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“So what is your plan?” I sit across the breakfast table from my father. He has come here to check on me, gain his own measure of the men I am with, and to drag me back to work, kicking and screaming, if he must. His words, not mine.
“I’m staying here,” I answer, while taking a sip of my coffee. “I figured I would sell my penthouse, move everything in here, make parts of it feel more like me.”
“And Medusa Enterprises?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He sets down his coffee cup and takes a breath before meeting my eyes. “We need you back in the office. You brought on that fucking hockey team, and all hell is breaking out. The least you can do is clean up the mess.”
I smile, liking the fact that my father is now realizing my value. He needs me. He’s always needed me, and he now knows it.
“I don’t care who you are sleeping with,” he continues, “as long as you are happy. But you are a Godwin. That comes with strings. I don’t care if you marry one or even all of the assholes living here, and you change your name to some new age, hyphenated bullshit. Hell, they can all take your name for all I care. But this family has a legacy, and it needs you.”
“You have two sons who are perfectly capable of—”
He shoots me a look full of daggers and says, “Medusa needs you.”
“I’m not sure I need Medusa.”
“Look, I love your brothers, and they are capable of a great many things. Running this empire fully and alone isn’t one of them. It’s a massive beast, and you know it. I’m trying to step down myself and enjoy my old age.” He takes a sip of his coffee before adding, “I never thought you had it in you, but you came in and made every single man you had to work with your bitch in a matter of days. You have the business sense of a fucking viper and the ruthlessness of a shark. We need you back at work. You can telecommute until you are back on your feet for all I care, but we need you.”
I’m surprised to hear my father give praise. I’m even more surprised to hear him say he needs me out loud.
“I’ll come back to work,” I say, “but things are going to be different. I’m not going to be the same viper you expect. I need to… I need to allow myself to be happy.”
“Fine. I want that, too, for you. I know I don’t say it. I know I sure as fuck don’t show it. But I do care. I do. I built Medusa for my children. For you.” He pauses and looks around the house. An awkward silence stretches out between us. I don’t know what to say or do with all the free emotions and honesty given. Finally, he says, “Why did you start all of this?” He waves around the room.
“I was searching for something. I thought I was looking for my mother, wanting to know who she was, get some questions answered.”
“Did you find her?”
“Yes.”
“Was she what you were looking for?”
“No, she wasn’t, but I found what I needed.”
“And what was that?”
“Me.”
I see my father out after more promises to start checking my email and bring the guys over for family dinner at Olympus a week from Sunday, to give him and my brothers a chance to properly intimidate my men.
“So, back to work?” Perseus says from behind me, making me jump.
“Spying on me?” I turn to see him leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest.
“No, okay maybe a little.” He pushes himself off the wall and moves to stand in front of me.
“You know eavesdropping is rude.”
“You’ll get over it. Besides, I don’t trust him.”
“You’ll get over it,” I parrot his words back to him. “He’s my father. He’s not going anywhere.”
“So, you aren’t going to move back to your fancy city penthouse by yourself?”
“No, I was planning on staying. If that’s okay?”
“It’s your house,” he counters as he slides his fingers into my hair. “But I can see how you might be tempted to go back to the solitude of your own life.”
“It’s our house,” I correct. “This is where I belong.”
“Good.” He kisses me hard, he isn’t asking, he isn’t tempting me to follow him. He is demanding my kiss, and I am eager to give it to him.
“Get the others,” I tell him. “Meet me in the library.”
“You want to be the center of attention, princess?” He runs his hand down my back and grabs my ass as he starts to kiss my neck.
“No, well, yes.”
Chapter
Fifty
Athena
I stand naked in the library, the candle’s flickering the only light. Three men also stand naked before me. Heph. Perseus. Eros.
