Billionaire Sat Beside Her at a Funeral, Not Expecting Their Shared Silence Would Start a Love Story
The Gift and the Hidden Truth
They walked to a small cafe across from campus, the autumn air crisp between them. Once seated with steaming cups before them, Xander seemed to be carefully choosing his words.
“Eleanor left something for you in her will,” he finally said.
Arya nearly spilled her coffee.
“For me? But I’m not family.”
“Neither am I, technically. But Eleanor considered us both important.”
He reached into his suit jacket and produced a sealed envelope.
“This is from her attorney. There will be a formal reading of the will next week, but he thought you might want some time to consider this particular bequest beforehand.”
Ariel accepted the envelope with trembling hands.
“I don’t understand. Why would you be the one to deliver this?”
Xander’s expression was unreadable.
“I’m the executive of her estate.”
“But how did you know her?”
The question had been burning in her mind since the funeral. He took a careful sip of his coffee before answering.
“She was my father’s college professor decades ago. When he died, she reached out to me. I was just an angry teenager then.”
“She became a mentor to me as well. She helped me navigate some difficult years.”
Arya opened the envelope, scanning the formal legal language until she reached the part that made her heart stop.
“This can’t be right.”
“It’s right,” Xander confirmed.
“She’s leaving you her cottage in Maine, along with the rare book collection inside it.”
“But that’s—that must be worth several million.”
“Yes. Elena was quite the collector.”
Ariel set the letter down, feeling lightheaded.
“I can’t accept this. It should go to her family.”
“You were her family in all the ways that mattered to her.”
His gray eyes held hers.
“Just as I was.”
They sat in silence for a long moment, the weight of Eleanor’s final gift settling between them. Finally, Arya spoke again.
“What did she leave you?”
A shadow passed over his face.
“Her shares in Valentine Industries.”
The pieces suddenly clicked into place: the expensive suit, the driver, and the sense of authority that seemed to surround him.
“Valentine Industries? You’re that Valentine? The tech billionaire?”
He grimaced slightly.
“I prefer Xander. Especially from people who knew Eleanor.”
“I had no idea she had connections to your company.”
“She was one of our earliest investors. My father met her at Princeton. When he started the company, she believed in him enough to invest a significant portion of her inheritance.”
His fingers tapped against the ceramic mug.
“When he died, she stepped in as a silent partner, guiding me until I was ready to take over.”
Ariel was struggling to reconcile this new information with the literature professor she had known.
“She never said a word about any of this.”
“Eleanor compartmentalized her life. I think it helped her maintain perspective.”
He leaned forward slightly.
“Which brings me to the second reason I wanted to meet with you.”
“There’s more?”
“The cottage in Maine. It needs a proper caretaker, someone who understands the value of what’s inside it.”
“I’m hoping you’ll consider actually living there, at least part of the time, rather than selling it.”
Arya’s mind raced with possibilities. The idea of living surrounded by rare books in a coastal Maine cottage was almost too perfect to imagine.
“I’d have to leave my job here.”
“Actually, I’ve been discussing an arrangement with the university. They’re quite interested in having access to Eleanor’s collection for research purposes.”
“You could maintain your position as curator, just with a different collection.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“You’ve been planning this. Laying groundwork.”
“The decision is entirely yours,” he corrected.
As they left the cafe, Arya was deep in thought. Xander walked beside her in companionable silence, matching his long stride to hers.
“Would you like to see the cottage?” he asked suddenly.
“I’m flying up there tomorrow to check on some things. You could come along, get a feel for the place before making any decisions.”
The sensible part of Ariel knew she should decline. She barely knew this man, billionaire or not.
But something about the way grief had connected them at the funeral, and the shared understanding of what Eleanor had meant to them both, made her nod.
“Yes. I think I would.”
The following morning found Arya boarding Xander’s private jet. She felt wildly out of place with her worn leather satchel and practical clothes.
Xander, however, seemed perfectly at ease in jeans and a cashmere sweater. His usual formal attire was abandoned for the trip.
“I come up here whenever I need to think,” he explained as they flew over the New England coastline.
“Elena used to joke that she kept the cottage as a billionaire rehab center: a place to remember what’s actually important.”
The cottage turned out to be a deceptively simple-looking structure perched on a cliff overlooking the Atlantic.
Inside, however, it expanded into a carefully designed space where nearly every wall housed floor-to-ceiling bookshelves.
Arya moved through the rooms in quiet awe. Occasionally, she pulled volumes from shelves with reverent hands.
“This first edition Austen! I’ve only seen photos of it.”
Xander watched her from the doorway, something softening in his expression.
“This is why she chose you. The way you look at those books—it’s exactly how she used to look at them.”
