And the paralysis that had deepened with each incredible word out of Aris’s mouth shattered. She rocketed into the room.
He seemed taken aback at the sight of her. “Selene…” His rise to his feet was impeded by the same emotions ricocheting inside her, his eyes feverish on her face, making her feel treasured, needed, loved to her last cell. “I came to—”
She couldn’t bear for him to say one more word, to surrender any further. “I heard everything.”
His lips twitched, a tidal wave of heat entering his gaze. “Eavesdropping, agape mou?”
Before she could say anything more, a newly toddling Alex spilled into the room, fell flat on his face, came up on his hands and knees and ate up the distance between himself and Aris in an accelerated crawl, ending up launching himself at his father.
Aris groaned, his reddened eyes tearing as he swooped down and picked up Alex, as if he were diving after the heart that had spilled out of his chest.
Tears were now a constant stream flooding down Selene’s cheeks. Her heart almost burst with needing to throw herself into his arms and beg him to never let her go again. But she had to give him this moment with Alex first.
Suddenly, Aris kneeled before her, Alex and all. “Will you agree to marry me…again?”
She rained tears of joy on his face. “Oh, my love, I will agree to anything and everything you ask, for as long as I live.”
Alex was gazing up at her with the same expectation, shrieked with glee as her tears splashed on his gleaming cheeks. She swooped down on the two people who formed the soul that existed outside her body, hugged them with all her strength, showered them with her love and gratitude.
Aris gathered her with Alex between them, rocked on his heels as he broke out litanies of love and worship and relief. “My love for you and Alex has made me the person I was supposed to be before life forced me to steel my heart and hide inside my isolation. But don’t take my word for it. You can keep me on probation for as long as you see fit. In fact, I demand it.”
She squeezed him tighter, her tears running faster. “For all you put me through, for making me love you so much that I’m empty and lost without you, you deserve a few decades or so of probation.”
“I’ll outbid you,” he groaned against her cheeks, her eyes, her lips. “A life sentence, and beyond.”
A cough brought them out of their surrender to the bliss of finding each other again. They all turned to her brothers.
Lysandros was gaping at them. “All right. This is…disturbing.”
Damon snorted. “Tell me about it. This love thing is now officially the scariest sickness I’ve ever seen. Seeing Sarantos of all men in this condition is definitely creepy.”
Nikolas nodded his emphatic agreement. “It’s enough to make me run the other way the next time I see an attractive woman. I don’t want this to happen to me.”
Damon shuddered dramatically. “You and me both.”
Aris smirked at her brothers. “You better get down on your knees and pray this, or even a fraction of this, happens to you. It would be the one thing that would make your life worth anything.”
Her brothers rolled their eyes as if on cue.
Damon then looked at Selene in open amazement. “And to think our kid sister has the power to tame the world’s biggest monster, have him on a leash purring and rolling over this way.”
Lysandros nodded. “Guess we’ll have to take her really seriously from now on.”
Nikolas eyed Aris in consideration. “What worries me now is how the hell we’ll adjust from considering you public enemy number one to brother-in-law.”
“It’ll be a real challenge…Aris,” Lysandros said, letting the name slide off his tongue, clearly not liking its taste.
“Don’t.” Aris winced. “You keep on calling me Sarantos. Or don’t call me anything, if you prefer. But you don’t get to call me Aris. That’s Selene’s and only Selene’s.”
“Fine, what’s-your-name.” Damon laughed. “I’ll be watching you.”
Lysandros added, “Ditto. I think it’ll take another decade for me to wipe from my mind what the past ten years of you engraved in it.”
At that point, Apollo, whom she’d left at the mansion while she and Alex were away and hadn’t yet taken back home, scampered into the office and made a beeline for them, including Aris in his warmest welcome of his family.
Damon cracked a booming laugh. “All right. Maybe we don’t need to keep a close eye on you after all, Sarantos. Granted, you’re an uncanny enough businessman that your ‘proofs’ might ultimately mean nothing, while Selene loving you is of no consequence in my eyes, since she’s a woman and can be fooled. But Alex’s love for you gave me pause. Now Apollo seals the deal. A cat is the ultimate litmus test. If he thinks you’re okay, and evidently can’t get enough of you, you can’t be all bad.”
Nikolas and Lysandros laughed. Selene laughed, too, a new rush of relief and elation surging through her.
Even if all the heartache she’d suffered hadn’t led to uniting with Aris, it would have been worth it to see her brothers at ease together for once. Their love for her and their stand against what they’d perceived as a common enemy had made them put their differences aside. She could only hope, now that those unifying factors were no more, they wouldn’t become estranged again.
But for now, she couldn’t think about that. She only had one thing on her mind. Aris.
Leaving Alex and Apollo with her brothers, she grabbed Aris and his “briefcase of sacrifice” and ran them up to her old room.
The moment they entered, she pushed him against the door, climbed him, owned every inch of flesh she could reach with lips and hands made aggressive in her yearning.
He surrendered to her, letting her devour him, brand him, own him, a litany of bass groans rumbling from his depths. “S’aghapo, Selene, s’aphapo, apape mou.”
And she sobbed, “And I love you, my love, my Aris. I’ve loved you forever.”
He growled, took over.
He took her to her bed, threw them both down on it in a tangle of entwining limbs and lips and lingering sighs.
She didn’t know how or when, but he had them both naked, their flesh mingling, straining against each other with the fevered need to merge, to never part again.
Suddenly, before he could complete their union, she pushed him away.
He fell to his back. His shock became fierce protest as he realized why she’d left him.