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CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THINGSWERENOTeasy after that. Constantine was taking great pains to avoid her, after all of his proclamations about her being his. After... After everything.
He certainly wasn’t acting as if she was his. Rather he was behaving like she was on the private island by herself.
And she had said that she didn’t need anything from him, but she was very afraid that she actually did.
She wanted him to love her. Was that so bad?
And that was the problem. What she wanted was to be patient. What she wanted was to give him time.
But she also wanted the feeling of having her love returned, because she had felt so... Dry and lonely for all of her life, and even knowing her mother loved her it... It hadn’t been expressed in a way that she could understand it, and so she had often felt like... Like it wasn’t there. When she looked at Constantine, she could not imagine what he was thinking.
She was brooding in her room, upset that Constantine had been avoiding her for the better part of the day.
When she heard a door, she went to it. Expecting that it would be Constantine, because who else would it be? She was shocked to discover that it was not Constantine, but a woman.
“Hello, miss,” she said. “I am Cristela. I am part of the household staff in Athens. I’ve been sent here to help care for you.”
“What?”
“Mr. Kamaras has gone back home.”
“He didn’t.”
“He did. He assures you that there is a phone waiting for you in what he was using as his office.”
She ran straight upstairs to that office, and she looked in the phone to see if he had left his number. He had. She called him in absolute fury.
“Constantine,” she said. “What is it you’ve done?”
“I’m leaving you on the island, where you are safe,” he said. “But I... It was time for me to return back to work.”
“You left me here.”
“Yes.”
“You’re keeping me prisoner,” she said.
“I am not. I’m making sure that you’re safe. It is the only place on earth that I can make sure nothing will happen to you. And as the news of our relationship gets out...”
“This is... This is a lie. You were perfectly happy to be here with me until I told you that I loved you. And you left me. I think we both know it has more to do with that than it has to do with—”
“Are you calling me a coward?”
“Yes,” she said. “I am. I’m calling you a coward because you deserve to be known as one. Because how dare you? How dare you leave me here?”
“You will be provided for. You will have everything that you could possibly want. And you have no reason to be upset.”
“I have every reason to be upset,” she said. “You have marooned me.”
“On a private island with a beautiful house and a full staff. There is a doctor as well.”
“Everything I could possibly want except the man that I love. You know that I... You had to know this would hurt me.”
“The last thing I want to do is hurt you. I am protecting you.”
“From yourself? Is this about your sister? Because I don’t understand. You were a child, and you were kidnapped by very bad men. I can understand you being angry at your parents for not coming for you in time. Angry at your grandfather. I cannot understand you being angry at yourself for crying. You were a boy. A child.”
