Page 94 of About Love and Revenge

“What do you want to know?”

“Whatever you can tell me.”

I calmly analyze what is safe to say. “Ask a few questions, but know that it’ll be an exchange. You’ll also have to reveal some of your secrets.”

She bites her lip, and I don't think she was expecting my counteroffer, but she finally nods in agreement. “Okay.”

“Ask.”

“Where are your parents?”

I close my eyes for a moment. I thought she was going to ask about my hatred for Leandros.

I never talk about my parents to anyone, and I think she realizes I've closed myself off, because she tries to get up again.

I lock my hands around her waist. “Dead,” I say expressionlessly but feeling like a cold knife is swirling inside my chest.

I don't like to mention their deaths because it makes me remember everything all over again. Those memories poison me in such a way that they leave me intoxicated with hate for days.

Elina doesn't look surprised, which makes me immediately suspicious, but as if she can read my thoughts, she says, “Zoe told me you're an orphan, but even before that I had guessed. Why else would you live with Aristeu unless your parents were no longer alive? Our island was not a fun place to be.”

What she has no idea about is that going to live with Aristeu had everything to do with my plans and nothing to do with the fact that I'm an orphan.

“And what else do you know?”

“Nothing more. That's why I asked. Do you miss them?”

I leave my little sister, Skadi, out of the revelations. “My father, yes.”

“Not your mother?”

I feel the nerves jumping inside my body. “No.”

“Why?”

“Because she was a traitor,” I reply on impulse.

“I don't understand what that means, but you don't have to tell me if you're not ready.”

That surprises me. I thought she would keep pushing, but as usual, I can't predict her moves.

Finally, I can breathe again, but it lasts less than a minute because her next question puts me on alert again.

“How did they die?”

I look into her eyes. “In a fire.”

Her mouth opens in a silent O, but then she wraps her arms around my neck and lays her head on my shoulder. "Is that why you help burn victims?"

“One of the reasons, yes.”

“And what’s the other reason?”

“I was there when it happened.”

She looks at me again. "Were the burns what made the skin on your back thinner?"

Elina has never asked me about it before, but sometimes when we're in bed, she asks me to lie on my stomach and straddles me, caressing and kissing the area. At first I was tense, but little by little I got used to it. Now I miss it when she doesn't touch me there.

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