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“I ate most things by picking them out. When the olive flavor was too strong, I ate bread.”
Aris returns his attention to the fridge. After selecting more items, he chops the vegetables. With nothing to do, I move closer to observe him. He handles the knives with a swift efficiency that reminds me he has more lethal talents.
“Do you like to cook?”
He spares me a glance before adding onions to a skillet. “I’ll soon find out. Have a seat.” He points his knife at the island overlooking the stove.
“This is your first time cooking?”
“No, I took cooking classes, but this is different.”
The barstool is lined with soft black leather. The backrest hugs my spine and I sigh at the comfort. “How is today different?”
“I’m cooking for you.”
Not for the first time, his response stumps me. The implication is hard to believe. If I am to accept what he leaves unsaid, my wants and needs are important to him. But why?
“Would you like to eat on the terrace? We should take advantage of the warm weather while it lasts.” Aris plates the food he prepared.
He leads me to a back patio. Despite being in a densely populated part of Chicago, silence enshrouds the space, creating an intimate oasis.
I take a bite of the meal under Aris’ intense scrutiny. The flavors burst on my tongue. “Mmm, this is delicious.” I attack the food with more gusto.
After a few seconds, Aris begins to eat his dinner. “To answer your earlier question, yes.”
“Earlier quest—oh, about if you like to cook. What was the deciding factor?”
“Your reaction,” he says betraying zero emotion.
The simplistic response means more to me than it should. I shift under his steady stare, unused to attention from anyone outside the organization. Even within the family, my status prevented my father’s underlings from taking liberties.
I clear my throat and search for a topic that isn’t fraught with tension. “You said you didn’t know your parents. How did you…become you?” I flinch at my indelicate question. “You don’t have to answer that.”
“Are you curious about me, agapiméni mou?”
“I, uh, shouldn’t I get to know who I married?”
“Although I’ve never met my parents, I had a privileged upbringing. My adopted parents are Ozias and Elisavet Glezos. They head a multinational syndicate which gave me the connections to be a successful matchmaker and peace negotiator.”
I finger my wine glass but sip from my water glass instead. “You aren’t much for giving details, are you?”
Aris lays his silverware on the table and rests his chin on his steepled fingers. “In public, Ozias and Elisavet treated me as a beloved son. Everyone believed them because they had lost their actual son and couldn’t have more children. The way they treated me in private was a different story. Ozias and Elisavet never failed to remind me I didn’t belong. That I was a useful tool, nothing more. They never explained what they meant, but their actions made it clear. If I broke, I would be discarded like any other tool.”
“That’s awful.” I reach out to offer him comfort but think better of it and let my hand fall to the table.
Without understanding why he took me, I can’t let myself sympathize with him. Yet his careful censorship tears at my defenses and I curl my fingers until I feel the bite of my nails.
I can’t deny the ache in my chest for the child he was or the parallels with my own upbringing. “I get now why you think we’re similar.”
“No, agapiméni mou, we are not similar. You live surrounded by darkness, but it hasn’t tainted you. You’ve bloomed into a beautiful night blossom, whereas I ate the darkness and became something worse.”
“If not for our similarities, why did you take me?”
Aris peers up at the darkened sky, then at me. “If you’re finished, follow me and I’ll show you.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Aris takes me to a park I used to sneak out to visit when my father’s men became complacent. Ferb accompanies us, prancing like a proud show dog, although there is no one around to envy him.
