Holy shit.
“It’s not that serious.” I lift my hands. “It’s fine. I’m so sorry.”
Penelope is the name of his wife. Hadeon Olympian and Penny are the only two members of the family who are married. I read somewhere that the oldest children of the Olympian empire struggle to find someone they trust enough to marry. And Hadeon is willing to leave his wife over my stupid journal.
But his attention is on the screen. “Do you understand?”
“What did I do wrong?” Her voice is quiet with fear laced in every letter.
“I’m asking the questions,” he counters. “Honest answers or move into the Martha’s Vineyard house.”
“You’ve never acted like this before.”
“I’ve never suspected you of pulling this level of bullshit. This is the shit my family does. Not us. You and I are different.” He closes his eyes and inhales like he’s trying to keep his demons at bay. When he looks at the phone, he’s still cold and dark. The reset didn’t work. “Look, if you did it, we’ll deal with the fallout, but I swear to fucking God if you lie to me, twenty years of trust vanishes. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” Her voice sounds so small. Hadeon starts his interrogation.
“How much money did you spend blocking Grae’s attempts to find Alana?”
“His, or Amanda’s attempts too?”
Holy shit. They were being blocked. The most powerful humans on the planet were actively trying to keep us apart.
“Both.”
“Twenty-four million dollars over the last twelve years.” She says the number with no emotion. Like it’s a fact, and facts don’t need feelings. He curses under his breath, glancing away from his phone.
“Did you know Grae has blackouts?”
“Yes.” This time her voice breaks.
“Were you aware he keeps journals?”
“I’ve read his digital journal for a few years.”
“How?” I squeak out.
Hadeon waves me off. “If it’s digital, my wife can find it.”
“He’s there?” she asks. “This isn’t private?” But he ignores her.
“This is the last question: did you, or someone working on your behalf, steal his physical journal from the time of Davin and Kinsley’s breakup?”
Again, hearing our old names sounds so alien.
“He had a physical journal?” She sounds angry and annoyed at the same time. “No.” Her voice is sharp. “Damn, if I had known… maybe I would have taken it and burned it. But I had no clue. I only found his digital journal a few years ago. And quite frankly, he’s a very boring man. He spent three weeks debating if he should get a new dishwasher and if so what brand.” She emphasizes, “Three weeks! And that was his biggest problem.” She exhales. “His journals were not at all useful or entertaining.”
Wow. I’m having my privacy violated and being insulted at the same time.
He looks at me again. “Did you get a new dishwasher?”
“Yeah and immediately regretted it.”
“See!” Penelope’s voice echoes in the car.
Hadeon’s lips curl in the corners. “Do you have any questions?”
He hands me the phone. She’s in her late thirties, nearly flawless skin that comes from treatments and serums. Her hair hangs low around her shoulders with a hairpin holding it back behind her ear. The real her looks so elegant compared to the high gloss and filtered, press-released images.
