AllFreeNovel
Share Us
And how he loved her.
He’d long admitted to himself that the all-consuming feeling that had blossomed into life from their first meeting and had only intensified as he’d gotten to know her, was love.
No. Far more than love. He now fully knew what his brothers, Antonio, Rafael, Raiden and Numair, even Richard, felt for their soul mates. This absolute admiration and allegiance, this endless desire and devotion. And he wanted with her what they had with them.
Union, children, permanence. Everything.
But that also meant being in extreme proximity with his own family, since they were a close and constant part of her life.
In her efforts to convince him that going back home, reentering her family’s life wouldn’t impact him or their relationship, she’d as good as pledged he didn’t have to see any of them. But he knew this was impossible. How could he make her live in this abnormal state, torn between him and those who’d raised her? How could he force her to split herself in two, part for him and part for them, keeping the two halves separate, with her contentment lost in the middle?
He couldn’t. He’d taken her away knowing it was best for her. He shouldn’t have pressured her to remain in isolation with him the moment he’d realized it was no longer the case.
And now she was here. Back among the only people in the world he couldn’t bear being around. The ones he had to abide if he wanted to be with her again.
Suddenly, the talons that had sunk in his heart retracted, letting him breathe. Because something was becoming clear.
Right now his agony was only over the idea of separation from her. None of his misery in these past hours had been about the aversion that had ruled his life since he was twelve. None of it had anything at all to do with his family.
Even if the dread of being around them wasn’t gone, it was nothing compared to the unimaginable desolation of being without Anastasia. The idea of putting up with their presence in his life for as long as they lived, of even developing a relationship with them for her sake, wasn’t abhorrent anymore. It even bordered on being welcome. As long as it made her whole and serene, as long as it afforded him the miracle of her presence in his life.
He had no idea if she even loved him a fraction of how he loved her. But that, too, didn’t matter. Whatever she felt for him now was more than enough.
For a second chance with her, this time for life, he was willing, eager, happy, to put up with anything.
He couldn’t believe he hadn’t figured this out before.
Starting the car, he put it in reverse and backed up into her parents’ driveway, in the exact same place he’d parked that first day he’d asked her to go with him.
This time, he would ask her to be with him. Forever.
* * *
Within ten minutes of being with her parents, Anastasia had expended all the hugs and kisses and the delight of seeing them again. Now an awkward silence descended on them. She really had nothing to say to them.
It wasn’t only Alex’s loss that gaped between them like a black hole that would forever suck any real brightness out of their relationship. They truly had nothing new to say to each other. They’d been talking regularly while she’d been in Russia, with her keeping them updated about her health while they’d kept her up-to-date with the incidents of their own uneventful lives, and the more bumpy adjustments of Cathy’s and the kids’. She knew her mother and father had always itched to learn the details of her situation with Ivan—what she’d adamantly refused to discuss.
Now there was nothing to discuss anymore.
Ivan had succumbed to her desire to return home, had been immovable about delivering her here himself. As he had that time when he’d gotten her and Alex home. It had been almost as horrible as those dark days, sitting onboard his jet with him, knowing that the hours had been counting down to separation from him once again. This time for what looked like a final time.
Suddenly, it all hit her.
This could actually be the end.
And there was absolutely no way she could let it be that.
She heaved up to her feet so suddenly she made her parents exclaim in alarm. Excusing herself, she told them she had to do something urgently and would be in touch as soon as she could. Then she ran out of the room with them gaping after her.
She couldn’t let Ivan go. She wouldn’t. Not this time.
In the past, in Russia, she hadn’t fought for him, for them. This time she would. Until her last breath, if need be.
Getting her phone out, she dialed his number as she ran to the door. And the phone rang. Not her phone. A phone on the other side of the door. For a second it didn’t make sense.
Then she snatched the door open.
He was there, one hand poised on the doorbell, the other reaching for the phone still ringing in his pocket.
