This was what she now held in her hand.
“But I’m not just offering you my fortune, Letty,” he said quietly. “I’m offering everything. My whole life. Everything I’ve been. Everything I am.” Lifting her hand, he pressed it against his rough cheek and whispered, “I offer you my heart.”
Letty realized she was crying.
“I love you, Letitia Spencer Kyrillos,” he said hoarsely. “I know I’ve lost your love, your trust. But I’ll do everything I can to regain your devotion. Even if it takes me a hundred years, I’ll never…”
“Stop.” Violently, she pushed the paper against his chest. When he wouldn’t take it, it fell to the snow.
“Letty,” he choked out, his dark eyes filled with misery.
“I don’t want it.” She lifted her hand to his scratchy cheek, rough and unshaven. Reaching her other arm around his shoulders, she whispered, “I just want you, Darius.”
The joy that lit up his dark eyes was brighter than the sun.
“I don’t deserve you.”
“I’m not exactly perfect myself.”
He immediately began protesting that she was, in fact, perfect in every way.
“It doesn’t matter.” Smiling, she reached up on her toes to kiss him, whispering, “We can just love each other, flaws and all.”
Holding her tight, he kissed her passionately against the greenhouse, with the hot wet jungle behind the glass, as they embraced in the snow-swept bare garden. They kissed each other in a private vow that would endure all the future days of sunshine and snow, good times and bad, all the laughter and anger and pleasure and forgiveness until death.
Their love was meant to be. It was fate. Moíra.
They clung to each other until he broke apart with a guilty laugh.
“Ah, Letty, I’ll never be perfect, that’s for sure,” Darius murmured, smiling down at her through his tears. “But there’s one thing you should know…” Cupping her cheek, lightly drawing away the cold wet tendrils of her hair that had stuck to her skin, he whispered, “For you, I intend to spend the rest of my life trying.”
Spring came early to Fairholme.
Darius had a bounce in his step as he came into the house that afternoon with a bouquet of flowers. He’d had to work on a Saturday because it was crunch time developing the new website. But he was hoping the flowers would make her forgive the fact that he’d missed their new Saturday morning family tradition of waffles and bacon.
Darius had started that tradition himself, in the weeks he’d taken to focus only on Letty and their beloved son, whom they’d nicknamed Howie. After that, encouraged by Letty, he’d sheepishly called Mildred and apologized, then asked if there was any way she could try to reassemble his team at the office.
“The office is still in fine fettle,” she’d replied crisply. “I’ve been running everything just as you requested. I knew whatever you were going through you’d soon come to your senses. I haven’t worked for you all these years for nothing.”
He choked out a laugh, then said with real gratitude, “What would I do without you?”
“You’ll find out next summer,” she’d said firmly, “when you send my husband and me on a four-week first-class cruise through Asia. It’s already booked.”
Darius grinned to himself, remembering. He was grateful to Mildred. Grateful to all the people around him, his employees and most of all his family, who saw through all his flaws but were somehow willing to put up with him anyway.
Money didn’t make the man. He knew that now. What made a man was what he did with his life. With his time. With his heart.
His father-in-law had died in January, surrounded by family, with a smile on his drawn face. Right before he died, his eyes suddenly glowed with joy as he breathed, “Oh. There you are…”
“He saw my mother before he died,” Letty told Darius afterward, her beautiful face sparkling with tears. “How can I even be sad, when I know they’re together?”
Darius wasn’t so sure, but who was he to say? Love could work miracles. He was living proof of that.
Now he looked around his home with deep contentment. The oak floors gleamed and fresh-cut flowers from the greenhouse filled all the vases.
Fairholme was about to be invaded by more of the Kyrillos family. He’d sent his private plane to Heraklios, and tomorrow, Theia Ioanna, along with a few cousins, would arrive for a monthlong visit. His great-aunt’s desire to meet her great-great-nephew had finally overcome her fear of flying.
He relished the thought of having his extended family here. Heaven knew Fairholme had plenty of room.
Love was everywhere. Love was everything. His son was only five months old, but he’d already collected toys from all the people who loved him around the globe. His wife did that, he thought. With her great heart, she brought everyone together with her kindness and loyalty. She was the center of Darius’s world.
“Letty!” he called, holding the flowers tightly.
“She’s outside, Mr. Kyrillos,” the housekeeper called from the kitchen. “The weather’s so fine, she and the baby went for a picnic in the meadow.”
Dropping his computer bag, he went outside, past the garden, where even though the air was cool beneath the sunshine, tulips and daffodils were starting to bloom. He walked the path through the softly waving grass until he reached the meadow where he’d first taught his wife to dance. Where she’d first taught him to dream.
He stopped.
The sky was a vivid blue, the meadow the rich gold-green of spring, and in the distance, he could see the ocean. He saw Letty’s beautiful face, alight with joy, as she sang their five-month-old baby a song in Greek, swinging him gently in her arms as he giggled and shrieked with happiness. Behind them on the hillside, a blanket was covered with a picnic basket, teething toys and that well-worn book about the bunny rabbit. But now, as always, Letty was dancing. Letty was singing.
Letty was love.
Darius stared at them, and for a moment the image caught at his heart, as he wondered what he’d ever done to deserve such happiness.
Then, quickening his steps, he raced to join them.
Tara Pammi
LEAH HUNTINGTON COLLAPSED onto the plastic chair behind her small desk, her knees buckling out from under her. The red stamp spelling out “REJECTED” on the application form blurred in front of her eyes. Her heart squeezed painfully as she fingered the flat sketches on her drawing board, the possibility of seeing her creation take form now evaporating like a puff of smoke.
Sweat ran down her back, the slow whir of the ceiling fan scraping against her nerves. She ran cramped up fingers over her neck, feeling the muscles tighten with tension.
Mrs. DuPont, the buying manager for a retail store, had given Leah only two months to create her first collection and all Leah had now were flat sketches. And as she had to do everything herself instead of contacting a factory