Her impeccable appearance—champagne-colored dress, white heels—clashes sharply with the gravity stamped on her face. My shoulders tense immediately at her tone.
Lysandra has a bad habit of being dramatic, and most of the time her great worries aren’t truly worth noting. Still, I can’t help feeling alarmed by her voice. I always think that this time, something might really have happened—and the last thing we need is a problem on Christmas morning.
“What happened?” I ask, my mind already running a marathon in search of solutions to a problem I don’t yet know.
“This happened!” she replies, thrusting a newspaper up in front of my face, practically rubbing it against my nose.
It takes my eyes a few seconds to process the image printed there: Nina and me, last night, in the garden. We’re standing side by side, looking at each other and smiling. The photo was taken before the dance, before the kiss.
Above it, the headline reads:“Greek Heir Off the Market?”
“It’s a Christmas disaster!” Lysandra declares, convinced.
I restrain myself from scoffing.
She lowers the newspaper just enough for me to see her face—genuinely worried.
“It’s a photo, Mother.”
“Yours—with a… a… a… urgh! I don’t even know what that girl is!” She points at the image as I turn away and continue getting ready, now that I know nothing truly happened. I pick up my watch from the bedside table and fasten it around my wrist. “You need to be more careful, Nero.”
I turn my head slightly toward her.
“Careful about what?”
“Your…” She pauses, as if searching for the right word—but I know my mother well enough to know that if she came in here, every word she intends to say has already been carefully chosen. “Your company,” she concludes. “You need to be careful with your company. All your life, you and those boys—” the lasttwo words drip with the usual disdain “—have had all sorts of affairs, and this sort of thing”—she lifts the newspaper again to emphasize—“has never happened before. You can’t be careless now, Nero.”
One of my eyebrows lifts reflexively. I blink—and almost laugh.
All sorts of affairs?
Where did she get that from?
I press my lips together, making an extra effort to keep the laughter in. That would only irritate her further—and for fuck’s sake, it’s Christmas.
“All sorts of affairs?” I ask.
Lysandra rolls her eyes.
“You know what I mean.”
I narrow my gaze, because no—I really don’t.
That statement would only make sense if we took the number of women Apollo sleeps with and averaged it across four people. I abandon the thought the moment it crosses my mind.
“I don’t think I do,” I say.
My mother lets out something close to a growl.
“Public relations is already dealing with it,” she says, completely ignoring my words. “But discretion, Nero. That’s all.Be discreet and avoid ending up on more front pages next to that… that… thattype.”
I let out a long breath, allowing my mother’s words to go in one ear and out the other.
I love my parents. I am deeply and eternally grateful for everything they gave me—and for the opportunities that allowed me to extend that generosity to others.
That doesn’t mean I’m blind to who they are as people.
Lysandra and Konstantino have always been good parents to me. Far more than I ever expected when they told me I was being adopted.
