67. Lourdes – One Week Later
Lourdes – One Week Later
Nine weeks have passed since the day Ares appeared in Sandrine’s facility, shattering the fragile walls of our separation and setting up a new world to explore, thrive, and love.
Morning greets the desert differently from any other place I’ve woken up. Even Santorini. Wild animals scurrying across the vast openness, living, mating, and dying, until the sun comes up and the morning breathes.
If desert wildlife shenanigans are anything like the way my husband takes me, humans would be overrun with desert cottontails, coyotes, and lizards. As gentle as Ares is making love to me in my condition, he’s primal and raw about it.
It hits me after a few blinks that today is a day I’ve both looked forward to and stressed about.
If we didn’t have these two months working together for Sandrine and getting to really know each other more than before, I may not have believed he loved me.
He told me the day he arrived. He showed me every day that followed. He never pressured me to go home with him or to move our relationship faster than the pace I set.
When I shift beneath the covers to stretch, he stirs immediately. Arms already around my waist tighten, and when I look up at him, his gray-violet eyes gently open from a deep sleep.
“You have a few more hours, my love,” he murmurs, not a hint of resentment that he’s not in New York. “Rest. This will be a long day for you.”
For a moment, I simply study him. The softened lines bracketing his mouth and the faint shadow of stubble along his jaw belong to the real man he let me see. Someone no one else gets.
He’s mine.
“Thank you for staying all this time,” I say softly. “I’m not sure I’ve told you that.
After that first day when we made love here, Ares left his guards at the fancy hotel and has been sleeping under this roof with me. This snug one bedroom. Every night.
He watches me for a beat, and then his expression eases into something warm and unguarded.
“You never have to thank me for giving you what you need,” he replies gently. “I stayed because you weren’t ready to leave your sister. And I wasn’t leaving here without you.” He kisses me.
Something inside my chest bursts with warmth and excitement.
We make gentle love like most mornings, then we shower and make love again.
We’re leaving today. My husband is needed in New York, and agreeing to stay his wife means my place is with him. Sandrine is stable. Our cousin is here.
“Elodie said we can leave our clothes,” I say, picking through what I want to bring home to New York.
“That’s until I buy us a house,” he says.
The first spark of tension in months flashes through me. “What do you mean?”
He smiles and pulls me close. Answering calmly, he says, “This is where you want Sandrine to be. You like it here. I like it here. It makes sense to have your own place here.”
“Ares…”
“Know this, my love. I will not take decisions away from you, but you are my wife and the mother of my child. That means I take care of you. In every way, especially financially. There will be no negotiation on that.”
His gentle words settle over me slowly. He rests his hands lightly against my waist, cradling the life growing between us.
I relax in his arms. “Thank you. I’d love it if we had a house here.”
But I don’t immediately tell Elodie that when we see her later that morning on our way out to spend one last day with Sandrine.
“Hey, El.” I walk toward her, watering potted succulents on her back patio. “We’re heading to Marlowe. And then to the airport.”
Elodie puts down her watering can and faces us. “Sandrine will be fine. I’ll be there almost every day.”
“In a couple of weeks they’re starting the memory restoration therapy,” I say slowly. “The stage where they tell her she’s not Jessica Parker.”
We all collectively brace, knowing that will be a turning point for Sandrine.
“I’ll be here for that,” I add, nodding.
Ares grips my hand. “We’ll both be here.”
Elodie leans in and hugs me. “He’s a keeper,” she whispers.
I smile in agreement. “I’ll call you tomorrow to see how she’s doing.”
“It was nice meeting you, Ares.” Elodie hugs my husband.
“I thank you for letting Lourdes stay with you.”
“You’re both welcome back.” Her phone rings, and her eyes light up. “I gotta take this.”
Watching her scamper away, Ares says, “Did she get the person in Las Vegas to talk?”
“She’s still working on it.” I smile at Elodie talking to the source she’s trying to break. “And no, Ares. You can’t find the guy and beat him up.”
Ares just laughs and steers me to the SUV he bought for himself and the guards who have been here with him this whole time. “Like you can stop me.”
Shaking my head, I get into the back of the Escalade, and Ares sits beside me.
We reach the facility ten minutes later. Stepping into the familiar lobby tightens my chest with the knowledge that I’m saying goodbye. At least this one isn’t in the shadows of many separations she and I have faced.
Sandrine sits with her sketchpad in the blooming garden behind the main building. When she sees us approaching, she smiles at our clasped hands.
Will there be love for her one day? I never thought about that until now. Maybe that’s how far she’s come, and I didn’t notice until I stepped back. How she smiles that I’m happy maybe means she sees herself being happy like this, too.
Oh… Ares will have something to say about that. He already acts like her older, bossy brother.
I sit next to her in the garden and kiss her on the side of the head.
“I can’t believe it’s already the day you’re leaving,” she says, being brave about it. “I feel like we just got here.”
“I know,” I reply softly. “But Elodie will be here later and most days that. I’ll be back frequently for visits.”
She studies me carefully, and then she smiles in a way that feels stronger than anything I’ve seen from her since the accident. For just that second, she’s the Sandrine I kissed goodbye to go back to college.
“It’s okay, Lourdes,” she says. “I never expected you’d stay here forever just because of me.”
My throat tightens. “I never minded staying.”
“I know,” she replies gently. “But you deserve your life with a husband who loves you and your baby.”
Ares steps toward us, and seeing him, she smiles and sits straight up. A look passes between them. He’s been visiting her himself here and there. Getting to know her. I found it incredibly sweet.
I turn to face my husband. But he lowers to one knee in front of me in the middle of the rehabilitation garden, in front of patients, nurses, therapists, and my sister. For a man like Ares Zervas, born of the Gods, a man who never bends to anyone, this is his surrender.
“Ares…”
“Lourdes Zervas. You are already my wife. But I denied you a proper marriage proposal. I denied you the truth about what you mean to me and why I really wanted you to be my wife. It was complicated before. But now it’s simple.
I love you.” He takes out a velvet box. “This is empty. It’s a symbol of the ring I want you to pick out. ”
I blink. “Ares, the ring you gave me was beautiful. And the wedding bands. And the dress you picked out and our whole wedding. This proposal was the only part missing. I don’t want to do any of it over again.
I’m your wife. I want to stay your wife.
And now I have this memory of you declaring for me. ”
He stands up. “I’ll declare for you every day. I just need to ask you the question. Will you be my wife, Lourdes?”
“Yes, Ares, I’ll be your wife.” I can add stay, but that’s not who we are anymore.
He kisses me, and a smattering of cheering erupts from behind us. Sandrine rushes into our circle, and we both hug her, too.
I recall thinking Ares would be turned off by her disability, her injuries, the care she needs. It’s turned him into someone I’m not sure he knew he was deep inside.
“You call us with anything you need,” he tells Sandrine. “You’re my sister, too.”
Sandrine leans forward and lowers her voice just enough that she thinks I can’t hear.
“Take care of Lourdes,” she whispers to him. “She’s too strong to ask for it.”
But I do hear it, and tears spill down my face, hot and unrestrained.
Ares’s answer is steady and certain. “You can count on that, too.”
We spend another hour at Marlowe, Ares not rushing me. Sandrine’s hug goodbye feels stronger than ever. I remind myself this isn’t goodbye.
When Ares finally steers me to the SUV, I give one look back and see Sandrine sitting once again with her sketchbook. The look of ease on her face that I will not be there tomorrow or the day after that steadies me.
Ares takes my hand. “She’s amazing, Lourdes. And that’s because you never gave up on her.”
Sniffing, I say, “And I can take the jet back here anytime I want?”
“As often as you want. As often as you need.” He kisses our linked hands. “And I hope you’ll let me come with you when my schedule allows.”
“I would love that.” Relief moves through me like a long, slow breath.
“You changed my life, Lourdes,” he says softly. “And I’ll spend the rest of it making sure you never forget how much I love you.”
“Ares…” I don’t know what to say, so I just put my head on his shoulder.
We drive for a few minutes, and then Ares sits up. “Lourdes, when Sandrine finds out her name isn’t Jessica Parker, will she learn the other truth?” he asks, concern in his voice.
His question makes me wonder how my sister will react if we tell her she’s also engaged. To a man we’ve been keeping her from.
“She doesn’t remember Kirill at all,” I say, shaking my head. “We’ve been talking more about the past. She doesn’t mention him or any past boyfriends or dates. No one. Nothing.”
Ares is silent for a moment before he says, “Then perhaps she doesn’t need to know that part of it.”
I glance up at him. “You think we shouldn’t tell her?”
“Not yet,” he says calmly. “Let her accept who she is first. The rest can wait.”
After a moment, I nod. “I think you’re right.”
Ares’s jet waits for us at a private airport. I board the plane, and when the attendant welcomes me as Mrs. Zervas this time, I finally feel like I’m Ares’s real wife.