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‘Looking for thatgnocchirecipe,’ Lykos answered, eyes still glued to the screen. ‘Since you clearly turned into a domestic goddess—’
Theron reached for the nearest thing, which happened to be a rather creased newspaper, and threw it at him.
Lykos caught it without looking up, a smirk across his lips.
As they made their way through the city at night, the faint glow of Lykos’s screen illuminating the back of the car, Theron spared a brief thought for what Lykos had been doing all these years. Because of his job, Theron had access to as much information on people as he’d ever want. But he’d never looked Lykos up.
‘Okay, fine,’ his old friend said, putting away his phone just as they pulled to a stop. ‘Right, I’ve got it. Maps, secret passageways, hidden jewels, treasure hunt. Blah, blah, blah.’
‘I’m beginning to think you’re more interested in me and Summer.’
‘No idea what you’re talking about,’ Lykos hotly denied. ‘My only interest is in whether I can get my hands on that castle or not.’
‘It’s anestate,’ Theron growled, getting out of the car and staring up at the building it had pulled up in front of. He frowned. He had expected to find Lykos staying in some sleek and impossibly expensive penthouse. And while this definitely ticked the impossibly expensive box, the Regency terrace in a tree-lined road in the heart of Knightsbridge was altogether somethingother. He looked from the house to Lykos and back to the house again as his old friend passed through the wrought iron gate, pressed his thumb against an electronic keypad and pushed open the front door.
‘But itwasthe necklace from Duratra, right?’ Lykos asked, not bothering to look back as he stalked into the living area, tossed his suit jacket on a chair and went straight to a drinks cabinet to pour himself a whisky. Belatedly, he turned, gesturing to Theron, who nodded and accepted the glass Lykos then gave him.
‘Yes, it was the necklace.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
Three days ago...
THERONPACEDTHEtiled floor of the kitchen.
That kiss.
It had been just like the one on the beach in Piraeus. It had knocked him off his feet and made him lose his mind. Only it hadn’t been enough. Not nearly enough. He knewexactlywhat would have happened if they hadn’t been interrupted. His body did too and was still clamouring for it. Needy for it.
He shook his head in swift denial of his thoughts and his body. He needed to get a grip and put it to the back of his mind. Summer and her sisters had been searching for the jewels non-stop for nearly two whole months. Dancing to the tune of some now dead relative in order to save their mother. She now had within her grasp the ability to help save her mother’s life.
What would he have done for such a chance?
Anything.The answer was swift and sure.
He could see in an instant how nothing would be conceivable for Summer until she found the diamonds. No thinking about the future, no decision, nothing. Her mother’s health and her and her sisters’ ability to secure it would have, and clearly had, eclipsed all else.
But there would come a time when they would have to sit down and talk—about their future, their child’s future and what that would look like. And before they could do that he needed to know whathethought, whathewanted it to be.
His mind flashed back, not to Sunday dinners with Kyros and Althaia, not laughing with Lykos on the beach, terrorising tourists and local vendors for money and food, but to sitting in his mother’s lap in a room he could barely remember, hands clasped around her neck, cheek to chest, feeling nothing but safe, nothing but love.
Thatwas home. That was what a parent gave a child—whathewanted to givehischild.
But could he give that to Summer?
The sound of water bubbling over the edge of the pan drew him back to thegnocchi. Seeing that they were ready, he tossed the potato dumplings into the frying pan with the sauce and finished with salt and pepper, before dividing them between two plates. He found a tray from somewhere and put the plates, some water and cutlery onto the tray and took a deep breath before heading to the library.
As he’d expected, Theron found Summer hunched over the small table where she’d gathered all the journals, her hand resting on the necklace’s velvet pouch while the index finger of her other hand traced the handwritten instalments in leather-bound journals that looked exactly what they were: decades old.
He turned on the overhead light, causing Summer to momentarily sit up, blink, and then go back to the journals. Her concentration was fierce and impressive—it must be, to study what she did, to think the way she did—but he worried about the toll it took on her. He placed the food on the table beside her and took his to the chair by the fire.
Over the next few hours Theron came and went and Summer barely moved. He took away the plates, washed up, added logs to the fire, looked at the rows of books on the shelves, but none of the titles caught his eye.
He frowned, looking over at one of the journals Summer had discarded and snagged it from the table without her noticing. Gently, delicately, he fingered the pages, frowning at the tightly curled cursive handwriting, passing dates that spanned months through the late eighteen-hundreds. Unable to resist, he turned to the final page.
I have heard it said that life is lived forwards, yet only to be understood backwards. I believe I know a little of that.
Theron recognised the Kierkegaard quote as one of his favourites, marvelling at how forward-thinking Catherine had been. And then he smiled, realising that he shouldn’t be surprised. The Soames women were impressive, and his heart warmed with the hope that their child might be a girl to carry on those same indomitable traits.
