her vision adjusted, his beloved shape materialized out of the darkness, and emotion twisted in her throat as it always did whenever she beheld him. It regularly blindsided her, the power of her feelings for him.
He was so achingly beautiful, so frightfully perfect, she lived in dread of anything happening to him. She wondered if all mothers invented nightmares about the catastrophic potential of everything their children did or came in contact with or if she was the one who’d been a closet neurotic, and having Leo had only uncovered her condition.
Even though she was unable to see him clearly in the dark, his every pore and eyelash were engraved in her mind. If anyone had suspected she’d been with Maksim, they would have realized at once that Leo was his son. He was his replica after all. Just like Alex was Aristedes’s. When she’d first set eyes on Alex, she had exclaimed that cloning had been achieved. Now their daughter Sofia was the spitting image of Selene.
Every day made Leo the baby version of his impossibly beautiful father. His hair had the same unique shade of glossy mahogany, with the same widow’s peak, and would no doubt develop the same relaxed wave and luxury. His chin had the same cleft, his left cheek the same dimple. In Maksim’s case, since he’d appeared to be incapable of smiling, that dimple had winked at her only in grimaces of agonized pleasure at the height of passion.
The only difference between father and son was the eyes. Though Leo’s had the same wolfish slant, it was as if he’d mixed her blue eyes and Maksim’s golden ones together in the most amazing shade of translucent olive green.
Feeling her heart expanding with gratitude for this perfect miracle, she bent and touched her lips to Leo’s plump downy cheek. He gurgled contentedly and then flounced to his side, stretching noisily before settling into an even sounder sleep. She planted one more kiss over his averted face before finally straightening and walking out.
Closing the door behind her, she leaned against it. But instead of the familiar depression, something new crept in to close its freezing fingers around her heart. Rage. At herself.
Why had she given Maksim the opportunity to be the one to walk out on her? How had she been that weak?
She had felt his withdrawal. So why had she clung to him instead of doing what she herself had stipulated from the very beginning? That if the fire weakened or went out, they’d end it, without attempts to prolong its dying throes?
But in her defense, he’d confused her, giving her hope her doubts and observations of his distance had all been in her mind, when after each withdrawal he’d come back hungrier.
Still, that had been erratic, and it should have convinced her put a stop to it.
But she’d snatched at his offer to be there for her, even in that impersonal and peripheral way of his, had clung to him even through the dizzying fluctuation of his behavior. She’d given him the chance to deal her the blow of his abrupt desertion. Which she now had to face she hadn’t gotten over, and might never recover from.
Rage swerved inside her like a stream of lava to pour over him, burning him, too, in the vehemence of her contempt.
Why had he offered what he’d had no intention of honoring? When she’d assured him she hadn’t considered it his obligation? But he’d done worse than renege on his promise. Once he’d had enough of her, he’d begrudged her even the consideration of a goodbye.
Not that she’d understood, or believed that he had actually deserted her at the time.
Believing there must be another explanation, she’d started attempting to contact him just a day after his disappearance,
The number he’d assigned her had been disconnected. His other numbers had rung without going to voice mail. Her emails had gone unanswered. None of his associates had known anything about him. Apart from his acquisitions and takeovers, there’d been no other evidence of his continued existence. It had all pointed to the simple, irrefutable truth: he’d gone to serious lengths to hide his high profile, to make it impossible for her to contact him.
Yet for months she hadn’t been able to sanction that verdict. She’d grown frantic with every failure, even when logic had said nothing serious could happen to him without the whole world knowing. But, self-deluding fool that she was, she’d been convinced something terrible had happened to him, that he wouldn’t have abandoned then ignored her like that.
When she’d finally been forced to admit he’d done just that, it had sent her mad wondering...why?
She’d previously rationalized that his episodic withdrawal was due to the fact that her progressing pregnancy was making it too real for him, probably interfering with his pleasure, or even turning him off her.
Her suspicions had faltered when those instances had been interrupted by even-wilder-than-before encounters. But his evasion of her attempts to reach him had forced her to sanction those suspicions as the only explanation. Then, to make things worse, the deepening misery of her pregnancy’s last stages had forced another admission on her.
It hadn’t been anguish, or addiction, or needing closure.
She’d fallen in love with Maksim.
When she’d faced that fact, she’d finally known why he’d left. He must have sensed the change in her before she’d become conscious of it, had considered it the breaking point. Because he’d never change.
But if she’d thought the last months of her pregnancy had been hellish, they’d been nothing compared to what had followed Leo’s birth. To everyone else, she’d functioned perfectly. Inside, no matter what she’d told herself—that she had a perfect baby, a great career, good health, a loving family and financial stability—she’d known true desolation.
It hadn’t been the overwhelming responsibility for a helpless being who depended on her every single second of the day. It had been that soul-gnawing longing to have Maksim there with her, to turn to him for counsel, for moral support. She’d needed to share Leo with him, the little things more than the big stuff. She’d needed to exclaim to him over Leo’s every little wonder, to ramble on about his latest words or actions or a hundred other expected or unique developments. Sharing that with anyone who wasn’t Maksim had intensified her yearning for him.
Her condition had worsened until she’d started feeling as if he was near, as if she’d turn to find him looking at her with that uncontainable passion in his eyes. Many times she’d even thought she’d caught glimpses of him, her imagination playing havoc with her mind. And each time this mirage had dissolved, it had been as if he’d walked out on her all over again. Those phantom sensations, that need that wouldn’t subside, had only made her more bereft.
Now all that only poured fuel on her newfound fury. But anger felt far better than despondence. It made her feel alive. She hadn’t felt anywhere near that since he’d left.
She was done feeling numb inside. She’d no longer pretend to be alive. She’d live again for real, and to hell with everything she...
The bell rang.
Her heart blipped as her eyes flew to the wall clock. 10 p.m. She couldn’t imagine who it could be at this hour. Besides, anyone who came to see her would have buzzed her on the intercom, or, at the very least, her concierge would have called ahead to check with her first. So how could someone just arrive unannounced at her door?
The only answer was Kassandra. Maybe she’d left something behind. Probably her phone, since she hadn’t called ahead.
She rushed to the door, opened it without checking the peephole...and everything screeched to a halt.
Her breath. Her heart. The whole world.
In the subdued lights of the spacious corridor he loomed, dark and huge, his face eclipsed by the door’s shadow, his eyes glowing gold in the gloom.
Maksim.
Inside the cessation, a maelstrom churned, scrambling her senses. Heartbeats boomed in her chest. Air clogged in her lungs. Had she been thinking of him so