Nero

CHAPTER 56

NERO ZANTHOS

I stop in front of Nina’s door at eight thirty in the morning. Her shift ends at seven, so according to Atlas, Rosa should already be on her way to daycare with Kael, and Nina is home alone. I thought she’d prefer this conversation in private.

I look down at the envelope in my hands.

All the terms Apollo drafted are inside. In them, I make it clear that I’m renouncing any claim to Kael’s custody—full or shared. I place myself entirely at Nina’s discretion and ask only to be allowed to be part of my son’s life, under whatever conditions his mother deems appropriate.

I ring the doorbell once.

Footsteps sound almost immediately on the other side. They draw closer—then fade away again. I wonder if we’re going to have to talk through the mail slot another time. The thought makes me smile.

The tightness in my chest has loosened, and the ease of my smiles is only the smallest consequence of that. The full-breath feeling that hit me the moment I stood face-to-face with Nina—without barriers—still feeds my lungs, making life lighter just from knowing where she is.

God, not knowing was unbearable.

I know we still have a long road ahead. I know I have a long road ahead. But there is a road, damn it. There is a path—and that’s far more than I’ve had in the last five years.

Less than a minute after the footsteps retreat, they approach again. The door opens—but it isn’t Nina.

Rosa stands there, a broom in hand, her expression hard.

“I was expecting you.”

***

The look on Nina’s face when she turns onto her street and finds me sitting on her front steps is pure frustration. She blinks, as if she can’t trust her own eyes, and stops walking.

She’s dressed much like yesterday—jeans, a T-shirt, sneakers—but today her hair is pulled up high, leaving her face completely exposed.

Her attention locks on me. When she realizes that no matter how many times she blinks I’m not disappearing, Nina lets out a tired sigh and resumes walking toward her house—toward me.

“Hi, Little Fae,” I call, my voice loud enough to reach her from where I sit.

She closes her eyes and presses her index and middle fingers to the bridge of her nose. I need to watch myself with the nickname.

“I’m exhausted, Nero. I just finished an eighteen-hour shift. I can’t deal with you right now,” she says, stepping into her yard.

“I told you—I can come back whenever it’s convenient. Just tell me when.”

“Or what?” she snaps as she reaches the steps and I stand. “You’ll keep cornering me at my own door every chance you get?”

“I just want to talk to you, Nina.”

She looks away, biting her lip, as tired as she said she was.

“It’s impressive how suddenly willing you are to do that,” she replies, acid in her tone.

I nod. “You’re right.”

“Forgive me,” I say—for the first time. It wasn’t until I lay down in the small hotel bed last night, wearing an idiotic smile, that I realized the most important word had never left my mouth. “Forgive me, Nina.”

I say it with all the honesty I have when she stops in front of me and stares as if the last few seconds are too absurd to be real.

“And now what?” she asks. “I should hug you, kiss you, tell you everything’s fine? That we can go back to being a happy family?”

Her restraint makes the violence in her tone sharper. “Like I told you yesterday—you’re too late.”

“I won’t lie and say that isn’t where I want to get to,” I answer. “I do want us to be a happy family. But I don’t expect forgiveness overnight.”

She laughs, bitter.

“I’m amazed you expect forgiveness at all, Nero. How noble—wanting your lost family back. I wonder what your current wife thinks of that. Does she know you’re here?”

“My what?” I blink, eyebrows lifting, my voice coming out too sharp.

“You didn’t marry her too? Don’t tell me she’s the next stop on this trip. Does Kael have a brother he needs to meet?”

She fires the questions aggressively, and even though I have no idea what she’s talking about, I rush to answer.

“I didn’t get married. You were the only woman in my life from the moment I laid eyes on you that Christmas night, Nina.”

My Little Fae freezes, as if she’s calculating the exact meaning of my words. I don’t expect her to believe me—not now, not when all she sees is someone she needs to get rid of as fast as possible.

But it doesn’t make what I said any less true.

Nina was the only one. Since she left, I haven’t been with anyone—emotionally or physically. There was nothing left of me to give. Everything I was, Nina took with her when she left.

“My mother heard it,” she says.

I resent Rosa a little for that. She conveniently left out the detail—Nina’s belief that I’m married—from our conversation this morning. I suppose broom hits and cries of pain count as communication, right?

“The day Kael was born, Atlas called. You were talking in the background. My mother heard the boys mention your fiancée.”

I frown.

“Can we have this conversation inside?”

“No.”

I nod.

“I was never engaged, Nina. I never married. I was never even close to a relationship. That was just another of my mother’s schemes—trying to force me to replace you at any cost.”

The word makes Nina flinch, and I head her off before she can accuse me.

“You don’t need to worry about her. Ever again. We’re not a package. My mother isn’t part of our lives—and she never will be.”

I say it with all the force of my resentment, and I think it resonates with Nina long enough for me to add, “What she did can’t be undone. But her presence can. I don’t want her anywhere near you—or me.”

She considers that.

“What do you need? Proof?” I offer. “In fifteen minutes I can bring every document showing my marital status hasn’t changed in the last five years.

Proving I wasn’t engaged might be harder—I don’t know how to prove the absence of something that never happened—but if that’s what you need, say the word, Nina, and I’ll get it.

I’ve been guilty of many things—many—but not that. ”

She listens carefully before looking away.

“Fine. That means we’re your only stop. But you have a date to leave, right? When?”

I shouldn’t smile—certainly not this widely—but I can’t stop it.

“Never, Nina. I’m never leaving you again.”

She laughs, disbelieving. “I think you lost your mind over those five years.”

“You have no idea how right you are. And that’s just one more reason to stay—yesterday was the first time I felt sane again.”

She shakes her head and steps around me, climbing the stairs to her door.

“I’m too tired to keep having this conversation.”

She reaches into her bag for her keys. I draw a deep breath.

“Can I—”

“If you ask for a hug again, Nero, I swear I don’t know what I’ll do,” she cuts in. I laugh, which only makes her angrier. Beautiful. Absurdly beautiful.

My hands itch to touch her, but I restrain myself, tucking the envelope under my arm and shoving my hands into my pockets. Mental note: no clothes without pockets for the foreseeable future.

“Meet him, Nina. I was going to ask to meet him.”

Her eyes widen instantly, just like they did when we were kids.

“No!” she says, vehement.

I nod, accepting it, but hurry to explain.

“I promise that’s all I want. Nothing else. I brought this.”

I offer her the documents. “They’re guarantees. I’m fully renouncing any present or future claim to Kael’s custody—full or shared. All I want is to be part of my son’s life in whatever way you allow.”

Nina lowers her gaze to the envelope, studying it with suspicion before taking it.

Her eyes stay on our hands for a long moment before she answers.

“No. If you want anything from me or my son, we’ll handle it in court.”

“We’ll do it your way,” I agree. “If you want court, we’ll go to court. But I won’t say anything different there than I’m saying now. I told you yesterday I wouldn’t work against you, and I’m telling you today that I want nothing beyond what you’re willing to give me. Please—read them.”

I let go of the envelope. Her arm drops, but she keeps holding it.

She doesn’t look away from me. For a second, I glimpse the size of the walls I’ll have to tear down to get where I need to be—with my son and his mother.

They don’t scare me.

Whatever it takes, I’ll do it. And after that, I’ll do everything else too.

“Mama?” a small voice called from behind the door.

My eyes widen.

My heart starts racing, and I’m sure Nina will send me away—but Kael’s voice seems to make her forget I exist. She slips the key into the lock and opens the door, and I freeze when the little blond boy is revealed.

He’s small. Of course he is—Kael isn’t even four yet. His eyes are blue like mine. His face is exactly like mine when I was a child—because it’s far too much like my adult face now.

My gaze takes in the blue Superman T-shirt, the black shorts, the colorful socks—and lingers on the red fabric tied around his neck like a cape.

He's a carbon copy of me. Anyone seeing us side by side would know Kael is my son.

My son.

And he looks just like me.

Fuck. Holy shit.

I bite the tip of my tongue until I taste blood, trying to keep the tears at bay. I am dangerously close to crying, and that would be hard to explain to a child.

I watch Nina crouch to speak to him, smile at him, and wrap his small arms around her neck—but I hear nothing. The world goes muffled. Only my vision works, hyper-focused.

I register every detail: the narrow nose, high cheeks, thick brows. Kael’s lips are small and pink, and there’s a tiny scar on his forehead whose story I already want to know.

I want to know everything about him.

My God. How much time did I lose?

The cost of all those years drops onto my shoulders like crushing weight.

“Are you daddy?”

The same small voice breaks through the sound barrier and wraps around my lungs. I can’t breathe. Did he just—

“You look a lot like me. Like me grown up, right, Mom?” he asks, turning to Nina, who keeps her eyes on my unraveling.

I want to tell Kael yes—that I’m his father—but I promised Nina I’d do everything on her timeline. So I don’t answer. I don’t deny it, but I don’t confirm it either.

“Can I give you a hug?” I ask, crouching to get closer to his height.

Kael looked at me for barely a second before flinging his arms around my neck without fear.

That’s all it takes.

His joy pulls the tears free. I use the hug to wipe them away without him noticing, holding him tight against me.

I… I don’t know how to describe it. I only know I would never be whole if I lost him again.

He still smells like a baby.

Fuck—I’m going to cry again.

Kael pulls back, saving me.

“Are you still a prince?” he asks, adding surprise to the storm of emotions on my face. “Mom said my daddy was the prince of Khione and that’s why he was far away—because he had to work. Are you done working? Are you very hungry?”

He asks question after question without waiting for answers—mercifully—because the only one I can manage is the last.

“No. I’m not very hungry.”

“Oh, good!” he says. “Grandma’s going out and only made food for two, but I’ll share with you.”

I look at Nina.

“Can he have lunch with us, Mom?”

I’m certain she’ll say no.

It would be fair. It would be understandable.

Nina’s gaze moves between our son and me a few times before she answers.

“He can.”

The smile on Kael’s face becomes my new sun.

I don’t need another. Even if the real one disappeared tomorrow, I wouldn’t miss it.

“Okay!” he says, reaching for his mother’s hand—and mine—pulling us inside. “You can have all the broccoli and peppers. I don’t like them at all.”

And I thank the heavens when he turns and drags us inside before we can stand, because I cry again—and this time it’s impossible to hide it.

There are many tears. Fast ones.

I hate broccoli and peppers too.

It’s stupid—but I can’t stop feeling everything.