"I wondered if you would ask about that. It’s no big secret. We were no longer compatible."
The photos would say otherwise, but so would the ones of my father and I when we’d been caught in someone’s lens.
"You're being deliberately cryptic,” I accused softly. “I don’t need to know intimate details, but I’d like to be aware of where I fit or if I'm being measured against a predecessor.”
His expression shifted, his thumb stilling against my skin. For a moment, he simply looked at me, his gaze penetrating as if peeling back layers I didn't know I had.
"You're not a replacement," he said finally, his voice dropping lower. "You're not measured against anyone who came before. There is no comparison. You aren’t stepping into someone else's shadow. You aren’t a continuation of an abandoned chapter. You’re the very beginning of something new."
"Something new," I repeated.
“Do you understand what it means to be my wife?" The question wasn't gentle. His eyes burned into mine. "Not the sanitized version from the doctrine. I'm asking if you understand what it means to be mine.”
He went on before I could answer.
“It means your safety becomes my singular obsession because my enemies will become your enemies. But that also means that when you walk into a room, you do so with the Kostas power wrapped around you like armor and trust no one will ever lay a hand on you again.”
His words settled into my bones, heavy with promise and threat intertwined.
"And what do you actually get from this arrangement?" I emboldened to ask.
His smiled down at me, but it wasn’t one I would call warm or sweet. "I get you."
“That doesn’t seem like a great trade-off.”
"You, your loyalty and your commitment to our future together will be more than worth it. Everything else we can negotiate in time.”
"You’re talking as if you know me well enough to be so sure of that. We only met recently,” I replied quietly.
"I've been aware of you for longer than you realize, Selene."
The admission sent a chill down my spine that wasn't entirely unpleasant. "That sounds disturbingly like stalking."
"It's called due diligence." His tone was matter-of-fact. "I don't enter arrangements blindly."
Well, that made sense. I already knew he didn’t blindly decide to make me his wife, but there had to be some driving force behind it he wasn’t telling revealing. I studied him, trying to decipher the layers beneath his words.
"That's not really much an answer."
"It's the only one that matters right now." His fingers finally slid from my neck, and he reached for my hand, his fingers entwining with mine.
It wasn't what I wanted to hear, but he’d already given far more than my father ever had. There were no false promises, no pretty lies. Just truth, however stark.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
We wound up at a white marble gazebo nestled between ancient cypress trees, their shadows dappling the stone floor with shifting patterns of light. A circular wooden bench, polished to a honeyed gleam, wrapped around the interior, and a fan spun above, circulating the air and keeping us cool.
Our conversation had ebbed and flowed like a nearby fountain I could hear but not see. I couldn't remember the last time I'd ever spoken so much, my usual careful silence abandoned somewhere along the winding cobblestone path that had led us here.
Alaric was settled beside me on the bench, his posture relaxed yet somehow still commanding the space. For a moment, we lulled in silence, the only sounds being the distant fountain and birds calling to each other from above. Then he turned toward me, his knee brushing against mine.
"Tell me about the men you've been with," he implored, his tone casual but his eyes intent. "Before me."
The question caught me off guard. "I thought you did your research," I replied, trying to keep my voice light. "Isn't that what you called it? Due diligence?"
Something flickered in his eyes—amusement or appreciation for my deflection. "I want to hear it from you. Not from reports or surveillance notes. From your lips."
I looked down at my hands, suddenly feeling exposed in a way that had nothing to do with the thin silk of my dress. The truth was simple enough but admitting it made me feel oddly vulnerable.