Page 145 of Modern Romance March 2025 (5-8)

They were both still holding the plate and it seemed to conduct energy from him into her. The current traveled up her arm and into her lungs. Her throat became too tight to release the tiny word he had demanded. Her lips refused to form it.

Because it would be a lie.

Yearning had haunted her for years. What-ifs. She had buried them under anger and scorn, but they’d always been there in wayward dreams and hidden moments of reliving the most exciting kiss of her life.

That painful truth rose to make her skin feel too small for her body. Heat suffused her. Culpable heat. A distressing desire that only seemed oriented to him. It pulled dampness into her eyes.

“All right, then,” he said quietly, and released the plate.

She set it in the sink with her own, clumsily, so the dishes clattered and jangled discordantly. Then she stood there, shaken.

“It’s going to be okay, Stella.”

“No, it won’t,” she choked. “This is going to ruin my life, isn’t it?”

That was hitting her along with the harder truth that she couldn’t pretend she wasn’t attracted to him. He had all the advantage and it frightened her.

“Youcan go back to your life,” she accused. “You’re rich and untouchable. If people ask you uncomfortable questions, you can get in a helicopter and go somewhere else. I’m never going to have that luxury. I’m always going to be the woman in the photos, the one who broke up your relationship. That is unfair, Atlas. I shouldn’t be paying for one stupid kiss this many years later!”

She wasn’t just talking about a kiss and a photo, though. She was talking about this other thing. This connection. Was it an obsession? She didn’t know and she didn’t want to examine it for fear of giving it even more life.

“It’s deeply unfair,” he agreed, coming around to her side of the island. “That’s why I brought you with me. I’m going to protect you, Stella.”

“For the low, low cost of an affair?” Her voice hit a strident note.

“No. I want that. Don’t doubt it. But it’s not a condition for my helping you.”

“And how will you—” Her phone began to jingle in her bag. “That’s likely someone in my family, worried sick over the headlines.”

She leaped on the excuse to move away from him and catch her breath.

“Hoi, Beate.” She switched to German as she accepted the call. “I’m fine, but I had to leave Zermatt—”

“Pappa’s here,” Beate hissed.

“At the house? Why? Grettina let him in?”

“He wanted to have dinner with us. He says he lost his job and his apartment. He says he has to stay here.”

“No. Tell him I’ll cover his rent.”

“He owed so much he was evicted.”

“He hasn’t been paying? Why didn’t he tell me?” She knew why. Because he hated that she wasn’t beholden to him. He hated that she had defied him and forged an independent life and that she couldn’t be manipulated the way the rest of the family could.

“He can’t stay, Beate. You know how that will go.” She started for the stairs, then turned back to collect her glass of wine, avoiding Atlas’s frown. “Have you called Elijah?”

“He came when I texted that Pappa was here. He’s trying to talk him into going to a hotel, but you know what Grettina’s like.” Their stepmother wouldn’t put him out. He was the father of her twins.

“Is he really evicted? Or just playing on her sympathy?” Stella closed herself into one of the bedrooms, barely taking in the faux rustic decor of iron bed frame and refinished washstand as a night table. She sat down on the fluffy white duvet.

“They locked up his tools until he pays his back rent, but told him not to come back. He has nowhere to go. Oh, here’s Elijah.”

Elijah was the next eldest and lived at the dorm of the university.

“What is going on with you?” Elijah demanded quietly as he came on the line. “Beate said there are photos of you with a man?”

“Don’t worry about me. What about Pappa?”

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