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“Are you that old, Anton?”
He shot me a dour look. “No, Star. I’m not five hundred. Not yet.”
My lips twitched. “He’s ancient, but not that ancient, Lyra. You don’t have to be frightened of him. He’ll crumble to dust if he scares you.”
“Charming, Star,” was Anton’s droll retort. Then, he reached into his pocket. “I knew your father, Lyra.”
“You did?” she asked slowly.
“His name was Aleks.”
Lyra moved her face away from Troy’s pants entirely and her lips formed the name before she repeated it aloud. “Aleks.”
“Do you remember him?”
She hid behind Troy again, leaving her to answer, “She was only a toddler when he passed away.”
Anton held out a picture. I studied it from the corner of my eye, taken aback to see Aleks and a much younger version of my mom though she was definitely the older sibling. It was only then that I realized a bizarre truth.
“When was Mom born?”
Anton frowned at me, clearly startled by the question. “1957.”
My mouth rounded as I learned about yet another of her lies—her age. Slow to process that, I didn’t realize the conversation had changed course until Troy growled, “I don’t need your charity.”
Cutting her a look, I asked, “What’s wrong?”
Just as Lyra tugged on Troy’s pants, querulously asking, “Mom?”
“Nothing, sweetheart,” she said to my cousin. To me, she bit off, “Your grandfather says this apartment is for me and Lyra to live in full-time.”
I arched a brow at this news but shrugged. “I live in this building with Kat and Conor.”
“Then I will have one of two guest rooms in which to stay when I visit New York, da?” was Anton’s placid retort.
“Don’t push your luck,” I said with a sniff.
“I don’t need your charity,” Troy repeated.
“You lost your sanctuary because of the Sparrows because you saved my granddaughter for the second time in her short life. If you think that doesn’t deserve gratitude—”
“She saved her three times.”
Anton frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Lyra was injured in the car accident that…” My gaze clashed with his. He nodded his understanding of precisely which car accident I was talking about without needing to say it in front of the traumatized little girl. “…and she needed medical care.”
“The only way I can show you the depth of my gratitude, Troy, is to help you now. This is not charity. This is thanks.”
“I did it for neither. You can thank me by letting me raise her the way I have been doing—”
“Have I not promised you this already?”
“You have,” Troy groused.
“And are you not in need of somewhere to live?”
“I suppose,” was her glum retort. “My bees are in more need than we are.”
