Marry Ex's Billionaire Uncle After Divorce (Aurora and Jasper) novel Chapter 225

Chapter 190: The Alps

(Author’s POV)

At the Everett estate, Phineas was still in his study when his phone rang.

His man on the ground kept the report brief: Neil Dawson had been spotted in the city earlier that day. Brief appearance, no contact with anyone they could identify. Last confirmed sighting was at the airport.

Phineas set his pen down.

“Find him,” he said. “I don’t care how long it takes. I don’t care what condition he’s in when you do.”

He ended the call and sat back in his chair. The old account with Neil had never been settled. He hadn’t

forgotten. He never forgot.

(Aurora’s POV)

I was up early.

I stood in front of the mirror for longer than usual, pinning my hair back, checking the line of my coat.

Today was the wedding photos. I’d been trying not to make it into a bigger thing than it was, but I’d still

spent twenty minutes on my makeup, which said enough.

Phineas was waiting at the car. He looked at me once when I came down the steps, said nothing, and

opened the door.

The drive to the airfield was quiet. I assumed we were heading somewhere in the city – a studio, maybe a

park. I was already composing a list of polite things to say to the photographer.

Then we pulled up to a private jet.

I stopped walking.

“Where exactly are we going?” I asked.

Phineas was already boarding. He glanced back at me over his shoulder. “The Alps.”

I stared at him. “The Alps.”

“Switzerland, specifically.” He said it the way other people said *the grocery store.* “Are you coming?”

I followed him up the steps, mostly because I didn’t know what else to do.

We were in the air for just under two hours. Phineas worked through most of it, tablet open, reading something I couldn’t see. I looked out the window and tried to figure out when exactly my life had started including sentences like *we’re flying to Switzerland for photos.*

About forty minutes before we landed, I finally asked.

“Why the Alps?”

<Chapter 190. The Alps

He didn’t look up immediately. Then he set the tablet down and looked at me with that particular expression of his the one that gave nothing away.

Claim

“You posted something,” he said. “About a year ago. On your social media. You said the one photo you’d always wanted was a shot at golden hour in the snow. Mountains behind you.”

I opened my mouth. Closed it.

“You remembered that,” I said.

“I remember most things.”

I turned back to the window. My reflection looked faintly stunned.

The andscape below us was white and vast and impossibly still.

We landed at a small private airfield and drove up into the mountains. When I stepped out of the car, the

cold hit me immediately – clean and sharp – and I stood there for a moment just looking at it. The peaks

were enormous. The snow caught the winter light and held it, golden and soft.

I changed into the dress in a small heated trailer they’d set up near the shoot location. When I stepped out,

Phineas was already there in a dark suit, standing with his back to me, looking out at the range.

He turned when he heard me.

He didn’t say anything. He just walked over and held out his hand.

I took it.

The photographer started shooting almost immediately. For the first few minutes I felt stiff,

self–conscious, aware of the camera and the cold and the fact that this whole thing was built on a

contract. But Phineas kept his hand in mine, and he kept leaning in to say things – quiet, low, half under his

breath – and every time I started to relax, I’d catch the way he was looking at me and lose it again.

I was aware, at one point, that my face was warm despite the cold.

We shot for a full hour. The photographer was practically bouncing by the end of it, pulling up the preview

screen and showing us frame after frame.

“These are incredible,” she kept saying. “Every single one. You two are ridiculous.”

I was still looking at one of the images – the two of us against the snow, his head bent slightly toward mine

– when Phineas came up behind me and draped a heavy coat over my shoulders.

“Don’t change,” he said.

I looked up at him. “What?”

“Leave the dress on. We’re going to an island this afternoon.”

I stared at him. “An island.”

“A private one.” He said it with the same casual certainty as he’d said *Switzerland. “Different light.

<Chapter 190. The Alps

Claim

Different backdrop.” The corner of his mouth moved. “I should have mentioned – we’re shooting all four

seasons today.”

I looked at him.

He looked back at me, and there was something in his eyes – a quiet, deliberate amusement – that made it

very clear he’d planned this from the start and had simply chosen not to tell me.

I had nothing to say to that.

I pulled the coat tighter around my shoulders and walked back toward the plane.

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