pulling her hand to his lips and pressing a soft kiss against her knuckles.
After the downfall of the Hart syndicate, Dominic had dissolved the forced marriage contract entirely, granting Evelyn complete financial independence, her father’s legal estate, and her freedom.
And then, three weeks later, he had taken her to a quiet restaurant along the river, sat across from her without guards, without business, and asked her to marry him for real—not as an alliance between two mob families, but as two people who had found light in the darkest corner of their lives.
She had said yes before the dessert arrived.
Noah let out a loud, happy babble, reaching his small, applesauce-covered hand toward Evelyn’s dress.
Dominic reached over quickly to grab a napkin, but Evelyn simply laughed, leaning down and picking the boy up out of his high chair, placing him on her lap without caring about the silk fabric of her dress.
“He’s gained two pounds this month,” Evelyn noted, wiping his face gently with a warm cloth. “His lung capacity is completely restored.”
“Thanks to his mother,” Dominic said softly, watching the two of them together.
Evelyn looked up at Dominic, her dark eyes filled with a deep, unshakeable warmth that had replaced the ice forever.
“You know,” Evelyn said, adjusting Noah on her lap as the child reached for her golden necklace, “when I first came to this house, I thought you were just another ruthless man who only cared about territory and power.”
“And now?” Dominic asked, leaning across the table toward her.
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“Now,” Evelyn murmured, leaning in until her lips were inches from his, “I know you’re just a man who needed a very good doctor to show him what was worth fighting for.”
Dominic leaned forward and kissed her—a long, deep, sweet kiss under the warm afternoon sun, while Noah giggled between them, clutching his mother’s dress, bathed in the safety of a house that was finally, truly home.
