She didn’t hear it hit the cobblestones.
Didn’t hear anything except the roaring in her ears and the ragged sound of her own breathing and Leon’s voice, hoarse and desperate, saying her name like a prayer.
“Lexina?”
He loved her.
He had wanted to divorce her to protect her.
He had fallen in love with her before he even knew about the patent.
Before he knew she could be useful to him.
Before any of it.
“Lexina, please—” Leonidas’ voice cracked. “That was my last gamble. And if it still wasn’t enough to earn your forgiveness, then I—” He stopped, swallowed hard. “Then I will let you go. If that’s what you need. If that’s what it takes for you to be happy, I will—”
Lexy didn’t let him finish, launching herself at him with enough force to make him stumble, her arms wrapping around his neck, her legs locking around his waist, her hands coming up to cup his face the way he had cupped hers so many times before.
“I love you.” The words tumbled out of her, wet and messy and completely inelegant. “I love you, I love you, I love you so much—”
His mouth found hers before she could say anything else, and this kiss was different from all the others—deeper and more desperate, but also more precious, his lips telling her without words what her heart already knew.
I love you.
Epilogue
The VIP box at Monaco’sCircuit de Monaco was nothing like Lexy had imagined.
She had expected something cold and corporate—all glass walls and leather seats and the kind of hushed reverence that came with obscene ticket prices. But Sienah had decorated it herself, apparently, and there were throw pillows on the couches and fresh flowers on every surface and a coffee station that would have made her husband nod in masculine approval.
Her husband.
How was it that they had been married for eight years, but at the same time, it felt like they were newlyweds, with her cheeks warming at the mere thought of Leonidas as herhusband?
Lexy settled into her seat by the window, the Monaco sun pouring through the glass as the track below buzzed with pre-race energy. Pit crews swarmed around their cars like ants attending to queens, and somewhere down there, Leonidas was doing his final checks, running through the systems she had designed with the same intensity he brought to everything.
