The dismissive hand rose again. ‘Do you think you are the first member of our family to impregnate a woman out of wedlock? You’re wealthy in your own right. There are means, if the will is strong enough.’
‘Are you suggesting that I shouldn’t marry her?’ Now he really was shocked. He knew how much importance his grandfather placed on matrimony, and how important it was to him to see the family line secured.
‘I am suggesting you think in more depth about it before you tie yourself into a marriage neither of you can back away from.’ His lined face softened. ‘Whatever you choose...know that I will support you. Now, let us meet our guests and enjoy the day.’
* * *
Theseus dragged himself off the sofa in his palace apartment, clutching his head with one hand. From the look of the sunlight filtering through the shutters he hadn’t closed properly it seemed that the sun had long beaten him awake.
He hadn’t intended to stay the night. His plan had been to return to the villa once the official after-Gala party in the palace had finished. But with Talos long gone—chasing after the fabulous violinist who’d brought the entire audience to tears—and their grandfather having already retired, it had been left to him and Helios to play hosts to their distinguished guests.
When the last of the crowds had gone, all abuzz with the news of Helios’s engagement to Princess Catalina, which had been announced during the gala, the Princess had flown home with her father and Helios had muttered that he needed a ‘proper’ drink.
Armed with a bottle of gin and two glasses, they’d hidden away in Helios’s apartment and drunk until the small hours. He didn’t know which of them had needed it the most. It was the first time Theseus had drunk so much in years.
They should have been celebrating.
Theseus had achieved the one thing he’d set out to do all those years ago, when he’d turned his back on being Theo and embraced who he truly was: he’d made his grandfather proud. The biography had been completed on time and it was a true celebration of the King’s life—exactly as Theseus had wanted it to be.
And Helios had just got engaged to be married, so he should have been celebrating too.
Instead, the pair of them had drowned their sorrows.
All Theseus had been able to think about was Jo, and how animated her face had been when she’d championed him to his grandfather.
No one had ever done that before—spoken so passionately on his behalf. Not since his mother, who would implore his father to treat him as an equal to Helios only to be slapped or, if she was lucky, just ignored for her efforts.
His mother had loved all her children fiercely. He could never have disappointed her, because in her eyes her boys had been perfect and incapable of doing wrong.
Jo loved Toby just as fiercely. Like his mother, she was a good, pure person. She deserved everything that was good in life. She deserved better than him.
He might not have disappointed his mother, but at some time or another he’d let the rest of his family down. When he’d selfishly left the palace to see the world he’d left the fledging business he and his brothers had just formed in their hands.
What a monstrously selfish person he had been.
Even his years of doing his princely duty had been done with the ulterior motive of gaining his family’s forgiveness. His heart had never been in it. Indeed, he’d had to shut off his heart to get through it, to be Prince Theseus.
He knew that to make it through the rest of his life he would have to keep it closed. His dreams had to be stuffed away with the memories of his travels before they crowded his head with taunts of what could never be.
‘Those people watching the Gala. They have no idea of our sacrifices,’ Helios had said, finishing another glass.
It was the first time Theseus had ever heard his brother say something disparaging about being a member of the Kalliakis family, and with hindsight he should have probed his brother about his comment, but his mind had immediately flown to Jo and the sacrifices she’d made. The sacrifices she would continue to make for the rest of her life...
She’d been so pale during lunch, and when Toby had been introduced to his grandfather she’d hung back, her eyes fluttering from Theseus to Toby and back to his grandfather.
Toby hadn’t been even slightly overawed, and had happily chattered away as if the King had been a fixture in his life from birth.
But Jo...
His heart lurched.
He knew what he must do.