Page 77 of 10 Days to Surrender

“Enthusiasm without knowledge is how you get root rot.” She prods a particularly suspicious patch of soil. “Speaking of rot…”

“Zoya—”

“Don’t ‘Zoya’ me. You look awful. Come here and take off that shirt so I can get a proper look at you.”

There’s no point arguing. I submit to her examination, wincing as her fingers find tender spots along my ribs. She clicks her tongue at each flinch, each half-healed bruise.

“You’re not sleeping,” she accuses.

“I sleep fine.”

“Liar.” Her hands are gentle despite her sharp tone. “You think I don’t recognize restless eyes when I see them? I raised you,solnyshko.”

I grunt noncommittally, but she’s already launching into a story about her rooftop garden in Brighton Beach, how she spent years coaxing stubborn plants to life in that salt-stained soil.

“Everything worth having takes time,” she concludes, finally stepping back from her inspection. “I learned that watching my first tomatoes grow. Such fragile things at first. But withpatience, with care…” She trails off, squinting at me. “That’s not what I really meant, though.”

“Then please,” I drawl, “enlighten us on what you really meant.”

“Don’t be smart with me.” She smacks me in the back of the head with her cane, then gestures in a sweeping arc across the half-started garden, taking in the uneven rows, the ambitious scope of it. “Some things needrootsto grow.” The knowing look she gives me could pierce armor. “Like families.”

“We’re not?—”

“If you try to tell me this isn’t a family,” she cuts me off, “I will hit you again, and this time, I won’t be gentle about it.”

The scent of coffee saves me from having to respond. Belle emerges from the villa, carrying three steaming mugs with practiced grace.

“I thought I heard voices,” she says, distributing the coffee. Her smile wrinkles when she surveys the garden. “Oh, dear. Why do I get the feeling one of my girls was responsible for this?”

Zoya accepts one of the mugs with a nod. “I was just telling Sasha how these girls need proper instruction. In my day, every woman knew how to tend a proper garden.”

“Oh, I tried teaching them. But ask me if those little hellions ever wanted to listen.” Belle settles onto a stone bench, tucking her feet beneath her. “I had the tiniest herb garden on our fire escape in New York. Just a few terracotta pots, but the basil…” She inhales, like she can still smell it. “Leander used to say he could follow the scent home from three blocks away.”

Something in her voice—a soft, bruised note—brings a memory of my own mother’s window box flooding back. Six geraniumsin chipped pots. Defiant spots of red against the city’s gray. The only beautiful thing Yakov never managed to destroy, though not for lack of trying. My mother would sing to those flowers in the morning, her voice as bright as their petals.

I catch Zoya watching me, her eyes knowing. She remembers those flowers, too—she’s the one who helped my mother plant them.

Belle and Zoya fall into easy chatter about compost ratios, and just like that, the ghosts retreat. But the memory of those geraniums lingers, red as hope against concrete.

Then the villa’s back door creaks open.

And my throat goes dry.

Ariel stands in the doorway wearing one of my shirts, the white cotton gone nearly translucent in the morning light. Her hair tumbles wild over one shoulder, still mussed from my fingers three hours ago. From this distance, I can see the shadow of a mark I left on her collarbone, barely hidden by the collar.

The collar slips off one shoulder as she stretches, fabric riding up. That fucking swell of belly peeking through when she twists to tie her hair back…

She freezes mid-yawn, caught. Our eyes lock.

Just sex.

Just lies.

Zoya clears her throat pointedly. Only then do I realize I’ve been staring.

Belle, oblivious to the XXX-rated path my thoughts just took, smiles at her youngest daughter. “Good morning, sweetheart! Come join us. We were just admiring your… handiwork.”

Ariel blushes as she pads over to us. She stoops down to pluck a weed from the dirt and scowls at it lying limply in her hand. When her shirt inches higher, I catch the dark lace of panties peeking above her sweatpants waistband. My cock stirs.

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