Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 80576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 403(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
I’m seeing spots as the air is sucked out of the room. Her realization is punching what little air I have left to breathe out of me. I just fucked up. I really fucked up.
“Ares?” Her question—my name—comes out hoarse, almost inaudible.
My mind spins as I try to come up with a solution to the impending chaos. Do I deny? Do I say that I had doctors fix my infertility? Do I try to convince the woman standing before me she’s got it all wrong?
“Oh my god. You aren’t Apollo. You’re Ares.” Her eyes haven’t blinked once.
I can’t look her in the eyes. I can’t tell this woman something she already knows.
As if a lightning bolt had struck a damn, destroying it to pieces, the wave of anger flows over as she charges me, punching my chest with both her fists. “Where is my husband? Where is Apollo?”
I take hold of her wrists and answer, “Dead. He was the one who died in the accident. Not me.”
But she already knows this. She knew it the minute I handed her the pregnancy test. I know this now. I should have read it in her face, but I didn’t. Maybe I could have rebounded quicker. Maybe I could have figured out a way out of this and kept the lie going. Maybe—
Snatching her wrists away from me, she storms to the other side of the room, spinning on her heels to face me as fire burns in her eyes. “Why would you pretend to be your dead brother? Why would you want to be Apollo?”
“You know why,” I say calmly, wishing I had a way to defuse the bomb going off inside of her.
“No, I—” she freezes. “So you wouldn’t have to go to jail?”
I simply stare at her, letting her put all the pieces of the story together herself.
“You were just going to step into his life and be him. Remain married to me.” Her breath hitches as it’s clear the memories of everything that has happened since the accident flood in. She flinches with each memory. She inhales and exhales with shaky breath. Her eyes dart side to side. Her hands clench at her sides, and then land on her stomach. “You had sex with me. You made me think you were him!”
“I did.” I will not deny anything anymore. Nothing but honesty from this point on.
“And you aren’t apologizing?” Her voice raises another octave. “You don’t even seem like you are sorry.”
“I won’t apologize. I made a decision and stand by it.”
“To sleep with your brother’s wife? I didn’t agree to have sex with you! I thought you were my husband.”
I nod, taking in her words and hating the pain and betrayal she must be feeling. “You have every right to be angry.”
“And you aren’t even going to apologize for that?”
I remain silent.
“Does everyone know but me?” she asks. “Am I the only fool in this fucked up and twisted Godwin game?”
“Only my father knows. He figured it out at the hospital. This was all his idea at first.”
“Of course it was,” she hisses with a roll of her eyes. “And that’s why he let you take me to Olympus. He had no doubt you’d be able to kill me because you are Ares.” She tilts her head and studies me. “So why didn’t you kill me? I’m not your wife? And it was because of me you were going to jail.”
I had just told myself that I was going to be honest and not hold anything back, and I’m a man of my word. “Because I developed feelings for you. Because…I wanted to keep you as my wife. My brother had his time. Now it’s mine.”
It’s as if my confession slapped her in the face. Her head reels back, her lips part, and her hands start to shake as they hold her belly that now carries my child. “I can’t stand here and look at you. I can’t—” I see the tears in her eyes glistening and threaten to fall, but before they do, she runs out of the room as fast as she can.
Chapter
Thirty-Six
Daphne
The sound of the helicopter landing on the Godwin property spins my mind in mayhem even more. I’m pacing the bedroom I just spent the night in having sex with Ares, holding my hand on my belly, trying not to throw up.
I’m pregnant. I have a baby inside of me. I’m going to be a mother. These are all things I had given up thinking were even a possibility when we discovered Apollo couldn’t have children. I had grieved that part of my life I’d never experience, and just like that… I’m now going to be a mother.
With Ares’s baby!
When the helicopter’s motor turns off, signaling that whoever arrived is going to stay for a while, I realize Athena is here to kill me. I may actually never become a mother if in fact Apollo, correction, Ares, didn’t underestimate Athena’s rage. Just because I’m pregnant doesn’t guarantee the woman won’t kill me. I wouldn’t put it past her ruthless self to kill an unborn child if it belonged to me.