Chapter Forty

Breakfast went by smoothly and Joaquin had left the house for work. For the rest of the morning, Astrid and Darius stayed out of each other’s way, awkwardness brushing through whenever they met.

Astrid paced around in her room, wondering how to break the news to Darius. The last thing she wanted was for complications to arise from a conversation she thought to be simple. Things had changed. Darius had changed. She didn’t know what to expect from him as a reaction.

After a long while of keeping her thoughts to herself and getting sick of it, she decided to find Darius and have a talk with him. She found him seated in the movie room. She had barely been there, if she had been there at all.

He sat, fully concentrated on the show on the television. She was sure he hadn’t heard her enter the room.

She sat beside him on the dark sofa which formed a semicircle facing the television. Darius turned to her and gave her a warm smile. “Is Dahlia asleep?”

“Yeah.” Astrid nodded.

“Do you want