When he reached Lucina, standing out on the stone landing, he gave her a set of color-coded house keys: green, red, and gold.

He told her, “The green opens the door from the garage, the gold opens the doors to the house from the outside, and the red is for a secret door inside. You may even want to put that somewhere else.”

Lucina remained speechless. She took a deep breath with the keys in her hands and turned to face him. She said, “Ivan…what are you…what are you trying to say?”

She could barely get her words out. And it wasn’t just the house, the view, or the proposition, it was being able to share it all with him. Lucina had been so used to selfish men who built storages of wealth around her, or others who attempted to seduce her with preexisting wealth she had not earned, that Ivan’s surprise was overwhelming for her. She actually felt that she deserved it this time. And more than that, she genuinely loved Ivan. She loved his fairness, his determination, his vision, and his courage. She even admired his stubbornness. She just didn’t know how she could ever bring herself to accept a relationship with him outside of business. So she had fought off the idea, while maintaining enough proximity to him to continue to monitor his progress. She had played the same game that he had played—watch and wait.

Ivan took a deep breath of his own. He told her, “I want us to be partners again. Lately we’ve been more like…associates.” He said, “But all of this right here…this is yours now. I can’t see myself sharing it with anyone else. You’re the one who sparked a lot of my ideas and forced me to make ’em work.”

Lucina just stared at him as if he were a statue that had hypnotized her. She still had no words to respond to him with. She needed to hear more to confirm that it was all real.

Ivan asked her, “You don’t have anything to say?”

She didn’t. She looked away in silence, still taking it all in.

Ivan read her silence as confusion and hesitancy. He wasn’t used to Lucina not being able to respond to him. So he continued to pitch her.

He said, “I’ve had this place empty for weeks now, just waiting for you to get the time to come over here and see it. But just with you standing here, with no furniture or nothing, it’s like…your presence fills the place up alone. You know what I mean? Just having you here to share it with me is like…everything. And I want you to live here. Move in. Decorate it. The whole house. Any way you want to. And I’ll just watch you. This is your house,” he repeated.