Page 32 of Greek’s Christmas Heir

Because this is what he knew about his ex. She was not a happy woman. It was not evenhimshe had ever wanted, not really. It was what he had stood for. It was his status, his money. All the things it would have meant for her to become the wife of a man of his stature. That was what Delphine had wanted.

He could not even be certain that she had truly enjoyed the pleasure they’d taken in each other. Mechanically, he knew she had. But had she actuallylikedthat kind of release? He had come to think that she hadn’t and that was why he’d ended it.

It had become too difficult to see what part of Delphine was an act and what was real.

This all-encompassing, life-altering feeling inside of him whenever he so much as thought about his daughter was something else again. He knew people called it love, but it was far deeper than that. It was more terrible, moretotal.

It was something fused into his bones.

It was terrifying.

One moment he had been himself. And the next, his daughter had been born, and laid upon Constance’s chest, and he had been changed forever.

He could not say he’dlikedany of it.

But his life had changed that day and he had known, irrevocably, that there was no going back. He would keep his daughter safe. He would dedicate his life to her happiness, and it did not matter ifhewas happy in the midst of that.

He did not need to wreak his revenge on the woman who so richly deserved it, because she had ceased to matter. What mattered was Natalia.

And Constance, the woman who loved her as he did.

The woman he had very nearly kissed, and not because it was the end of a date and a kiss was called for. But because it had been dark in that hallway and she had smelled so good, and they had been standing close, and he had felt soraw—

Thank all the gods, old and new, that he’d remembered himself in time.

Another truth, he acknowledged as he was announced into the gala, was that he barely remembered what Delphine looked like any longer. He struggled to recall a single face of any woman he had known intimately. They all seemed to fade away, suggesting he had been as unengaged as many of them had accused him of being.

All he could see these days were eyes like smoky quartz, a spray of freckles across a pert nose, and that devastating smile.

He found himself particularly unhappy about that, but the more he tried to bring another woman’s face to mind, the more he realized that it had been a very, very long time indeed since he had thought of any woman save Constance. And that truth was...unsatisfying.

Unwieldy.

And only half-true to begin with,something in him argued.

He ignored it as he walked into the throng of people, nodding at faces he recognized, but not wishing to stop or speak to anyone.

Until, that was, he found himself face-to-face with his sister and had no choice but to stop. And even attempt a smile.

“There you are,” Vasiliki said, dressed splendidly. She swept a sharp gaze over him. “You look lonely, brother. More so than usual.”

Anax decided he hated that she could read him. He supposed he always hated it—no matter how he relied on it—but today it seemed more offensive than usual.

“It is my natural state,” he bit out, without the usual gloss of civility he tried to pull on at events like this. “It suits me. As it does you, or have I read you wrong, Vasiliki? Do you only pretend to be lonely out of some sense of solidarity?”

But if he’d thought that would land like some kind of weapon, he was mistaken. Vasiliki managed to give the impression of a deep, jaw-cracking sort of yawn without allowing so much as a muscle to move. Or her gaze to become any less withering.

“I will book some time in your schedule to discuss my loneliness, shall I?” she asked, sardonically. “I am sure you are precisely the therapy I need, brother. As you are so evolved yourself. In the meantime, let me present you withyourdate for the evening.”

Anax opened his mouth to cut that off, and fast—certainly not to apologize—but instead it was as if all the air in the world...vanished.

His sister reached back and pulled the figure he had only half noticed standing behind her to the front.

It had been a very long time since anyone had kicked him hard enough in the gut for him to lose his breath. But that was not a sensation that a man forgot.

He felt it again now. Intensely.

“It is my pleasure to present to you, Anax, your wife,” Vasiliki said, with a mock bow. “Constance Ignatios, this is your husband, little though you might know it after his recent behavior.”

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