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She takes me to her flower greenhouse, and as we walk around, I decide that I want one like this for myself in the future. I’ve never paid attention to flowers, but Christos’s mother tells me that she considers caring for her orchids a kind of therapy.
“Why?” I ask, referring to her calling me special.
“You’ll hardly find anyone more indifferent to relationships than Christos, and yet here you are.”
“It’s not like your son has much of a choice, is it? I’m staying at his house.”
“You’re a smart girl, so answer me: why is my Christos in Boston and not in New York, where his main residence is?”
I stay silent, understanding what she means. With his fortune, Christos could go anywhere in the world during this crisis, and yet he’s chosen to stay with me.
A twinge of hope begins to grow in my heart.
“Our history is complicated.”
“I have time, and I consider myself a good listener.”
Their property is huge. We walk, now in the sun, and I explain everything to her, from the moment he caught me in Barcelona taking a picture on a forbidden floor of the ship to my return to the United States without saying goodbye and my meeting with him again.
“The accident you’re talking about, in addition to physically hurting him, messed with my son’s head a lot. Even if he had no reason for that, he blamed himself for the little girl. The man driving the car was drugged. Not only a little, but close to having overdosed. It could have killed them all.”
“I only believed Ernestine’s story because I didn’t know Christos well. Anyone who spends ten minutes with him knows he’s not the type to shy away from responsibilities.”
“You’re in love with him, Zoe.”
“I think I always have been. I didn’t have a choice. From our first exchange, he charmed me.”
She looks at me like she knows a secret, so I continue.
“I’m afraid of getting hurt, though. My fake marriage couldn’t hurt me because I never loved Mike, but Christos could destroy me.”
“I’m not a spokesman for other people’s feelings, kid. Every couple has its own rhythm and story, but my boy feels the same way about you. Although he hasn’t put it into words, I carried him for nine months, and I know Christos. Like his father, he only loves once, and you, my beautiful child, are the chosen one.”
Christos
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
BACK TO BOSTON
“How are you feeling?”I ask. We’re almost at the house I’ve rented for her parents.
“Excited. I know it’s nonsense because I talk to them on the phone, but my mom and dad are all I have in the world. My real family—what’s left of the biological one in Boston—other than the cousin I told you about, Madeline, I don’t give a damn about them.”
She said she was related to the Boston Turners. I had the misfortune of meeting the aunt she mentioned, Adley, at a gala dinner for charity a few years ago. She’s insufferable and arrogant and acts as if the universe should be grateful that she breathes the same air as the rest of humanity.
“They are well,” I say, referring to her parents.
“I know, and I’m very grateful for that.”
“Don’t you understand, after all we’ve been through, that there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to make you happy, Zoe?”
I’m not kidding, and I think she notices, but after a quick glance at me, she changes the subject. “The streets look like the ones on a TV show. The apocalypse, as if we were the only survivors.”
“Anyone who has the privilege of being able to work from home is being conscientious.”
We drive around in the car, and my attention, which was entirely on her, shifts to checking what she said. Rarely does a car pass us by.
“Many have lost their jobs,” she says.
