Suddenly cold, Leah shivered. Throwing his arm around her, Stavros pulled her into his warm body.
Alex had been Calista’s on-and-off boyfriend. “Alex...you sent him to jail after Calista...”
“We found that he was the one selling drugs that day. He had a long record of possession and substance abuse,” Dmitri replied while Stavros remained stubbornly silent.
“I thought you did that because...” The words trailed off Leah’s lips as she realized how absurd she sounded.
Alex had been the one who had given them to Calista? Charming, easygoing Alex? And in contrast, Stavros had seemed such a monster in her head.
“Get dressed, Leah. Let me talk to Dmitri alone.”
She was so much in panic that she didn’t even say a word. Something flickering in his eyes, Dmitri hugged her, sheet and nakedness and all.
After all these years, what did Alex want now?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
STAVROS HAD BEEN expecting something to strike at the haze in which he had been living for the past month. Something that would wake him up from the dreamlike state he had been functioning in with Leah. Something so painfully real, so achingly raw, it was bound to end.
He expected the novelty of making love to her to wear off. He expected the high of being around her, the high that came with her laughter, with her irreverent humor, with how easily she gave of herself and how possessively she demanded of him, to end at some point.
He expected the amazing light and joy that had pervaded him, even as he had tried to tether and control it, to fizzle out.
Because life didn’t work like that, did it? At least, not his.
It didn’t carry so much joy, so much laughter, so many emotions that had overthrown him the last month. It never had such gnawing hunger, such desperate need to grasp what he could, such panic-ridden drive to control it so that he didn’t become its slave.
But he didn’t think it would come in such a way. He hadn’t thought it would rip his heart out like this and leave him gasping.
That it would wreak on him an avalanche of hurt and inadequacy and pain.
He had thought Dmitri uncharacteristically foolish to even indulge Alex Ralston’s demand to talk to Stavros. Yet, he had just disconnected the call with Alex, a video call that the thug had insisted on.
Nausea whirled in his gut at the things Alex had said about Calista. It was like hearing stories about a stranger, not his sister at all.
All he had known of Calista had been a front, a lie. A lie that had been neatly supported by Leah for so many years. Because Leah had known it all.
And in the sinking morass of his grief, that betrayal cut the deepest. Leah had known and hadn’t whispered a word to him. Even when he had asked it of her.
“Stavros?” Dmitri nudged him.
“Locate him, Dmitri.” He stood up with such force that the desk rattled. “He can’t go to the media with this. Theos, this is Calista... I don’t want her name besmirched like this.”
“I will stop him. Stavros...it’s not your fault. Calista...whatever Ralston told you about her, you couldn’t have known. You did everything you could to help her.”
“I should have known. All along, she had so many problems and I...” A growl escaped his throat.
“Have you ever thought that some of us are beyond help, Stavros? Too broken to be fixed? Giannis said she was just a child when your mother walked out. Whatever Calista needed, you didn’t have it.”
“She needed to be loved, Dmitri. And I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know how. Not then, not now.”
He was the one in pain, and yet Dmitri looked pale. He kept shaking his head as if he could see into Stavros’s head. “Her behavior is not your fault.”
“I wish I could forgive myself as easily as you, Dmitri,” he said, hating himself, hating Dmitri for being so understanding.
He couldn’t numb the gnawing in his gut as the truth solidified. He had never had what it took to begin with.
Was that why he had clung so tightly to doing what was right? Because he hadn’t possessed, hadn’t ever known, his heart?
Beneath Leah’s betrayal, beneath the shock of learning his sister’s truth, only one thing remained.
You are made of stone.
How right Leah had been... If he had ever known it once, he didn’t remember. He didn’t know if he had buried it deep so that his parents’ indifference, their negligence didn’t hurt.
He had never understood Calista, never saw past the facade his sister presented because he had never understood her fears, her pain, her joy. Every time she had mentioned their parents, every time she had expressed her confusion, he had only pushed her to move on, had brushed her away believing that they were better off without them.
Because he hadn’t wanted to dwell on it, because it would mean acknowledging all the wrongs they had done to them, it would mean letting them be a part of who they were.
Again and again, he had closed himself off to her grief, her pain. Until she had decided that he would never understand? Until she had decided, like Leah, that he didn’t have the capability to understand? The capability to love?
In the end, his parents had robbed him of everything.
Even if he forgave Leah’s lies, what did he possess to give her? How long before she would realize the truth? How long before she realized that he had never known and would never understand love?
That he would never know how to give it and take it.
It was two hours before Stavros returned to their suite, two hours in which Leah had become half-crazy wondering what was going on. One look in his eyes, and her heart skidded to her gut.
“Pack your bags. You’re catching a flight to New York in a few hours.”
“What? The fashion week isn’t for another fortnight...”
He stood only a foot away, yet it could have been a thousand miles. Why wouldn’t he look at her?
“It is better for you in New York rather than here with Ralston around. Apparently, he’s very much interested in hearing how I’ve mistreated you.”
“But all my stuff is...” She stopped, his words slowly registering with her.
His cell phone rang and he looked at her finally. “I will ensure that Rosa packs up your stuff with utmost care.”
Rosa was going to pack her stuff, she was going to leave for New York...
Leah stared at the empty space he left behind for a few seconds. The shock slowly blunted, bringing in its wake utter panic.
Throat dangerously close to tears, she found him in the study that offered a breathtaking view of the Eiffel Tower.
He was on the phone, listening, but his gaze stayed on her face. And that’s when Leah noticed the white pallor to his skin.
She would have welcomed his blistering contempt, or even his lacerating fury. But the resignation in his gaze... As if he had lost something precious. As if he had finally given up.
The minute he disconnected the call, she stepped inside.
“If he comes for me, he has to get through you, doesn’t he?” she demanded, anger coming to her rescue. She wouldn’t let him treat her like this again. Not after the last month.
He looked up, a bitterness curving his mouth. “I’ll be busy trying to stop him from taking the story to the media, from turning my life and Calista’s...and yours into a cash cow.”
“What?” she said, fear spewing into her words now.
“If you go to New York, you’ll be free to do as you please. I know how much you don’t like being told what to do. I’ll make sure Ralston doesn’t follow you.”
“Why does it sound like you’re sending me away?” She sounded desperate, pitiful, but she didn’t care. It seemed she had no armor left.
He stood up from the chair, his every movement precise, his skin tautly pulled over those sharp features. There was nothing anymore of the man she had known this last month. The man who had smiled, laughed, kissed her, the man who had looked at her as if he would drown if he didn’t possess her one more time, nothing.
It was as if he was pulling himself back, word by word, second by second, until he became that Stavros she hated again.
Her gut twisting, she walked around the huge desk until he was forced to look at her. Placing her hands on his chest, she asked, “What did I do this time?”
He grabbed her wrists to push her away. But she didn’t let go. She would never hold him again if she let go, the fear clamored through her. “Tell me what’s going on, Stavros. Or I swear I’ll...” she broke off on a sob.
“You’ll what, Leah? Tell a new lie? You have won.” He became stiff, like he was a statue who possessed no feeling, no weakness. “I’ll sign the divorce papers, release your inheritance as soon as possible. You are just Leah Huntington again.” His gaze moved over her features with a hunger she knew he would deny. For all his withdrawal, she had the strangest feeling that he wasn’t untouched. That he was struggling just as she was.
Or it was the delusion she really wanted to cling to, she thought pitying herself.
“There’s nothing binding you to me or to Katrakis Textiles now.”
Her breath whooshed out of her in a painfully long exhale. Legs shaking beneath her, Leah grabbed the table. Tears pooled in her eyes and spilled over. Just breathing became a chore. “You’re punishing me again...”
“Punishment, pethi mou? No. I’m finally freeing us both. Giannis is gone, and you’ve proved beyond doubt that you can take care of yourself, ne? What is left of our relationship, if it could be called that, if we take away my duty and your lies, Leah?”