Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
A vra
Once Elias left the house, Vik and Laya slowly exited my office. It was apparent that they heard everything said between Eli and me—his declaration of love, his claim that he could never hurt me, and that vow.
My throat burned thinking of it.
So many thoughts and so many emotions tumbled around in my mind. The flowers set on the low table before me were a blurry haze.
He’d looked so broken when he left.
I’d done that to him. He wasn’t the type to beg, and he’d knelt before me, pleading for me to listen to him.
He expected me to believe him innocent in this. And everything inside me wanted to, oh, how it tried to do just that.
“Avra.” Vik cleared his throat.
This was just too much.
Trust him or don’t?
Believe him or stand firm?
“Avra,” Vik called my name again, but this time with a harsher tone, snapping me out of the pit I found myself drowning within.
I looked at Vik. Instead of feeling discomfort for overhearing Eli and me exchange emotional words, I felt his compassion and understanding.
“Don’t make rash decisions while in this state.” He held my gaze and then said, “I will check in with the team and alert them to this news. I’m going to get the full recording.”
With that, he turned and walked away. He would find the truth, whatever it was.
This man, who raised me, someone who wasn’t one for hugs or loving words, had given me more emotions in the last hour than I’d received from him in years. Maybe he’d walled himself off to protect himself as I had done.
I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me, and then turned my attention to Laya as she entered my line of sight. As Eli had crouched in front of me, she perched on the edge of the low table.
I sighed so heavily that it took all my strength not to sob. It was the one thing I hadn’t allowed myself to do since losing Mama and Papa. A tear here or there was one thing, but breaking down, crying my eyes out, and allowing the pain locked inside me to rush out wasn’t something I allowed.
As the eldest, I stayed strong, protected my sisters, and gave them hope for a better future.
Except, I couldn’t muster a tiny grain of strength to do any of it.
If only the numbness I’d used to allow to overtake my emotions would work now.
Fuck, I’ve really lost sight of the plan.
All because of Elias Xenos. Because of how he made me feel and believe we could have something like real love.
Laya took my hands in hers. “That wasn’t how I expected things to go.”
“Queen of understatements as always, Layana.”
“What do you think?” she asked me.
I lifted a brow as if she had asked me to define the meaning of life. “I have a lot of thoughts. Why don’t you ask a more specific question?”
“Do you think Elias knows about any of it?” She furrowed her brow, and then her features softened as though it pained her to ask this. “Do you think he’s in on his father’s plans to deceive you?”
I firmed my lips in a tight press. “I don’t know. From the start, we both went in knowing our marriage was nothing more than a means to an end. A game of deception wrapped up in a business transaction.”
She nodded. “An act.”
“Yes.”
“You said was . Not is . ”
“Things changed, Laya. Now, I don’t know what to think.” The back of my throat burned. “It’s hard to accept all of it was a lie. That recording. None of it makes sense.”
I thought back to all of my times with him. Each one painted a poignant moment of intimacy. It wasn’t about the intense and addictive sex but the mundane things. Every time we’d shared a meal and talked about business, theories, and life in general. Just being with him had become so much more than a charade. Living with and waking up beside him every morning represented a deep commitment I never wanted to lose.
If this truly was one-sided, then I wasn’t sure how I’d overcome the heartache.
“Well…” Laya sucked in a long breath as if shoring up her courage to continue speaking.
Or maybe she searched for the best words to offer me. She was the one I leaned on for tough sisterly talks. Cali was the strategic one, and having her in the mix for business and planning came in handy. However, she was too soft and prone to emotions in such situations.
Vik was cold and analytical, and knowing how uncomfortable tears made him, I wouldn’t turn to him for this situation unless we waged war. Laya was more like me, balancing both, keeping her heart safe behind walls and staying tough on the outside.
“Well, what?”
She smiled sadly. “Well, maybe there’s more to what Eli said than what you’re telling yourself to believe. What if it all was a setup? ”
“That’s where my thoughts keep going, but everything lines up. I don’t know what to believe. Or who.”
She frowned, a crease forming between her brow.
“I know you aren’t lying. So get that murderous glare off your face.” I huffed.
“Then stop talking and hear me out.” She gestured at herself. “I’ll be the devil’s advocate for a moment here.”
I smirked. “Go right ahead.”
“And I’ll be honest. I didn’t like Elias at first.”
“Because he is the son of Mama’s murderer?”
“That.” She rested her elbows on her knees for a beat. “He was just so…harsh at first. I swore the man couldn’t smile, not even fake it.”
Because he’s not a fake man, he is—was—real. What you saw was what you got with Elias. Or so I’d been duped into believing.
“He had this inner darkness, this lethal vibe, and yeah, it did make me uneasy to think of you being stuck with him, within reach if he were to be abusive like so many husbands can be.”
I shook my head. “He’s a hard man, but not toward me.”
Any and all bruises or marks he left on my body were the result of unhinged, carnal lust and pure, uninhibited desire.
I’d keep that information to myself, or it would derail the conversation.
“After you returned from your honeymoon, I saw that. Elias made you happy, physically, at least. Do you remember that lunch? You couldn’t stop blushing. No man has ever made you blush or smile so carefree like that, no one until him. And you can’t fake that.”
I nodded, my cheeks heating, thinking about how I must have looked that day from her perspective.
“I figured he was hung and knew how to use it. Yay for Avra.” She gave me a mocking fist pump.
I glared at her. “Really?”
“Shh. I’m still talking.” She put a finger to her lips. “What proved that he cared about those you cared about was when he sent his men to back up ours, ensuring we were protected here. Then he arranged the whole thing for you with the trio. Those were his father’s friends. He went against his father’s allies. That’s pretty cut and dried. If he were working with Ozias, I can’t see him serving up his friends for you to slaughter.”
She was right. That didn’t add up in any other way.
“Not only that. I’ve studied the way he watches you. You’ve had my back for fifteen years, Avra. Mine and Cali’s. Hell, even Vik’s. You are a protector.”
I stared at her, wishing I could take faith in whatever observations she would share with me.
“Elias does for you what you do for us—always keeping an eye on you, watching you. Your comfort is his priority. He genuinely cares if you’re happy.”
“But his father…and the video.”
“Let me address each one separately. His father is an evil asshole. Him. Not Elias. Ozias is a bastard we need to put down. But Elias is not his father.”
I liked her comparison, separating the two. The more she elaborated on her opinions, the more swayed I was to believe her.
“And the recording,” she continued. “I’m suspicious why we only have that small clip, not the whole conversation. Doesn’t it make you wonder why the soldier didn’t want us to see and hear the whole thing?”
“Vik will have the answer to that question soon enough,” I said, looking down at the rings on my left hand. “And for Eli, I will know the truth based on how he handles this situation with Ozias. He’ll prove you wrong if he follows his father’s orders.”
“And if he doesn’t?” she pressed. “If he stops or tries to prevent his father from seeing his plan through?”
“Then I’ll reconsider and have faith that he does love me.”
Layana smiled a bit wider, pleased. She patted my knee. “I respect that. Given the circumstances and how hard we’ve worked and planned to get to this point, I would decide the same.”
“Thank you.” Her support helped.
“I mean, I’ve never been in love. It looks like I won’t have a chance to discover it, but I can imagine that maybe love overrules hate in some regards.”
I hope so. I badly wanted to think that Elias’s love would triumph over anything his father wanted him to do or go along with.
Deep down, I wanted so strongly to trust my husband. I yearned to believe him after all we’d managed to build. He’d broken down and smashed apart so many barriers to my heart, and now all of this. It was cruel. It was unfair. And I hated that I wanted to stomp and rage that both circumstances shouldn’t interfere with my future.
Because that alternative was too bitter and sour of a reality to accept, now that I’d let Elias in and given him carefully dosed-out permission to creep into my heart and mind, it would be far more painful to endure the aftermath of not having him so close.
“How mad will Cali be at us for leaving her out of this discussion? I’m sure she will have some choice words.”
I rolled my eyes. “If by choice, you mean the colorful string of acronyms I can’t decipher. I’m sure she will.”
“Actually…” She frowned, glancing at her phone. “I haven’t heard from her at all today.”
That wasn’t like her. She kept us in the loop on everything.
“She wasn’t at the house?” I checked.
She shrugged. “Well, I wasn’t either. Vik and I were out talking, and then I went out last night, pretending to be a college girl, and ended up with too many secrets to keep to myself. I slept in after the drinking”—at my glare, she sighed—“not that much drinking. Still, I thought waiting until today to tell you would make more sense. I didn’t want to barge into the ‘just married and we like to fuck in the kitchen’ house that late to talk.”
“Are you kidding me?”
She shrugged. “The staff knows it all, Avra.”
“The house was empty,” I surmised.
“Keep believing that…” Laya looked at her phone again, scrolling through her texts. “She didn’t message. That’s not like her at all.”
I grabbed my phone to see when I last spoke with her. Texts were our go-to, not calls, but still?—
I snapped into sister mode, my attention squarely back to a protector duty. Cali didn’t often wander and strike off on her own. Someone would always tail her. Security was a given. Even if she wanted to be alone, she was more of a homebody, preferring books and sketching in her notebooks than taking off and getting out.
“I forgot. We were going to meet up, but she changed plans and said something about an information session on upcoming classes at the university library.”
Laya smiled. “Yeah. And I’m pretty sure she said something to me yesterday morning about books on loan.”
We shared a knowing look. Cali at a library? She needed a tracker in a building full of books.
Laya got up, tilting her head toward the kitchen. “How about we make something to eat before you start overthinking everything? There is nothing you can do without more information.”
I got to my feet, appreciating her offer to keep me company.
“Unless I’m overstaying…”
I grabbed her hand and led her to the kitchen. “Not at all. I must stay preoccupied and not dwell on whether I’ll still want to keep my husband.”
I do.
My motives had to stay contingent on what he decided with his father first.