Marry Ex's Billionaire Uncle After Divorce (Aurora and Jasper) novel Chapter 253

(Aurora’s POV)

“Yes.” I smiled. “You two go ahead, I’ll wait here.”

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I stood there until they were through the door and out of sight. Then I walked quickly to the car, pulled the

door open, and dropped into the passenger seat.

Phineas glanced at me. “That was an interesting performance.”

“Don’t start.”

“You looked like you were smuggling something.”

“I said don’t start.” I pulled my seatbelt across. “Can we just go?”

He started the car. I caught the edge of his expression in the side mirror – something quiet and satisfied

that he wasn’t quite hiding. He said nothing else, which was almost worse.

We drove for about twenty minutes before I realized we weren’t heading home.

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

The car stopped in front of a stone castle estate set back from the road, the kind of place that looked like

it had been standing for three hundred years and intended to stand for three hundred more. Phineas got

out and I followed him through the main entrance into a long corridor lined with white hydrangeas and trailing greenery, soft pink carpet running the full length of the floor.

“The venue?” I asked.

“I wanted your opinion on the lighting.”

He walked to a panel near the far wall and adjusted something. The ceiling transformed. One moment it was stone and plaster, and then it was a deep, moving blue – a full dome of stars, slow and scattered, like

being outside on a clear night far from any city.

I stopped walking.

I didn’t say anything for a moment. I couldn’t.

About two weeks ago, we’d been talking about nothing in particular – the kind of conversation that happens when two people are waiting for dinner and have already covered everything important. I’d mentioned that blue was my favorite color. One sentence. I hadn’t thought about it since.

He had remembered. Not just remembered – he’d built it into the ceiling.

The light moved slowly across his profile, and I felt my pulse do something I didn’t authorize it to do. My ears went warm. I looked at the ceiling instead of at him.

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Chapter 218 A Card Not Yet Played

Then, without any warning, the voices from the office came back.

*She turned him down flat.*

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I breathed in slowly. Phineas was thorough. He was careful with details. That was who he was- he ran a global company on precision and follow–through. Remembering a color preference and incorporating it into a venue wasn’t sentiment. It was just the way he operated.

I exhaled. The warmth faded.

“It’s beautiful,” I said. My voice came out steady. “I think it’ll work very well.”

He was quiet for a moment.

I didn’t look at him directly, but I felt him watching me. The silence stretched just long enough to become

noticeable.

“Good,” he said finally. “Then we’re done here.”

(Author’s POV)

The drive back was quiet in a way that had weight to it. The driver kept his eyes on the road and said nothing. Phineas sat with one hand on the armrest, looking out the window. Aurora looked at her phone.

Phineas was running back through the evening in his head, trying to locate the exact moment when her expression had closed. She’d been genuinely moved – he’d seen it, that brief unguarded second before something shifted and she pulled herself back behind glass. He couldn’t tell if he’d done something wrong or if she’d simply decided not to let herself react.

He thought, not for the first time, about Jasper.

Then Aurora’s phone rang.

She looked at the screen. “It’s Olivia.” She answered. “Hey – what’s wrong?”

Whatever Olivia said made Aurora sit up straight.

“We’re on our way,” Aurora said, and hung up. She turned to Phineas. “Redmond house. Now.”

He told the driver without asking for details.

They heard the situation before they fully understood it. Olivia’s voice carried through the front hallway as they came through the door – sharp and embarrassed and furious all at once.

The living room tableau was not what either of them expected.

Gavin Sterling sat on the sofa across from Grandpa Redmond, jacket still on, posture relaxed, looking precisely like a man who had already won an argument and was simply waiting for the other party to accept it. Olivia stood to the side, arms crossed, cheeks flushed.

“They had drinks, things happened, and now he’s here telling my grandfather he’s going to marry me,” Olivia said, the moment she saw Aurora. “I am not marrying him. Grandpa, do not listen to a word he says.”

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Chapter 218 A Card Not Yet Played

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Grandpa Redmond looked between them with the expression of a man who had already made up his

mind.

Gavin reached up and loosened his collar slightly, revealing the faint edge of a mark on his neck. “I’m

being straightforward,” he said, calm and unhurried. “Something happened. I take that seriously. This is the

logical next step.”

Aurora looked at Phineas.

Phineas looked at the ceiling.

“You said he was your friend,” Aurora said quietly.

“I said I knew him,” Phineas said, with great neutrality. “We’re not close.”

“Aurora.” Olivia grabbed her arm. “Tell him to leave. And take Phineas with you while you’re at it.”

Gavin smiled. It was the smile of someone holding a card he hadn’t played yet.

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Chapter 219 On Me