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The first time Marco held a five-carat diamond in his trembling hands, he thought he might drop it. Not because of its value, though the $200,000 price tag certainly made his pulse race, but because Vincent was standing so close behind him, his breath warm against Marco's neck, his cologne mixing with the scent of jewelry polish and possibility.
"Steady," Vincent murmured, his fingers brushing Marco's as he adjusted the loupe. "Feel its weight. A stone this perfect deserves your full attention."
Marco was twenty-three and desperate. Desperate for experience, desperate to prove himself, desperate to escape the suffocating expectations of his traditional Italian family who thought his gemology degree was a waste of time. Vincent Romano's atelier on 47th Street, tucked between the glittering chaos of Manhattan's Diamond District, represented everything Marco wanted: prestige, artistry, and a mentor who saw potential where others saw just another kid with more ambition than experience.
What Marco hadn't counted on was how devastating Vincent would be in person.
The Diamond District's Best-Kept Secret
Vincent Romano was forty-two, silver at his temples, with hands that could coax beauty from raw metal and eyes that could appraise a stone's worth in seconds. He'd built his reputation over twenty years, creating custom pieces for tech moguls, Hollywood royalty, and the kind of old money that arrived in chauffeur-driven Bentleys with tinted windows.
The gay rumor mill whispered about Vincent, the confirmed bachelor who never brought dates to industry events, whose private life remained conspicuously private. Marco had heard the speculation before his interview but tried not to think about it. He needed this apprenticeship too badly to let attraction cloud his judgment.
That lasted approximately three days.
By the end of his first week, Marco was hyperaware of every moment Vincent's hand steadied his while teaching him to set stones, every approving nod when Marco successfully completed a bezel setting, every rare smile that transformed Vincent's usually serious face into something that made Marco's stomach flip.
The work itself was intoxicating. Marco learned to read inclusions under magnification, to understand how light traveled through different cuts, to appreciate the subtle difference between VS1 and VVS2 clarity. But more intoxicating was watching Vincent work, the absolute certainty in his movements, the way he'd lose himself in creation, emerging hours later with something that hadn't existed before.
Luxury, Secrets, and Stolen Glances
Their clients were a parade of wealth and want. There was the hedge fund manager who spent $300,000 on an anniversary band without blinking, arriving in a midnight blue Porsche 911 and leaving his business card with a wink aimed at Vincent. The Russian oligarch's wife who brought her Pomeranian to every appointment and insisted on viewing stones while her bodyguards stood outside. The newly-out tech CEO who commissioned matching rings for himself and his husband, then came back six months later, alone, asking Vincent to buy them back.
"That's the thing about this business," Vincent said quietly, after that last appointment. They were closing up, the winter sun already setting at 4 PM, casting the workshop in amber light. "People think diamonds are about forever. But sometimes they're just about right now. The moment when everything feels possible."
Marco was reorganizing the stone trays, but he stopped, caught by something in Vincent's voice. "Is that cynical?"
"Realistic." Vincent poured them both a scotch, Macallan 18, because everything in Vincent's orbit was quality. "I've been doing this long enough to know that the stone doesn't make the love. The love makes the stone matter."
"Did you ever…?" Marco let the question trail off, but Vincent understood.
"Once." Vincent's smile was rueful. "I was young, stupid, convinced I could make it work even though he wanted me to be someone I wasn't. I designed him a ring. Platinum, three-stone emerald cut. He said yes." Vincent took a long sip. "Then his family found out about us, and suddenly that ring was very easy to return."
The Mentor-Mentee Tightrope
Marco knew he should maintain professional distance. Vincent was his boss, his teacher, fifteen years older, and absolutely off-limits by every metric of workplace appropriateness. But knowing something and feeling it were different animals entirely.
There were moments: brief, electric: when Marco caught Vincent watching him with an expression that wasn't entirely professional. When their fingers lingered too long during a stone transfer. When Vincent insisted on buying Marco dinner after a particularly grueling custom order, and the conversation drifted from shop talk to music, to Marco's terrible coming-out story involving his nonna's rosary beads and a very unfortunate Sunday dinner.
Vincent laughed: really laughed: and for a moment, the careful professional distance dissolved completely.
"My family wanted me to be a dentist," Vincent admitted. "Can you imagine? These hands drilling cavities instead of setting stones?" He flexed his fingers, scarred from years of metalwork. "My father didn't speak to me for three years when I came out. Another two when I opened this place instead of joining his dental practice. He died before we reconciled."
The vulnerability in that admission cracked something open in Marco's chest. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be. I learned that you can't build a life on other people's expectations. You have to forge your own."
Six months into the apprenticeship, a regular client: Jonathan Sterling, heir to a pharmaceutical fortune: came in to commission an engagement ring. He was handsome in that effortless rich-person way, driving a Tesla Model S and wearing a Rolex that cost more than Marco's student loans. He was also obviously, aggressively interested in Marco.
"You're new," Jonathan said, flashing perfect teeth. "I like new."
Vincent's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly, but his voice remained smooth. "Marco is my apprentice. He'll be helping with your design consultation."
What followed was forty-five minutes of Jonathan describing his perfect ring while staring at Marco like he was the stone being appraised. He left his number "for any follow-up questions" with a smile that promised more than technical consultations.
After he left, Vincent was silent, meticulously cleaning tools that didn't need cleaning.
"You should call him," Vincent finally said, not looking up. "He's rich, young, probably fun. Good catch."
Marco stared at him. "Are you serious right now?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"Because: " Marco caught himself, heart hammering. This was dangerous territory. "Because he's a client. It's unprofessional."
"Ah." Vincent set down his polishing cloth with careful precision. "Professional boundaries. Important in our line of work."
The subtext was suffocating.
When the Setting Finally Fits
The breaking point came during Fashion Week. A celebrity stylist commissioned a custom piece: an asymmetrical collar necklace featuring champagne diamonds and black opals. It was ambitious, requiring fourteen-hour days to complete on deadline. Marco and Vincent worked side by side, fueled by espresso and stubborn determination.
At 2 AM on the final night, Marco's hand slipped, and a small opal tumbled toward the concrete floor. Vincent caught it: and Marco's hand: in one smooth motion, then didn't let go.
They stood there, breathing hard, stone clenched between their intertwined fingers.
"I can't do this," Vincent said, but he didn't move away.
"Do what?"
"Pretend I'm not completely unprofessional about you. That I haven't been for months." Vincent's voice was rough. "You're my apprentice. It's wrong on every level."
Marco's heart was going to explode. "What if I'm not? Your apprentice, I mean. What if I finished the program? Got certified?"
"Marco: "
"I'm not a kid, Vincent. I know what I want." Marco tightened his grip on their joined hands. "And it's not Jonathan Sterling or anyone else who looks at me like I'm an acquisition. I want someone who sees me. Who teaches me. Who makes scotch feel like communion and whose hands: " Marco's voice caught. "Your hands are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen create beauty."
Vincent made a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob. "That's the most ridiculous thing anyone's ever said to me."
"Is it working?"
Instead of answering, Vincent kissed him. Soft at first, questioning, then deeper when Marco responded with six months of pent-up wanting. The opal was definitely going to fall this time, but neither of them cared.
When they finally broke apart, Vincent touched Marco's face with those artist's hands. "We're doing this right. You finish your apprenticeship. We keep it professional until then. And if you still want this: want me: in six months, we'll figure it out."
"I'll want you in six months."
"You don't know that."
"I know enough about precision and value to recognize a perfect cut when I see it." Marco grinned. "You taught me that."
Vincent huffed a laugh. "Using my own lessons against me. That's definitely grounds for failing you."
"You wouldn't dare. I'm your best apprentice."
"You're my only apprentice."
"Even better odds."
The Most Precious Stone
Marco did finish his certification. Vincent kept things scrupulously professional for those six months, though the heat in his eyes whenever he watched Marco work said everything his words couldn't.
The day Marco passed his final exam, Vincent closed the shop early. He poured them both scotch and presented Marco with a small velvet box.
Inside was a ring. Not a typical engagement ring: Vincent knew Marco too well for conventional. Instead, it was a band of platinum inlaid with rough, uncut diamond fragments.
"It's not finished," Vincent explained. "I thought you could finish it yourself. Set the stones how you want them. Make it yours."
Marco looked up, throat tight. "Or we could finish it together."
"Yeah?" Vincent's smile was nervous, hopeful, devastating. "You'd want that?"
"Vincent, I've wanted that since approximately week two of my apprenticeship when you explained crown angles and I realized I was completely screwed."
They finished the ring together over the next month: a collaboration, like everything they'd build going forward. Marco learned that love, like jewelry, required patience, precision, and the willingness to reshape yourself without losing what made you valuable.
The ring lived on Marco's finger, reminding him daily that the most precious thing he'd found in the Diamond District wasn't measured in carats.
It was measured in the weight of Vincent's hand in his, the shared language of gemology and trust, and the knowledge that sometimes the perfect setting takes time to create: but when you find it, nothing else shines quite the same way.
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