Page 120 of Beyond Enemy Vows

Six Weeks Later

Isit alone on the weathered stone bench, my hands folded carefully in my lap, watching afternoon light fight through the olive tree branches above.

Birds chirp above, oblivious to what this day means.

Six weeks since the gala. Six weeks since everything ended.

It feels like both a lifetime and a day ago. Time moves strangely when your world gets turned inside out and rebuilt from scratch. Some moments crawl by, while others flash by so fast I can barely catch them.

My mind drifts back to that night on the island.

We fled the island like our lives depended on it, which they did. The boat ride to the mainland felt endless. When we arrived, we hopped in a car and drove all the way to Athens. Declan drove like the devil himself was right behind us, while Keira sworeshe'd never wear heels again as I pressed a makeshift bandage around Niko's knee.

We made it to a private airstrip outside Athens, boarded a plane, and took off. I didn't breathe, not really, until we landed in Chicago. Even then, my chest felt tight. Niko kept his hand on my thigh during the entire flight, his thumb rubbing my skin. Neither of us spoke much. What was there to say? We'd crossed a line together, stepped into something darker and more permanent than either of us had imagined.

We landed in Chicago before sunrise.

My brothers were waiting for us at the private terminal. I had called them during our flight. I could see the fury radiating off them before we even descended the plane's stairs.

Ares stood with his arms crossed, his face carved from stone. Theo paced like a caged animal. Dimitri looked ready to kill with his bare hands.

They thought I'd been with Keira's security team, somewhere safe, protected. Not at Stavros's party with Niko.

"Where the fuck have you been?" Ares had snarled, eyes darting between my bloodstained dress and Niko's bandages.

But that fury died the moment I told them what I'd done.

How Stavros had planned to kill me. How Keira and Declan had helped me. How I made the decision, my decision, to end him before he could destroy everything.

"I killed him," I said. "I poisoned Stavros."

Ares looked at me like he was seeing me for the first time. Not as his little sister who needed protection, but as a Kastaris. Blood of his blood.

"You did what?" Theo asked, his voice wrapped with disbelief.

Keira stepped forward first, her chin raised defiantly. "She did what she had to do. That bastard would have gone after every last one of you."

I watched my brothers' faces change as the truth settled in. Not just what I'd done, but why. The protection I'd been trying to offer them. The future I'd been fighting for.

But my favorite part, the moment that still makes my chest warm when I think about it, was when Niko stepped forward and faced my brothers head-on.

He'd told them about the ambush. About fighting through Stavros's men to find me. What Stavros had planned to do to him and me. How he found me. How he got us back to Chicago safely.

And then he'd looked Ares straight in the eye.

"I love your sister," he'd said, his voice steady despite the pain I knew coursed through him. "I would die for her. And I would kill for our child."

Theo came around first. I could see it in the way his shoulders relaxed. He looked at Niko with something that might have been respect. Dimitri was next, offering a slight nod that meant more than words ever could.

Ares held out the longest, of course. He studied Niko like he was trying to read his soul, searching for any crack, any weakness, any reason to reject what was standing right in front of him.

But that night, when I saw my brothers share a drink with Niko, laughing, if you could believe it, I knew it was done. The war. The divide. The past. That was the moment I knew we could live the life we wanted.

And two weeks after that, the official cause of Stavros's death was labeled as a "heart attack," and the real clean-up began.

Every man who'd been involved in the ambush, every guard who'd stood by while their boss ordered his son's execution, simply vanished.

Some were taken care of quietly in Greece with help from Ares's men. Others met their ends in back alleys and abandoned warehouses across three different countries. The Bonventis even tracked down one and took care of him coming out of his favorite bar in Naples.