“You’re not? Are you sure?”
“I’m sure, but it’s nice to know you wouldn’t run if I were.”
Run? For a few short seconds, I was happier than a giddy toddler at a cartoon convention.
“Then what do you want to tell me?”
She inhales a deep breath, eyes on mine, small hands resting flat on my torso. “I love you.”
What? I’m beyond confused now. Of course, she loves—oh... she’s never said it aloud. I took it for granted because I’d been in love with her for a while. And then it hits me... I’ve never told her, either.
“You only just realized you love me?”
She shakes her head. “No, I’ve known since the break-in, but we’re so fresh, and I didn’t want to scare you off.”
“You being pregnant for ten seconds, if only in my head, didn’t scare me off. Nothing will.” I kiss her again. “I—”
She clasps her hand over my mouth, cutting me off before I can say those three words back.
“Don’t,” she warns. “Please. Not yet. I have a confession to make first. I just wanted you to know thatIloveyou, Theo. More than you could ever understand.” She kisses me again. “I’m sorry I left it so long before explaining.”
Jittery dread settles around us as she slides off my lap, moving to sit in the wing chair, her fingers knitting an invisible sweater.
I don’t like where this is going.
Sometimes you just know your world is about to be tipped off its axis. That something monumental is about to happen. Something out of your fucking control, and all you can do is sit and watch. An icy liquid works through my veins like some sort of terminal infection, my vocal cords tying into knots.
“What do you want to tell me?”
A shadow of nervousness crosses her face like a gusty wind running across a corn field. “My truth.”
TWENTY-NINE
Thalia
“YOU ASKED WHY I SPENT A MONTH IN JAIL,” I say, picking my nails, my heart racing in my chest.
I’ve been pondering the idea of keeping the reason a secret for the rest of my life, but that would never work. Theo asks too many questions about my past. I’m scared that one day he’ll open his laptop and try to find information online. He knows my last name, and I let it slip at some point that I grew up in Thessaloniki. That’s all the information he needs to find out what I’m hiding. It would take one google search for many shameful articles to pop up on the screen, and then he’d be a few clicks away from translating Greek to English and finding out why I was in jail.
And when that happens, he might not forgive me for not telling him myself. At least now, I can hope he’ll understand why I held off so long.
I can hope that he won’t leave.
“I was charged with murder.”
Theo’s eyes grow wider, an incredulous confusion clouding his handsome face as his lips part ever so slightly. He’s silent, staring at me with unseeing eyes for a few long seconds before he forces a shaky breath past his lips. “You’re here, so the charges must’ve been dropped.”
I open a notebook I hid under the mattress in the guest bedroom since the day I moved in here. It’s filled with newspaper clippings—articles and pictures concerning the trial. I find the one that doesn’t mention my relation to Vasilis and use an app on my phone to snap a picture of the text and translate it from Greek to English, then pass Theo the phone.
Vasilis D. was found dead this morning at his house in Thessaloniki. The details surrounding his death are not yet available to the public. The officer attending the emergency call informed the press that the 34-year-old did not die of natural causes. An inside informer who prefers to stay anonymous told us that Mr. D. was found in a bathtub. The scene suggests a suicide, but he insisted that murder cannot be ruled out at this stage due to incriminating evidence secured by the police.
Theo looks up, eyebrows furrowed, and I’m pretty sure I know what question dances on the tip of his tongue. The same one any other person would want an answer to after reading this article. I can see it in his eyes, and I have an answer ready before the words leave his lips. My palms grow cold, and my heart beats faster, dreading what will happen next.
Theo should know this by now.
I should’ve told him about Vasilis early into our friendship, even without mentioning the murder trial. It would’ve been easier back then. The impact of the news wouldn’t have been as big when we were friends as it will be now that we’re dating.
Now that I’m in love with him, and he loves me too.