She looked like an angel. All in white, the gentle rounding of her stomach highlighted by the soft, flowing fabric. Her blond hair was in loose curls, a halo of gold that made him ache. Made him hate the man who had taken her innocence and used it in his games.
Hate himself. More than he had ever hated Ajax. More than he had ever hated his father.
More even than he’d hated his mother as he’d watched the blood drain from her body, as he’d watched her steal herself from him.
Why would anyone ever love the creature he was? His mother must have known, even then, what he was. She had been able to love Kouklakis, but she’d never been able to love Alex. Had killed herself rather than face life away from the compound. Rather than face a life with just herself and Alex.
If there was anything more telling he didn’t know what it was.
I would have saved you. He’d wept that day. So hard. Without hope. I would have given you everything.
It had never mattered. Because he wasn’t enough. He would never be enough.
“I need to talk to you,” he said.
She blinked. “What about? Is everything okay?”
“We need to talk, Rachel.”
“Okay. Leah, can you give us a moment?”
Her sister nodded and headed back up the stairs, giving him a hard look that let him know she wasn’t overly impressed with him. Well, she would be even less impressed after this. But it didn’t matter. None of it mattered. He had just had a look in the mirror for the first time, so to speak, and he’d confirmed what the deep, clawing ache in him had always hinted at. No one hated him more than he did.
Except for maybe Rachel. But she would hate him even more if he subjected her to a lifetime of him.
“I am not marrying you,” he said.
“What?”
“You heard me,” he said. “I am not marrying you today.”
“Why the hell not? I have a dress. We have a marriage license. What in the world is wrong with you?”
“I have something I haven’t told you. Something that will change the way you feel about me. It could do nothing else.”
“What you just said has already started to change the way I feel about you.”
“Understandably. And you need to hear this, too.”
She threw her bouquet down on the step, spreading her arms wide then slapping her hands down on her hips before crossing her arms beneath her breasts. “All right. Great. Let’s hear it. Come at me, bro.”
“Ajax Kouros is my brother.”
That shocked her silent for a moment. “Say what now?”
“Ajax is my brother. Nikola Kouklakis is our father. We have different mothers. I have never known who Ajax’s mother was, and doubtless he didn’t, either.”
“Why didn’t he ever say anything?”
“He doesn’t know. I didn’t find out until years after he’d left. He left when I was eight or so, he would have been...sixteen. He never knew.” He swallowed hard. “When I was fourteen I was told who my father was, by Nikola himself. I was terrified, because I’d always been afraid of him. I’d always hated him. But, he said, with Ajax gone I would have to be his heir. And then... And then he told my mother it was time for her to go because she’d outlived her usefulness there. She’d provided me with...a mother’s presence, I suppose, and now he no longer needed her.”