by Tara Pammi
A nervous sort of quiet reined over the stables when she finally got there.
Sounds from Black Shadow’s empty stall sent her heart racing. She hurried over and then leaned against the opposite wall, her knees barely holding her up.
The Thoroughbred was tall, at least sixteen hands, and athletic with a dark brown, gleaming coat. A thing of utter beauty and male perfection, like the man who had bought it for her. Proud and arrogant too, just like Gabriel, in the way he reared his head when she took a step toward him.
Eleni just watched, her breath taken away by his male beauty. Her hands itched to trace those sloping shoulders but he would not like her to. At least not yet.
Like his Arabian ancestor, he would be very high-strung. And yet the very prospect of taming him with correct training, of forming a bond with him sent excitement fizzing through her veins.
When he was hers, his loyalty would be absolute. His love would be forever and unconditional. It was the same thing she craved from Gabriel.
She had no idea when Gabriel had decided on this, or when he and Angelina had even slipped away without Eleni knowing. Father and daughter were slowly building a tenuous bridge toward each other.
After a few more minutes of watching him, Eleni turned to walk out of the stables. Excitement fizzed through her at the thought of Gabriel returning. This gift, of all the ones he had showered on her, was so special. It said he knew her; it said he’d wanted to see her happy again, even as he understood that she’d always mourn Black Shadow.
She wanted to thank him personally for such an extraordinary gift. For knowing what would make her laugh again. For simply caring about her.
It was more than she’d expected, more than he had signed on for, she knew.
But the weeks she had spent with him, observing his every interaction with Angelina, learning small things about him, also kindled a flicker of hope.
Contrary to the media’s endless stories, she knew now that Gabriel was hardly the love-them-and-leave-them type. She knew that he had a deep core of loyalty toward those he considered his. Despite his initial refusal, he’d agreed to help Andreas in his search for whatever it was he was looking for. Neither of them would tell her what was going on, but she left them to it, used as she was to secrets in the palace and happy to allow Andreas some privacy.
When Monique’s mother, Angelina’s grandmother, had made a tearful phone call begging to see her granddaughter, Eleni had waited with bated breath. Lies or not, it was clear Monique had loved her daughter. And the thought of Angelina, so much like she’d been at that age, being cut off from another person who loved her, had threatened to slice through Eleni.
To her shock, Gabriel had asked her advice, trusted her to have Angelina’s best interests at heart. He’d confessed with a never-before-seen flicker of emotion that every instinct of his wanted to refuse the older woman’s request. To cut off his daughter from her mother’s family completely.
In the end, he had listened to Eleni’s advice that Angelina only benefited from the presence in her life of people who loved her like that.
He’d had Monique’s mother chartered to Drakon on his personal jet. However, he had insisted that Eleni accompany Angelina and her grandmother on their day-long tour of Drakon. Had even joined them for dinner that night and had been a charming companion after a satisfactory assessment of Monique’s mother.
Her husband, for all his denial of emotions and deep feelings, Eleni realized, felt very deeply when it came to the people he cared about. It was just very rare for anyone to get so close to him as to notice that.
Would he ever consider Eleni one of those? She had no idea. Would they ever share anything beyond the physical connection and their parenting of Angelina?
She had hardly taken another step when she saw a shadow enter the stables.
Her heart thundered that it might be Gabriel. Tucking away a strand of hair from her temple, she stepped into the main corridor between the stalls when she saw who it was.
“Hello, Eleni mou.”
Eleni’s head jerked up.
Hair shining like raw gold, a glorious smile illuminating his beautifully defined face, Spiros stared at her.
Eleni stiffened, her heart beating a thousand miles an hour. She didn’t want Gabriel to discover them here. She didn’t want the fragile truce they had built to shatter so soon. Not ever.
Would he even believe that she had not planned this? Would he understand that this was a conversation she needed to have?
She could not untangle her complex feelings for Gabriel without saying goodbye to her past forever. She could not even trust herself again until she learned why Spiros had abandoned her.
“Hello, Spiros.”
Her reached her and took her hands in his. A pang of familiarity pierced her heart. His face had been so dear to her once. The blond hair, the slender frame, the straight, patrician nose—it was like seeing a much-missed, dear old friend. She was glad that he was okay. That he hadn’t died in some unfortunate accident as she’d sometimes feared.
“Are you not happy to see me, Eleni?”
“I... I don’t know what to feel, Spiros. Or what to say. You got me in a lot of trouble for the stunt you pulled at my wedding reception. You disappeared without a word, and then you walk back in like you belong here.”
“I’m sorry about that.” He clasped her cheeks, his gaze reverent. Something inside Eleni—maybe that naive nineteen-year-old—ached at his touch. Couldn’t help but soften when she remembered how he’d been her only salvation on the toughest days.
If only he’d never left. If only they’d married back then... She didn’t know what the future would have held for her then, but suddenly Eleni knew, as well as the beat of her own heart, that Spiros was too late.
And not just because Eleni had said her vows to Angelina and Drakon.
“It took me forever to get into the palace, and when I did it was to see you in your wedding dress, looking incredibly lovely. I lost my mind right then. I hope that arrogant Spaniard was not cruel to you.”
“Gabriel is never cruel.” And she had known cruelty at the hands of the mad king. For all his claims to ruthlessness, Gabriel ran his empire with a firm but considerate hand. “Spiros, you left years ago. Without word. Without even a goodbye. Do you honestly expect that nothing has changed in all these years? That I have not changed?”
“But you waited for me, didn’t you? You didn’t look at another man. You didn’t marry until just a few months ago. Andreas told me you didn’t. Andreas told me you waited for me, you mourned for me...”
Eleni grabbed the wall behind her, a sick feeling clamping her stomach. Anything that involved her older brother, and the warpath he’d been on since their father’s dementia had worsened, did not bode well. For any of them. “What does Andreas have to do with any of this?” And even as she asked the question, things clicked. Andreas asking her about Spiros after their father’s death, relentless and incessant. Andreas asking her why she hadn’t moved on with her life.
“He’s the one who encouraged me to come back to you. He asked me if I still loved you and I said yes. But it was already too late. By the time I sold my business in the States and came back, you were already married to him.” Torment flickered across his angelic features while Eleni felt like she had stepped onto a land mine.
When and how had Andreas sought Spiros out? Was this the source of the tension between him and Gabriel?
She could just imagine Gabriel’s fury at Andreas’s meddling. Familiar fear flew through her veins. She didn’t want to lose either of them.
How like Andreas to pull the strings from behind the curtain. She was going to throttle her older brother.
“Say something, Eleni.”
“Why did you leave in the first place?” Eleni bit out loudly, frustration coiling through her. “I was so worried about you. I imagined such horrible scenarios. Couldn’t you have owned up to my face that we were done? That you never loved me.”
“But I did love you, Eleni. Desperately.” Spiros’s face fell and pity filled Eleni’s chest. “It was your father’s doing. He said I wasn’t good enough for you then. He said I had to grow some balls. When I told him you would run away with me, he threatened my family. You know how much my father and our family depended on the King’s goodwill. I let him...convince me to wait. I felt like I had nothing to offer you. He promised that if I made something of myself, he’d consider me again in a few years. But the condition was that I never see you. Never contact you. So I left, Eleni. I traveled the world. I...made something of myself.”
Her heart felt like it had received one final blow. “I waited and waited for you...and when you never came back I gave up on you. Then after a while, your family said that you’d gone to America. That you’d met someone there and forgotten all about me.”
“I’m sure he made them say that.” He moved back and forth in the confined space, his movements restless, angry. “Your father...he was mad. He never meant for you to marry me,” he said, coming to the same conclusion Eleni had. “He never meant for you to leave his side, Eleni. I was such a fool to believe him.”
Her knees shook with the magnitude of her father’s casual cruelty.
Spiros was right. Gabriel had been right. Her father had meant to keep her with him for the rest of his life. Like an unpaid staff member, a companion, forever reminded that she owed him for everything in her life.
He’d not only ruined her life but he’d ruined Spiros’s too. “Why did you come back now, Spiros?” She couldn’t even muster anger for him. She felt nothing.
“I heard the news of King Theos’s death. And I knew you were still...waiting for me.”
Eleni didn’t bother to correct him even though resentment grew in her.
“As you very well know, I’m a married woman now.” She jerked away from Spiros, resignation filling her. Suddenly, she felt immensely tired. “I don’t love you, not anymore.”
“But I love you, Eleni. I would wait another ten years if it meant you would be mine.” How could she tell him that it would come to nothing? That he should have stayed and fought her father, that he shouldn’t have let his insecurities drive him away.
Tears filling her face, Eleni let Spiros fold her into his embrace. Her chest ached for him and for her, for the future they could have had. If not for the machinations of a sick old man.
For her own sanity’s sake, she wished she felt something for Spiros. She would never break her vows but at least her heart would remain safe from Gabriel.
But even as Spiros held her tight, even as the man she had once loved promised his eternal love to her, nothing moved in her.
He was not overtly tall. He was not broad in the shoulder and narrow in the hips. He didn’t look at her with compelling gray eyes. He did not call her Princesa in a mocking way and yet somehow mean it.
He didn’t deny feeling any emotions. He didn’t fiercely protect everyone he considered his. He didn’t threaten her powerful brothers for their supposed neglect of her or even the entire world for insulting her.
He simply was not Gabriel.
“I have already made my vows, Spiros,” she said, wanting to do him a kindness. Wanting to alleviate her own guilt at the love she felt for Gabriel. “I have made promises to a little girl and her father. I... I cannot walk away from those. I will not break my word. I’m so sorry. There’s no future for you and me. Maybe there never was.”
Spiros frowned. His hands digging into her shoulders, he said, “This is not over, Eleni mou. I refuse to give you up so easily after all these years. The Spaniard does not love you. He cannot make you happy.”
Eleni didn’t know how long she stayed in the stall after Spiros left, his dire warnings ringing in her ears.
But it didn’t matter.
Gabriel had spoiled her for anyone else.
* * *
I will not walk away from the promises I made. I will not break my word.
Eleni’s words to that man haunted Gabriel throughout the day. Damn it, of all the times for him to walk into the stables, of all the things he had to overhear coming from her mouth.
Had he thought her like his mother once? Or like Monique or his sister, Isabella, fickle and full of deceit?
Now he wished she was like them. That she didn’t care for anyone except her own happiness.
But of course not.
His wife was a bloody saint, forever willing to sacrifice her own happiness on the altars of others’ lives.
It was her choice to give up her happiness, something said in his head. A voice that sounded very much like the ruthless, arrogant man he’d been when he’d threatened to sink Drakon if a mere woman didn’t cater to his wishes.
He wanted to, God, how he wanted to forget what he had seen in the damn stables.
The pain of a lost future in her eyes, the tears that had fallen when Spiros had told her what her father had done. The way she had folded into that man’s arms as if she had no will left.
He would have given anything to un-see it, to carry on like he had been for weeks now. Putting Andreas off, making plans to take Eleni and Angelina away from the cursed palace, reminding himself again and again that Eleni had chosen this marriage, chosen this over some fantastic notion of love.
That she gave everything to it because she wanted to.
Yet the shadow of the man had hung over them. The idea of him waiting forever and Gabriel hiding it from her, crept into all the small spaces between them, until it had become an invisible wall. Until the guilt of it had made him withdraw from her.
Neither had it been missed by her. More than once, Gabriel had seen her hesitate before she said something to him, had seen the stricken look in her eyes when he didn’t meet her gaze or avoided spending time with her.
For weeks, he’d existed in a strange limbo, unwilling to let go of her but unable to live with the gift of her choice.
And now—now that he had seen her face, now that he’d heard what she said, he found it unbearable to live like this any longer.
Was this how his father had felt after his mother had come back? Knowing that she still mourned the lover that had abandoned her, yet unable to turn her away? Gabriel had considered it his weakness.
Had his father loved his mother that much then?
Was this how it felt to love someone?
Because he did. Because he wanted Eleni’s happiness above all else. He couldn’t bear the thought of the future without her but neither could he live with her, knowing that her heart would forever belong to another. Knowing that he had selfishly stolen her happiness from her.
“Gabriel? When did you return?”
He turned to see Eleni walk toward him in the sitting room, a shaky smile on her face. Her eyes looked dull, bruised, the remnants of her tears still on them.
“Just an hour ago. I had to sign some documents for my assistant.”
She reached him, and then registering his tense pose, a wariness filled her eyes. “I... I’ve been waiting to see you.”
“Why?” he asked abruptly, his heart crawling into her throat.
She took his hands into hers, turned them over and kissed the knuckles. “I... I wanted to thank you for my gift.” When he frowned, she sighed. “The Thoroughbred? Angelina spilled the beans, and he and I have already become friends. I’m already a little in love with him.” She rose up on her toes and kissed his lips. Only he shifted in the last moment and her lips landed on his jaw.
He nodded, then cleared his throat. But for the life of him, he didn’t know what to say to her. It was unbearable to be her husband, to steal the intimacy she gave so willingly when in truth she might wish it on another man.
He hated this power she had over him, hated how weak she made him. How she made him want to put his happiness in her hands, how she made the future without her look like an unending abyss.
A nervous laugh fell from her mouth, pulling her attention to him. “Gabriel, is everything all right?”
“Eleni...did you see Spiros again?”
Eleni blinked. “I... Gabriel...”
“Just answer the question, Princesa.”
The harsh note in his tone made her flinch. But she nodded, dread curling up in her chest. This morning, she’d been planning to pour her heart out to him. Now she was afraid to look into his eyes. Afraid that all she would see were distance and indifference.
“Yes, I did. Just an hour ago, in fact. He... Gabriel, it was a conversation he and I needed to have. I needed to see him one last time.” Anger flooded her, a much better emotion than the fear stealing up her throat. “You can’t believe that I’m having some supersecret affair with him right under your nose. If you think that, you’re a—”
“No, I believe you, Princesa. What I want to know is if he told you. What your father had done.”
“Yes, he did.” Tears filled her eyes again. But she didn’t grieve over herself. She felt sad for her father, who had only sought to control and manipulate his children and not love them. She felt sad for Spiros, who was a good man, and who had become a pawn in that game. “But you already made me tough, Gabriel. You already opened my eyes to what he’d been.”
“So that’s it? You’re over him now?”
“It’s all in the past, Gabriel. I vowed to be your wife, a mother to Angelina. And I’ve never broken my promise to anyone. Not to my father, not to Spiros, not to Andreas, and I’ll definitely not do that to you or Angelina. For better or worse.”
Gabriel had never wanted to hear those damn words out of her mouth ever again. It felt as if he couldn’t breathe, as if a part of him was being wrenched away. Like there was already a hole in his chest.
He could not do it anymore. He couldn’t live with her knowing that she wanted another man, another future. “There’s nothing more in this marriage for either of us, is there?”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“Angelina and I understand each other. But still, I would ask that you not terminate our marriage too soon. I’ll leave Drakon within the next day. Angelina will stay here with you.”
-->