Contract Marriage: The President's Stand-in Lover - Chapter 29:

The Silent Year

Time slipped by quietly.

Winter in Paris had come and gone. Spring returned.

Along the Seine, the trees unfurled new leaves. The flower markets bloomed with color again,

filling the streets with life.

Lin Vianne had moved into a smaller apartment.

Her work had grown steady, her French fluent, her days calm and simple.

To anyone watching, her life looked peaceful, almost complete.

Only at night, when the city hushed and the lights dimmed,

would she sometimes hear a faint echo from her heart a deep,

gentle voice that carried a name she could not forget.

Gu Chen.

For a whole year, he had not appeared in her life.

Occasionally, she received official documents from his company back in

Country C—cold, professional emails that bore no trace of emotion.

Sometimes, she saw his name in business reports: Gu Chen, CEO of Gu Group,

leading another wave of international success, dominating the Asia–Europe market.

In those photos, he was the same elegant, controlled, untouchable.

Yet his eyes seemed colder now, and emptier.

She had once believed he would come for her again.

But he never did.

He had truly learned to let her go.

Sometimes, she would sit for hours in a café, watching the light shift across

the cobblestone streets, thinking to herself.

To have loved someone deeply, the hardest part isn’t saying goodbye.

It’s learning how to live without them.

Meanwhile, far away in C City, Gu Chen endured a winter that felt endlessly long.

The meetings continued, projects stacked one after another, his schedule never loosening its grip.

He buried himself in work, and no one dared to mention her name.

But when night came, he would always open a draft email that had never been sent.

Vianne,

I don’t know what I am to you anymore, or what right I have to write this.

Maybe I just want you to know that I’m still here still loving you.

I haven’t gone to find you, because I’m afraid.

Afraid you’ll smile and tell me you no longer need me.

Halfway through, he deleted the message.

A faint smile tugged at his lips, one of quiet defeat.

Closing the laptop, he whispered to the night beyond the window,

She deserves a version of me who never makes her cry again.

A year later, spring brought him back to Paris.

This time, there was no press, no business meetings, no contracts to sign.

He had come only to see the city she loved.

At a small art gallery tucked at the corner of Rue de Rivoli,

he stopped before a painting titled

Rebirth.

A woman stood by the Seine, her back to the viewer, the wind lifting

her hair as her figure melted softly into the light.

In the corner, the signature read: L. Wei-An.

His chest tightened. For a moment, he could not breathe.

The gallery owner, an elderly man with paint on his fingers, noticed his gaze and smiled.

She’s an exceptionally talented artist from the East, he said. Started painting only last year.

There’s a quiet sadness in her work, like she’s lived through a very long hurt.

Gu Chen listened silently, his fingertips trembling.

Where is she now, he asked softly.

The owner replied, She’ll be here this afternoon to prepare for her new exhibit.

By evening, the doorbell chimed softly.

Lin Vianne stepped inside, carrying rolled canvases in her arms.

A faint smile played on her lips.

She wore a white blouse and a pale gray skirt, her presence serene

like the woman in the painting who had finally learned to make peace with herself.

When she looked up and saw the man standing before her painting,

time seemed to hold its breath.

Gu Chen turned toward her, his gaze gentle, almost cautious.

Your painting is beautiful, he said.

Vianne stood still for a moment, then replied softly, It’s been a long time, Mr. Gu.

He smiled, and in that small curve of his lips lived a thousand unspoken emotions.

Yes, a long time.

Their eyes met, and in that silent exchange lived everything they had once said,

and everything they never would again.

In that moment, the distance between them was no longer the miles between Paris and C City—

but the journey between loss and rebirth.

Night fell. The lamps along the Seine flickered to life, one by one.

She said quietly, My life is good now.

He nodded. I know.

And you, she asked.

He paused, his voice barely above a whisper. I’ve been learning to let go.

But I’ve realized that letting you go is harder than living my whole life over again.

Her eyes trembled.

The wind swept through the open window, tossing her hair across her face.

He almost reached out to tuck it behind her ear but stopped himself.

This time, he did not cross the line.

He only looked at her, as if watching a dream he once lived in and could never return to.

Maybe one day, she said softly, I’ll paint another piece.

I’ll call it Goodbye.

He smiled faintly. When that day comes, I hope I’ll be the one who gets to buy it.

Outside, the cobblestones still glistened from a passing rain.

They stood side by side, saying nothing.

The silence of the year between them unfolded into quiet forgiveness.

Not reunion, not farewell but something gentler.

The kind of peace that comes when two people finall

learn how to be free inside love.