Lucy’s pulse hammered.
‘In my language,’ Augi added softly, ‘we have many words for love. But agápe means the kind of love which looks outwards, to others. It’s the kind of love that changes people. Not the easy kind, but the transformative kind. The kind that ruins your plans.’
Lucy stood very still, trying not to let the word land too deep.
‘It disrupted his plans,’ Augi continued, ‘to obliterate all traces of his father’s legacy and build on the grand one his grandfather once had. He might have been driven by emotion to do these things, but how he went about them,’ — she shook her head — ‘was purely his father. And I think that scared him to death.’
Lucy didn’t think she’d ever heard Augi say so much in one go.
Augi’s eyes flicked away for a second. When she looked back, there was something oddly gentle in her expression. ‘He’s had a change of heart.’
Heart. Lucy had accused him of not having one. She’d been wrong, and what Augi said made sense. But she needed to know for sure. And only he could tell her.
It’s his birthday tomorrow,’ added Augi.
Lucy blinked. ‘His birthday?’
‘I found it in my research, and I can’t help wondering how he’ll be celebrating. After everything that’s happened.’
Lucy’s breath caught. She was already standing fully now, as if her body had made the decision before her mind could veto it.
‘Thanks,’ she said, the word inadequate but all she had.
Dan frowned. ‘Where are you going?’
Lucy didn’t hesitate.
‘Off to make sure Oliver has a birthday he won’t forget.’
One way or another, she murmured to herself as she walked away.
Chapter Seventeen
Lucy had to see him.
She needed the truth. Whether there was still some commercially sensitive reason behind Oliver’s change of mind — or whether, as Augi believed, he’d had a genuine change of heart. Jen thought there was more to it. Lucy told herself she was merely indulging her intellectual curiosity. She didn’t want to go through life never knowing what had really happened here.
She picked up her phone again.
She’d written and deleted her message to Oliver so many times that, by the end, she stripped it back to something that couldn’t be misread.
Please ring.
Two words. Two simple words. There was nothing he could read into it. It was merely a polite request.
She placed the phone carefully on the table and sat staring at it, hands clasped, as if she might frighten the call away if she moved.
It was fine, she told herself as the minutes passed. He was busy. It was his birthday. Calls were going straight to voicemail — hardly a crime.
She began to text asking him what he was doing for his birthday, then deleted it again. She didn’t want him knowing she knew. That would mean admitting she’d dug deeper than she wanted to confess. But, then again, wouldn’t he have expected that? Maybe. But she didn’t think he’d appreciate it now.
She groaned, shoved the phone aside, and paced the apartment.
She was overthinking. Again.
Oliver wasn’t heartless. He was a man who’d been broken young and taught himself to armour what remained. He’d hidden that heart so well he might not even know it was there.
But she did. And she needed him to know that she knew.
