Page 31

Amari

I contemplated on my mother as she tended to our vegetable patch.

She reduced her working days to three days a week, saying she needed the social interaction, but she didn’t need to work at all.

I know Alcina was an accident, my mum was high risk being pregnant at over forty, but she didn’t consider a termination.

After the initial shock, both Christos and my mum were over the moon.

My mother was always very protective and I admired her in so many ways.

“Mum, Stefanos would like to get to know Alcina. I have threatened him so you won’t need to bury him in our back garden.”

“Hmph, about time,”

she said stabbing the small prong into the ground, yanking the weed out as if it were Stefanos’s head. “These Greek men are unbelievably stubborn.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about what his mum did? It was always in the back of my mind that Christos kept you as his side piece.”

She paused to glance at me.

“Once you start badmouthing another person, it becomes a habit which will eventually turn into bitterness. Baby, why would I give someone power over me like that?”

“I want to be you when I grow up,”

I said with a heavy sigh of defeat because I did not have my mother’s patience.

Her laugh tinkled throughout the garden, the sound made me smile.

“Invite him to dinner on the weekend. I want to watch him squirm,”

she said with an evil smile.

I began to laugh before I dragged a sack of compost to the patch my mum was working on while she muttered about once a month visits and non-existent projects.

***

“Why can’t I have a baby brother? Why does he need to be grown up?”

Alcina said with a frown.

My mum glanced at me with a smirk.

“You best get to making my baby a niece or nephew to play with?”

she said before her eyes softened and turned dreamy. “A grandchild.”

“You’re too young to be a grandma,”

I said with a frown, wondering how the tables turned against me in this conversation.

I thought of the picture Stefanos sent me and bit my lower lip.

It irked me as much as it turned me on but he knew what he was doing when he sent me the second set of pictures.

He sent a close up of his cock oozing out the clear liquid of his precum, a second one of it dripping down, and a third one of it on the wooden floor of his bedroom.

I remembered his words.

Taste me, lick it up, use that tongue like a good little whore.

I missed him.

The darkness, the humiliation, the pain.

I missed the way he took care of my every need.

It was such an immersive experience becoming his pet and I wondered if we could balance what we had with something new.

***

My mother was enjoying herself immensely as she watched Stefanos smile politely at his plate.

We tucked into the feast my mother had made while he watched us before copying us.

He had all three of us staring at him while he pulled off some of the soft doughy fufu and dipped it into the stew before putting it in his mouth.

“Swallow, don’t chew,”

I said with a smirk.

“He is so old. Why doesn’t he know how to eat fufu?”

Alcina whispered to me.

“Yes, why don’t you know how to eat fufu?”

I asked, watching him struggle to swallow the large mouthful.

Yeah, it isn’t so easy, is it? Try a ten inch pipe down your neck.

“Try a smaller piece,”

my mother said with a straight face.

Revenge was so much sweeter when your family had your back.

***

My heart would overflow with love watching Stefanos with Alcina.

I initially feared he was using her to get into my good books, but I could see his genuine curiosity for my baby sister grow into so much more.

Alcina graciously took him under her wing and taught him the ways of a six-year-old, showing me his will to adapt for someone he loved.

He told her stories of their father and I was sure Christos was somewhere watching over his children.

It was a pity he couldn’t have had this moment when he was alive.

My mother was right about negativity and bitterness changing a person.

It helped me change my feelings toward Cora from anger to pity.

“Is this making you broody?”

My mum asked.

“God, what is wrong with you?”

I exclaimed swivelling around to face her but her eyes were on Alcina and Stefanos.

“I might retire if you gave me some grandchildren to play with. Alcina would be in baby heaven.”

“He’s only been around for a few weeks and you want him to inseminate me,”

I said dryly.

“I’m beginning to see what Christos saw in him—and you,”

she said softly before putting her arm around my waist.

“Thanks, mum. For giving the space when I needed it and for being who you are,”

I said as I turned to hug her, drawing in her warmth and the faint scent of her perfume.

“You will always be my baby. It killed me having to hold back but I know you, and you are far stronger than you realise.”

My mother’s life hadn't been easy, and it was reassuring to hear those words coming from her. Little by little, I was healing and I was emerging stronger than ever before.

How could I not when my mother’s name meant Queen?

***

I took a deep breath, my fingers hovering over the phone’s keypad. Stefanos’s name glared back at me, a beacon of everything I craved and feared.

Club X. Just typing the words felt like stepping into a storm. Memories flooded me—the dim lights, his piercing eyes, the way his cruelty had cut deeper than the vicious swipe of the cane. But also the heat, the intensity, the way he’d made me feel alive in ways I couldn’t forget.

This time would be different. I wasn’t the same girl who’d let him break her. I had a choice now.

My thumb trembled over the send button. One tap. That’s all it would take.

I exhaled sharply, my heart racing.

Just do it.

The message sent before I could second-guess myself.