CHAPTER ONE
Spring
THELITTLEMAIDwas cleaning his room again.
Ares had come in to prepare for drinks with his father-in-law and there she was, on her knees in front of the big stone fireplace, sweeping ash out of the grate, and humming.
And she kept on humming as he shut the door behind him and strolled across to the chair that stood near the fireplace and sat down.
She kept on humming as if he wasn’t even in the room.
He’d thought that humming would irritate him the first time she’d appeared to clear the fireplace, but it didn’t. He even liked it. The soft sound of her voice was light, with a pleasing husk to it. Feminine. Soothing.
Mainly, though, he liked that she hummed as if he wasn’t Ares Aristiades, CEO of Hercules Security, one of the largest private security companies on the planet and in demand from governments the world over.
Ares Aristiades, ex–French Foreign Legion, scarred and broken and harder than the Greek mountains he’d been born in.
Ares Aristiades, whose heart and soul had died years ago, and now was burdened with neither.
Duty, though, remained, because here he was, visiting his in-laws at their remote mountain compound near the Black Sea. The way he’d done most years since Naya had died. Or at least, the years he hadn’t been either in hospital or in the Legion.
This particular maid had cleaned his room every year for the past five years, though it had only been in the last two years that he’d noticed her humming. And the last year he’d become aware that she was a woman and that the plain black dress she wore did nothing to hide the lush curves of a nineteen-fifties pinup.
She had long, honey-gold hair that she kept pinned in a severe bun at the nape of her neck and a sweet, heart-shaped face. Her mouth was full, her nose slightly tilted, her lashes long and looked like they’d been dipped in gold.
The staff here weren’t permitted to meet the eyes of the guests, or so his father-in-law had said—a strange rule for staff that Ares didn’t see the point of but hadn’t been interested enough to argue about—and the little maid never had.
Apart from once, the previous year, as she’d scurried out of his room with her bucket full of ash. Those gold-dipped lashes had risen, and she’d flashed him a wide-eyed glance.
Her eyes had been golden too.
She’d only given him the briefest of looks before hurrying away, but there had been no fear in them, only a kind of awed curiosity.
Which was surprising. That wasn’t people’s usual response to him. People were usually...disturbed if not downright terrified. Facial scars had that effect, he’d discovered.
He’d thought she wouldn’t be back cleaning his room after that, yet here she was, a year later, kneeling in front of the fireplace, once more shovelling ash.
He didn’t know what to make of it.
He didn’t know what to make of the desire that had ignited the moment her golden eyes had met his. He’d thought that as dead and gone as his wife, but one look from the little maid and it had roared into life, as raw and as powerful as it had been when he’d been young.
He didn’t know why he still felt it even though a year had passed since that one brief glance, yet he did.
What was different about this woman, he wasn’t sure, nor did he care to think about it in any depth. But it had made him aware that the years were passing, and he wasn’t getting any younger. And that he’d made certain promises.
Promises to his father that he wouldn’t let the blood of Aristiades die with him.
Promises to his late wife that they would fill their house with children.
Both his father and his wife were gone, but those promises were iron chains, and he couldn’t—wouldn’t—break them.
His conscience had died with his wife and now all that kept him on the right path was her memory and the promises they’d made to each other.
His father, Niko, had been very insistent that the line of Aristiades must be preserved, especially since they were descended from the mighty hero Hercules. And although Ares had no use for bloodlines himself and it didn’t matter to him if he was the last Aristiades, he’d sworn to his father he’d preserve it.
But it was for Naya’s memory that he’d actually do it. She’d always loved children and they’d planned on a big family, and even though she was gone, those plans hadn’t changed. His entire life since she’d died had been about honouring her, and having children would be another thread to add to that complex tapestry.
However, if he wanted them, he was also going to need a wife, and really, the sooner the better.