A/N: Thank you to peanutpup, FleshofMidnight, Dkk5, the Guest, and BabyNake for the reviews on the first chapter of this story, I really appreciate them!

2015

Erik stared out the window of his penthouse suite, but his mind wasn't on the stunning mountain view before his eyes. No, it was Christine who dominated his thoughts, as it always was. For five years, whenever he allowed his mind a rest from focusing on business, it was always her. The only difference was that this same afternoon a long-awaited email had arrived in his inbox, and now it was only a matter of time before he would see her again, at last.

When he had left her behind in Paris, Erik truly had intended never to see her again, never to bother her again, to let her live her life with her boy. And for a while, he had actually thought that it might be possible. Nadir had had a business proposition for him once he arrived in America, and although Erik had only intended to be an investor at first, it turned out he had taken more of an interest in Nadir's undertaking than he could have ever imagined, and his passion for the project had even been able to distract him from his obsession with Christine for a time, although it had certainly never gone away entirely.

Nadir had convinced him to partner with him to buy a small chain of casinos whose ownership had gone bankrupt, certain that with correct management the establishments could turn a profit. Erik hadn't particularly cared one way or the other, but the other man had been a good friend to him, and Erik had decided he might as well do something with the large amount of money he had inherited.

However, Erik had found himself taking an interest in Nadir's plans for the casinos, probably due to boredom more than anything else. As it turned out, he had a knack for anticipating what would attract patrons and actually allow them to turn a profit, and as time went on, he had started dreaming about what he would do if he built his own casino, exactly the way he wanted it, rather than working within the parameters of an already established location.

When he had confessed that dream to Nadir, Erik had been shaken at the man's faith in him - his friend had immediately supported the project, and due to their outstanding success with the properties they had bought for such a relatively low amount, it wasn't long before they were pursuing building their own casino from the ground up.

It had been Nadir's idea to build it in Black Hawk, and while Erik had protested at first, thinking his luxurious business needed to be located in a large city, when he had seen the facts that his partner presented him with, Erik had had to admit that Nadir was on to something by choosing this small mountain town. After that, however, Nadir had conceded to him on almost everything, trusting in Erik's vision for the property.

Now he was standing in his home in that very building. Phantasma was everything he had envisioned it to be, and possibly even more. But even as he saw his every dream of this place take shape, he had always been haunted by the specter of Christine - of what he had had for that one brief night, of what he would never have again.

Once the casino had been completed and open for business, he had again found some distraction in the newness of it all, in the rush of seeing this dream he never would have anticipated for his life become a reality. But now that things had settled down, there was more and more time for Christine to intrude into his thoughts. During the day, it wasn't so bad - there was Phantasma to continue to mold into its full potential, and their other properties to manage. But at night, when Nadir went home to Rookheeya and Reza, waiting for him in the home he had built for them, it was then when she invaded Erik's thoughts the most.

Finally, he had admitted to himself what it was that had changed his mind when he had initially disagreed with Nadir on choosing Colorado to build Phantasma in. When doing some cursory research on Black Hawk, Erik had of course read about the former mining town that adjoined it, and much to his surprise, he had learned that Central City had a historic opera house that had been fully restored and reopened over eighty years ago and was renowned for putting on world-class productions in the summer.

He had told himself that of course he would be intrigued by the opportunity to be so close to operas being performed in such a unique setting, but he knew in the back of his mind there was more to it. Although he had vowed to leave Christine alone, Erik still followed the world of opera, and there was no missing the fact that she had fully obtained the stardom she had been well on her way to achieving when she was still his student. When she had left Paris to move to New York over a year ago it had been well-publicized within the opera community, and it turned out that having her in the same country once more was too great a lure for him to resist, no matter how many miles actually separated them.

Naturally, Erik had immediately become a generous supporter and patron of the Central City Opera as soon as he committed to building his business in Black Hawk, so it hadn't seemed too out of place when he offered to sponsor the expense of getting the soprano that was on the dream list of most of the members of the board to perform in the upcoming summer festival.

When the first offer to her representation had been rejected, Erik had had the Opera counter with an amount he felt certain she couldn't refuse - and, as usual in matters of business, he had been right. In just a short amount of time, Christine Daaé would be arriving to get acclimated before performing a special gala concert at the Opera, and then settling into rehearsals for the festival.

However, Erik still intended to keep part of the promise he had made to himself five long years ago. Although he had manipulated her once again, this time into coming to Colorado to sing, he had no intentions of interacting with her in any way. Christine would arrive, perform throughout the summer, and then return to New York without ever laying eyes on him. She would never know he was there, or involved with her engagement with the Opera in any way.

Erik felt certain he would be able to avoid her entirely. The members of the Opera board knew he was reclusive and odd; they wouldn't find it that strange that he had no desire to meet the performer he had sponsored. And no good could come out of him meeting Christine again, certainly - if she knew he was there at all, she was likely to become angry and leave, and that would defeat the entire purpose he had had in bringing her here in the first place.

No, just being able to hear her sing again would be enough. It would have to be. He would figure out how to live without her and her voice in his life once again when the summer was over.

xxxxx

Christine Daaé stared out the window of the plane that was taking her to Colorado for the summer, her son sleeping peacefully in the seat between her and her beloved foster mother, a woman who never ceased to amaze Christine. Not only had Adelaide Valérius left the only country she had ever lived in to move with Christine and Gustave to New York City a year ago, now the woman was accompanying them halfway across this huge new country that they all resided in currently.

Making the move from Paris had been a risk, but it had proven to be a good decision for her career. Although if she was honest with herself, the move hadn't been only career-motivated. The money she had been offered to perform with the Metropolitan Opera had been very good, that was true, and while things were going all right for them financially, Christine wasn't in a position to turn an offer like that down, even if she had wanted to.

But the truth of the matter was, she hadn't wanted to. In fact, Christine had leapt at the chance to escape Paris; the city she had once loved had become a place where everything reminded her of the love she had lost before ever really experiencing it. Erik's memory haunted her to varying degrees no matter what she did or where she went - there were times when the loss of him from her life burned more painfully than others, but it was always there, a specter haunting her while she found greater success on the opera stage, and, more importantly, gave birth to and raised her son, alone except for the wonderful woman who had always treated Christine like her own daughter.

She still thought of Erik often, and had accepted that perhaps she always would - she had a permanent, much-loved reminder of him sitting right next to her, after all. But one benefit of moving to another continent was that she no longer looked for him in every crowd, no longer subconsciously hoped that he would show up at her door with an explanation for why he had left her - even though she had come to accept that there was most likely only one reason to explain the fact that she had never heard from Erik again.

Turning her attention back to her sleeping son, Christine gently smoothed a hand over Gustave's soft brown hair. When the offer to perform in Colorado had first come in, she had told her agent to turn it down without giving the matter much thought, thinking that the engagement was too long and too far away from their new home in New York. However, the second offer she had received had been too generous to disregard, and she had taken advantage of the opportunity to make a substantial amount of money over the summer.

Once she had accepted the offer and started to learn more about the place that would be their temporary home for the summer, though, Christine had actually become much more excited about the engagement. She was eager to see the historic theater she would be performing in, as well as to see the Rocky Mountains in person. And she felt that spending the summer in such a different environment from what he was used to would be good for Gustave.

In fact, as the plane started its descent into Denver and Christine checked to make sure her son was comfortable, she realized that she felt more optimistic than she had in a long time. She couldn't say why, but she had a sense that this summer in the mountains was going to be a good thing for all of them.

A/N: Thank you for reading! Please feel free to leave a review, I always enjoy seeing what people are thinking :)