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But that had been the daydream of a forcibly sheltered girl on the cusp of womanhood, whose only true exposure to the opposite sex had been the tall, dark Greek with brooding, hungry eyes. Hadn’t it?
She exhaled, her eyes flying open, in a wild bid to dispel the thoughts weaving so seductively in her head. The whispered what ifs that pressed so heavily on her, demanding attention. Ares’s terms said five years, after which they would separate...if she wanted to leave. That meant the option to stay was hers. Wasn’t it?
What if she agreed to his terms—for now—with a view to altering them later?
Odessa gulped down a rising bolt of unease. But it wouldn’t diminish.
She’d requested his help on a wild whim that had saved her from a fate worse than death. Dared she risk gambling again, on making this work too?
Her thoughts were still spinning when she finally fell into a restless sleep.
Alarmingly she felt stronger when she woke, showered and dressed a few short hours later, and then went to find the man who’d put his ring on her finger last night, and tossed her world into pure chaos.
The sun was barely peeking through the ancient Roman buildings, but Ares was already up and dressed, sipping an espresso on the same terrace Odessa had used yesterday.
He rose from the pristinely set table the moment she stepped out, dressed once more in her jeans and another simple top, and she couldn’t fail to see the contrast between them.
But for all his suave exterior and iron composure, his neatly combed hair and polished shoes, there was a coiled tension within him, an intensity in his eyes, that said her answer mattered to him. That perhaps he’d donned this bespoke armour because there was a chink he was determined to guard.
Delusional, perhaps, but Odessa ruthlessly clung to that, the same way she’d excavated pockets of defiance to fight her oppression over the years. She’d lost more than she’d won, but fighting had kept her spirits alive. And as long as she had breath in her body she’d keep fighting.
Especially if she was fighting for her children.
Because somewhere in the early hours she’d reasoned that if Ares truly was doing this for his father, and he wasn’t completely heartless in his endeavour, then perhaps at some point down the road she might sway him into accepting a different, better role than full custody.
And if he didn’t?
She shrugged inwardly. Then she’d just fight harder.
She’d persuaded him into granting her a lifeline out of the hell she’d faced in her father’s house, hadn’t she?
‘Odessa.’
Her name was a command. And, really, wasn’t she just torturing herself by withholding the answer she’d decided to give?
Slicking her tongue over dry lips, she stepped forward. The vital need to look into his eyes and see something...anything that would give her hope...was too compelling to deny.
‘It’s a yes, Ares. My answer is yes.’
She saw it then. The quiet exhalation. The release of tension. The flash of relief in his eyes.
She held up her hand when he opened his mouth to speak.
‘But before you celebrate, you should know this. I won’t abandon my children. Ever. No matter what.’
His eyes glinted fiercely with layers of triumph, then surprise, before settling on heavy scepticism. ‘We’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?’
He might deny them, but she intended to remind herself of those vital tells. Frequently.
Ares wasn’t inhuman.
She would change his mind down the road.
Anything else was unthinkable.
She raised her chin, met his gaze. ‘Hold your breath if you want. Or don’t. I won’t even bother with I told you so when the time comes.’
They landed in Athens later that afternoon to frenzied tabloid interest.
