“You plan on taking her away?” he growled, cutting me off.
“What? No. It would be a visit.”
But I could tell Lykos stopped listening to reason and my words.
“Did you tell her anything? Did you tell anyone?”
“No.” My voice pitched in volume, anger bubbling inside me. “Noon both counts. And I would never tell her such big news without you, Lykos.”
He studied me as if to assess whether I was telling the truth, letting the silence stretch.
I squared my shoulders. “I won’t ever take Aria away from you, but I’m hoping we can find some kind of arrangement where she can be part of both worlds: yours and mine.”
“No.”
“What do you meanno?” I asked, agitation creeping up my spine.
“She’s ours, and we will raise her together.” His hands came to my hips and he lifted me up, setting me on his lap. “Together. Here,” he added. “No shared custody, no blended family agreements.” His hand came to the back of my head and he tugged me closer. “We go all in,” he murmured. “You want totravel, we all fucking travel. Don’t think for a minute that I’d give up my daughter, Violet.”
Before I could protest or argue further, his lips covered mine.
A shiver trailed down my spine as he kissed me deeply. Our souls merged into one, and although I knew there were things to discuss, I gave in to the desire and let him carry me into the bedroom where we spent the next hour saying everything without ever uttering a word.
FORTY
VIOLET
Lykos’s kiss turned my brain and my insides into a pile of mush, and then he stopped. He just stopped, he took a step back watching me with his eyes filled with darkness that seemed to wrap around my soul.
Then he turned around and left… No explanation, no words… He just left.
The house fell quiet and I relished in the moment of it. I headed to the french doors that led to the balcony and opened them.
I wrapped one of Lykos’s shirts around myself and stepped outside barefoot, inhaling the salty air deeply as I took a seat. I put my new cell phone down at the little coffee table and soaked in the view stretching in front of me. The noon sun spilled across the balcony, painting the city of Athens and sea beyond it in molten gold, but the beauty of it all left me unmoved.
All I could think about was my daughter, Dimitros, and Lykos. The family I didn’t expect to love so much.
Yes, I’d loved my daughter for years, but this… it was so much more. I loved the idea of family with Aria, Dimitros, andLykos, but I also recognized that it wasn’t as simple as just deciding to stay and be a family.
For years, I buried fear from my father and grief of losing Aria so deep inside myself that I convinced myself I survived it. I built a career, became respected, untouchable in some circles, dependable in others.
I wastheDr. Violet Freud, the therapist trusted with the darkest secrets of powerful men.
And giving it all up terrified me.
What if I made this family my entire world and then they decided I wasn’t good enough for them?
My throat tightened painfully.
Or if Aria hated me once she learned I was her real mother.
Every instinct inside me screamed to seek her out, pull her into my arms and confess everything. I wanted to shout to the world:I’m your mother, Aria. There wasn’t a day that passed that I didn’t think about you. I never stopped loving you.
But I was also scared that once Aria learned the truth about her real mother, it might change things between us. In fact, it terrified me and maintaining my life and career was my safety net.
I had a life in Boston. Sort of. I had my patients. My office. My grandfather’s legacy. Friends. Everything I’d built. I couldn’t simply erase myself and become only this version of Violet. The woman hidden away in Greece with a man powerful enough to bend governments.
The problem was that I couldn’t maintain that safety net of my life back in the States and be close to Aria. Hence, wanting to introduce her to my life back in the States.
