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Tiero laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “You know, I’ve never seen it.”
“Seen what?” I ask.
Where is he going with this? Unease spreads through me like wildfire, and I clasp my free hand over our joint ones.
“It took you entering my life to notice what I was missing. I thought my world was so large, but you lit everything up and showed me how small and dark it was… is.
“I want your light to shine, angel, not to get dulled by the darkness surrounding me…” I look at him, confused. What is he saying?
Is he letting me go?
Even though it’s what I want, I’m not sure how I feel about it.
Then he changes direction again. It’s hard to keep up. Where is he going with this conversation. Perhaps he doesn’t know himself.
“I think you’re right. The three of us were destined to meet. And the signs were there all along.
“Take my yacht, for example. I found it long before you and I met. I was drawn to it even though I was going to buy a different one. You can imagine my surprise when you told me your name for the first time. But there’s more. I purchased the yacht through one of my companies. It was the first straight company I bought when I took over. You’ll laugh when you hear the name… Ayden Holdings.”
My mouth falls open. “You’re kidding?”
He shakes his head, chuckling. “Burg also said something earlier that shook me. Remember I told you about my Neptune dream when I was a child? I never told anyone, not even Enzo or Mateo, but Neptune spoke to me and showed me something. It scared me so much, I did everything I could to forget it. And I did forget it… until today. It gutted me. I know what Neptune meant now, and it’s almost too late.”
His brows draw tightly together. “How could Burg have known about it? Nobody guesses something like that.”
“What did he say?”
“That I had three chances to redeem myself or I’d come back with webbed feet.”
My eyes widen. “Aiden said that?”
“Neptune did. But Aiden said something similar. In the dream, Neptune told me I had a choice to make in this lifetime. To be a king like him or to take the easy way out. I would have three chances, and if I missed one, each chance afterward would be harder. And if I failed, I would become a laughingstock, and he showed me the webbed feet.
“He pointed his trident to the water in the distance and said that’s where I had to be.
“My first chance to leave my life… my ocean, was when I was a child. But I couldn’t see how. My second chance was when I met you. You even asked me to run away together, but I chose not to, feeling bound to my world.” Tiero closes his eyes as if in pain.
“And now, my third chance is the hardest of all.” His voice is tight, and I squeeze his hand lovingly. I want to comfort him, take away all his sorrows.
“Is that why you’re afraid of webbed feet?” I bump his shoulder playfully, and Tiero forces a smile.
“Hmm, I’ve never put that together. It probably is.”
“I still can’t believe you were freaking out about the cygnet’s feet touching you.”
“Palmates,” he corrects.
“Sorry, palmates. It was hilarious.”
“Only for you.”
“And your soldiers,” I add. Then I realize it was likely the first step to him being a laughingstock. Still, we both have a chuckle at that. All of us running away from two angry swans would have looked ridiculous.
Then Tiero falls silent, staring at our hands that are still intertwined. He seems far away. What’s going on in his head now?
Is he thinking about our time in Monza? It’s when I ran away…
We had our moments after he stole me, but the way we were just talking reminds me so much of our time on the island, when being with him was easy. Back then, I was hoping we could have a future together.
