The man gave him an excited wolflike grin. “It seems you and me are going to get along, boy.”
Leonid grinned back at him as widely. “I have no doubt we will. I would get along with the devil if he loved and cherished Kassandra. But as my father-in-law, and my daughters’ grandfather, you automatically commanded privileges few in this world do. Now after meeting you, you’ve just moved to the top of my list.”
Stavros laughed. “The list of devils?”
Leonid winked at him. “I do have a weakness for my kind.”
Stavros guffawed louder and thumped him on the back so hard he almost knocked him off his unsteady feet.
By the time Stavros moved on, the demonstrative man had inundated him with enough physical gestures to tell him he was already family to him.
Relieved that he’d won over the most important man in Kassandra’s life, Leonid turned to the other people who sought his attention at the reception, all the while seeking Kassandra, to no avail.
The coronation, and more important, the wedding, was tomorrow, and her whole family, all two-hundred-plus members of it, had arrived in Zorya the day before. She’d been lost in their sea ever since. Not that she’d been easily found before that. In the two weeks after they’d come together, he’d almost killed himself to wrap a million things up so he could rush back into her arms. But once he could, there had always been something stopping her from taking him there. For the past week she’d either been busy, sleeping, out or just unavailable when he’d sought her.
Even when he did see her, he couldn’t help but notice she’d...changed. She was subdued, as if all her fire had gone out. She’d only told him she had her period, and it was a particularly distressing one, what with all the preceding events.
But when he’d thought they’d go to meet her arriving family members together, and she’d gone alone, all his past doubts had crashed back on him.
For what if, after the first rush of sympathy for what had happened to him, it had all sunk in, that she’d be tying herself to a man who wasn’t only damaged, and who in spite of her protestations, she found revolting, but who would be the king of a country passing through turbulent times for the foreseeable future? What if she dreaded all the tension and trouble he would bring into her own life by association?
But though it agonized him to think any of that could be true, he dreaded saying anything to her even more, in case she validated his suspicions. So he’d chosen to convince himself she’d been having wedding jitters, that whatever it was, it was a passing thing that had nothing to do with him, or their impending marriage.
But when the reception ended, and she’d reappeared only to entertain her guests while keeping dozens of feet and people between them, he could no longer fool himself.
Something was wrong. Horribly wrong.
Three hours before the coronation and wedding ceremonies, Leonid stood before the full-length mirror in the quarters he’d relinquish forever tonight to move with Kassandra to the ones he’d slaved over realizing for her, her perfect wonderland.
His traditional Zoryan regal costume fit him perfectly. And weighed down on him absolutely. But he realized it wasn’t the lifelong responsibility it represented that was getting him down, but the hovering dread that he wouldn’t be bearing its burdens with a happy Kassandra by his side.
Then, as if he’d summoned her with his anxiety, Kassandra entered his quarters.
Just one look into her extinguished eyes told him.
His worst fears were about to be realized.
Forcing himself to ignore his trepidations, he rushed to take her in his arms. His heart almost ruptured when the woman who’d dissolved with passion in his arms a couple of weeks ago turned to stone there now. When she was supposed to walk down the aisle with him to a lifetime together in mere hours.
Before he could choke out his anguish, she whispered, “In spite of everything that happened, and how you came back into our lives, I believe you now love our daughters.”
Confused beyond words at hers, he again tried to reach for her. “Kassandra, moya lyubov’...”
Her hand rose, a feeble move without any energy. It still stopped him in his tracks. “I also do believe you’d make Zorya the best king. So for our daughters and for your kingdom, I’ll walk out there in three hours and marry you, Leonid. But for myself, I want things to go back to what you intended before. A marriage in name only, with separate lives.”
Feeling his world coming to an end, he couldn’t even breathe for long moments until he thought he might suffocate.
It was finally uncontainable agony that forced the choking question from his lips. “What changed?”
“Nothing changed. Things only became clear.”
He squeezed his eyes, his whole left side going numb.
Things were clear to her now. When he’d been trying to cling to the hope that she’d never come to her senses.
“It’s too much for you, isn’t it?” he rasped. “You tried to pretend my mutilation doesn’t appall you, but it does, doesn’t it? You can’t face a lifetime of curbing your revulsion at the sight of my stump, to the feel of my scars, can you?”
Her gaze deadened even more. “You can pick whatever reason you want. I’ll back up any story you decide on.”
“Story?”
“If you ever need grounds for divorce.”
With that, she turned and walked out, looking like an automaton.
But somewhere in the tornado that was uprooting everything inside him, he knew. She was now going to put on her wedding dress, then she’d walk with him to the altar, pledge to be his wife and queen, and instead of love and joy, he’d see in her eyes that she no longer wanted him. But out of duty to her daughters and their kingdom, she would still walk into the prison of being with him forever.
He couldn’t let her do this to herself.
He had to set her free, forever this time.
Shattered by her brief yet annihilating confrontation with Leonid, Kassandra had gone back to her quarters, where all the women of her family had gathered. In a fugue, she surrendered to their fussing as they dressed her in the fairy-tale dress Signor Bernatelli had designed for her. She thought she’d talked, smiled, even laughed, putting on a show for her family’s sake, for Eva’s and Zoya’s, for Zorya’s.
After her suspicions about Leonid’s intentions had erupted, wiping out her sanity, they’d receded enough to make her see the facts. That Leonid did love Eva and Zoya, with everything in him, and they loved him back. He was everything they could have hoped for in a father. Also undeniable was the fact that he was a formidable force for good, and as Zorya’s king, he would not only save the kingdom, but he’d stabilize the whole region.
As for his feelings for her, whatever he’d felt before, she now believed he was trying sincerely to be as attentive and loving as he could be. In the past week, he’d resumed seeking her, yet it had been as if it hurt him to do so.
Whatever it was, it wasn’t as sinister as she’d thought in that first wave of insanity. He was trying to do his best for all of them. It was she who was too greedy, too damaged. She couldn’t take what he was offering, when it was far more than what most women could dream of. Because it wasn’t everything. She’d either have all of him, or none of him at all.
In keeping with tradition, everyone left her for one last hour of solitude before the wedding. As the minutes counted down to zero, she waited to be called when the ceremonies began.
Then Anya walked in, looking stricken.
“My lady, it’s terrible. An absolute shock!”
Kassandra shot to her feet, her blood not following her up, making her sway. “What happened?”
“Prince Leonid has left the palace. After calling Princess Olga and relinquishing the crown to her!”
Among the total mayhem Leonid’s departure had caused, Kassandra clung to one thing.
The letter he’d left her.
Not that she’d even tried to read it. His actions had spoken far louder than anything he could ever say. That she’d catastrophically and unforgivably misjudged his feelings and misread his intentions. Again.
She’d exploded from the palace in search of him five hours ago. She’d taken Fedor and he’d driven her to every single place he could think of where Leonid might be. Leonid had turned off his phone, hadn’t been anywhere they’d searched. There’d been no sighting of him anywhere. Yet there was no evidence that he’d left the kingdom.
After the last failed attempt, she broke down and wept until she felt she’d come apart. But she got out his letter, hoping it would give her a clue where he’d gone.
Shaking so hard, eyes so swollen, it was almost impossible to read it. But she kept trying.
And every word killed her all over again.
Kassandra,
I will never be able to beg your forgiveness enough or atone enough for everything I cost you, every heartache I caused you, but I’ll make sure you never again sacrifice your well-being and desires for anything, starting with me. I will always love you, and our daughters. You will all, always, have everything that I have. But I only want you to be free and happy. While I will always be infinitely grateful for all the happiness and blessings you’ve given me, I only wish I could take back the suffering I’ve inflicted on you. But since I can’t, I can only cause you no more.