Page 114 of Modern Romance September 2025 1-4

Thinking wistfully of her sunny kitchen and the table she’d managed to wedge by the bay window where she ate every morning looking out over her own private patch of the Antoniadises’ landscaped gardens, Lydia took her seat and stared at the abundance of food that had been set out for her. It was the kind of spread she’d woken to every morning of her childhood and adolescence when the family had come together for the one meal where it was just the four of them. It was a rare evening meal when it was just them, her parents’ open table policy being taken advantage of by extended family, friends, business associates and even employees, the evening meal often feeling like an extended board meeting. Once she’d officially moved out to what was essentially the cottage at the bottom of the garden, Lydia had still joined them most evenings for dinner, and her heart clenched tightly as it suddenly occurred to her that she’d already enjoyed her last evening meal with them.

‘Coffee,despina?’

She nodded, blinking back the sudden swell of tears and prodding at her eye to make it seem as though she had something caught in it. ‘Yes, please. Sorry, what’s your name?’

‘Maya.’

Another Maya. Lydia’s lungs opened a little wider. She’d never known a horrible Maya.

‘Can I be of any further assistance?’

‘I’m good, but thank you…actually there is one thing.’ Before she could talk herself out of asking it, she said, ‘The flooring in the bedroom is different from when I was last here.’ No point pretending that she hadn’t made the walk of shame with this woman. Mercifully, she wasn’t feeling any judgy vibes from her. ‘How long ago was the new floor laid?’

Maya’s forehead furrowed a little. ‘I think two, maybe three months ago. I can check.’

‘Don’t worry about doing that.’ She dredged all the brightness into her tone that she could muster. ‘I was just curious—it’s all so different from how I remember it.’

If the maid’s face hadn’t turned the colour of the tomatoes the chef would be using to make Lydia’sstrapatsada, there was a slim chance she would have pushed the timing of the new flooring and the other niggling things to the back of her mind, but Maya’s bright red cheeks, tight lips and the way she was rubbing at her skirt told a story Lydia valiantly assured herself it was better to know now. The words Alexis had said before he’d distracted her by telling her the bed was brand new and so silently confirming he’d not shared it with any of his other lovers came back to her.

‘When I knew I would be marrying, I set things in motion…’

The drastic change in his bedroom hadn’t been for her sake. The wheels for the change had started turning weeks, even months before she’d begged him to marry her.

Whoever Alexis had imagined himself marrying, it hadn’t been her.

CHAPTER NINE

ALEXIS RODE THEelevator up to his apartment with a mixture of emotions playing in his guts. His legal team’s efforts to get the gossip about Lucie removed had been as pointless as he’d suspected. When he’d finally left the office,#RunLucieRunhad been trending all over social media. When he’d finally left the office he’d had to fight his way through a media scrum.

His hope that Lydia would spring out to greet him with a smile on her face came to nothing too. He found her in the main living room curled up on a sofa doing something on her phone. She lifted her face at the sound of his footsteps and raised a smile but didn’t raise her body. ‘How did it go?’ she asked.

He pulled a face and threw his suit jacket and tie on the nearest chair. ‘A contract we were days away from signing off on and which I’d planned to trumpet in the press as a sign that Tsaliki Shipping is still going from strength to strength, has been withdrawn. I’ve heard on the grapevine that another of our contracts which is up for renewal at the end of the year is in danger—the owners are in secret talks with one of our competitors.’

‘That’s worrying.’

He nodded. Lydia had grown up steeped in the business and knew how it worked.

After pouring himself a brandy, he slumped on a seat close to her and looked at her more closely. She looked tired and withdrawn, as if she too were carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. ‘You’ve been in touch with your family?’

She bit into her bottom lip and nodded.

‘So you know?’

‘About the shareholder meeting?’

He took a slow sip of his drink and inclined his head. Antoniadis Shipping’s major investors were demanding a meeting with Thanasis. Antoniadis Shipping were expecting a new fleet of container ships within the next week. Allegedly, billions still needed to be paid. If those investors pulled their money Antoniadis Shipping would be sunk for good.

She opened her mouth to answer but then her phone buzzed in her hand. She looked at the screen and closed her eyes.

‘Not going to answer it?’

‘I can’t speak to him.’

‘Your brother?’ he guessed.

Her jaw tightened as she took a long breath. ‘It was hard enough talking to my mother. Thanasis is in pieces. I saw a paparazzi picture of him earlier.’ She laughed morosely. ‘He looks a wreck. I used to think he was the best person in the world and the strongest, and now I’m completely torn. A part of me thinks he deserves all this for the unconscionable way he treated Lucie and then I hate myself for thinking that because the fallout is destroying so many lives. I think it must be destroying him the most because he fell in love with her and now he’s lost her and is losing everything else. I’ve already betrayed my family by sleeping with you and now I’m married to you and carrying your child and so he’s lost me too and it feels like I’m leaving him all alone. I don’t know how I can speak to him or even what I can say that won’t make everything worse for him and for myself because every word I do say will be tainted by lies.’ Her stare suddenly landed on his, her eyes flashing. ‘And God knows there have been enough lies, byeveryone.’

Alexis absorbed all this, absorbing too Lydia’s unspoken but implicit condemnation of himself for his role in all this. Their fathers’ war had started decades ago, before any of their children had been born, but it had been left to the children to be the grown-ups in the room and attempt to repair the wreckage. Their attempts had only blown a fresh bomb on what had already been a vast detonation.