Spiros & Jenny E-Book

L.J. Diva

• Herausgeber: Royal Star Publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Serie: The Porn Star Brothers Series
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 615

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

This series is dedicated to…

Jackie Collins is the biggest inspiration in my life when it comes to writing, if not the only inspiration. She had the passion; the brains, the ballsy rollicking attitude, and the kind of life that made me want to be her.

And to the three Stefanovic brothers, Carlos, Pedro, and Tomas, without whom I would not have had names for my porn stars.

In the tradition of the bonkbustingly good Jackie Collins comes L.J. Diva’s Porn Star Brothers series.

Spiros & Jenny is the origin story, taking you back to where it all began. How they met and fell in love, when they married and had their children, and the heartbreaking dramas that unfolded on the road to creating the family dynasty they have today, Stephanopoulos Incorporated.

So join them as they recount to their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren the trials and tribulations that make up the story of Spiros & Jenny…

Spiros and Jenny is the sixth novel in the Porn Star Brothers contemporary romance series, taking you back to the beginning of the Stephanopoulos dynasty.

**If you like family sagas, dirty little secrets, money and power, then you’ll love L.J. Diva’s page-turning series.

***Continue your love affair with The Porn Star Brothers Series today!

****In order of reading - Carlos, Pedro, Tomas, Retribution (or the Porn Star Brothers box set or collector’s edition paperback novel), Forever, Love Never Dies, Stefan: The New Generation, DeLuca, Spiros & Jenny, And Always

Leseprobe

SPIROS & JENNY

L.J. Diva

TIMELINE

November 2018

August 1950

October 1950

November 1950

December 1950

January 1951

February 1951

May 1951

October 1951

December 1951

February 1952

May 1952

December 1952

February 1953

February 1955

February 1957

November 1958

December 1958

July 1967

August 1967

June 1969

August 1969

Armidale 2018

About the Author

Other Titles

Dedications

Copyright

November 2018

“I now pronounce you, husband and husband.” The minister closed his bible and stared at the two men before him. “You may now kiss.”

Tomas Stephanopoulos and Roger Dencott faced each other in the Greek Orthodox Church in Armidale, Australia, lovingly smiled at each other, and kissed as husband and husband. It was the first time in forty-one years their marriage was actually legal. When they were done kissing, they turned to smile and wave at the wildly applauding family whistling and cheering them on.

The Stephanopoulos family had grown in numbers over the last forty-one years, with their grandchildren, bar Danté, married off and having kids of their own. They had hit thirty-seven members with three great-grandchildren being born that year alone.

Tomas, his beaming smile still in place, looked over his family, his brothers Carlos and Pedro with their wives Vivian and Angelina, and all of their children with their partners and children. His aunts and uncle who were left on his mother’s side, his cousins and their families that were still surviving, or could attend, and finally, his gaze settled on his parents, now in their nineties, sitting in the front pew on his side. So incredibly thankful to his mama for standing up for him and his sexuality for the last forty years plus, he stepped over to her and her equally beaming smile.

Jenny Stephanopoulos, ninety, and the matriarch of the family, watched her son and son-in-law proudly as they kneeled in front of her and her husband, Spiros. “My baby.” She gently laid her hand on Tomas’s cheek. “My baby boy is finally legally a married man. Congratulations, my baby. I’m so proud of you.” She kissed his forehead, and then gazed into his brown eyes. “I love you, always remember that. And Roger…” She turned her head to look at her son-in-law. “I know you will still look after him when I can’t.” Memories of her own wedding sixty-six years before had come bolting out of the blue and around her mind, infiltrating her heart with such sweet and tender moments.

“Of course, Mrs S,” Roger murmured lovingly to the only real mother he’d had for the last forty years. His own parents had disowned him when he’d come out as gay in the 1960s, but he’d reconciled somewhat with his mother in 1981 when they’d been told they were dying of what had come to be known as AIDS. They weren’t. It was a mistake made purely because so many diseases had the same symptoms and HIV hadn’t even been known then. But, by a miracle, even though Tomas had died and been brought back to life, they had both continued to live very happy healthy lives, and at the ripe old age of seventy, Roger was still powering on due to great health and mental happiness, and an amazing family to be a part of.

“Dad.”

Roger saw his son standing behind him, and getting to his feet, he took Simon, and his wife Deirdre, into his arms. He’d only found out Simon had existed in 2007 after Simon’s mother had kept him a secret all those years. Before her death, Jan Metcalfe had told her son all about his father, who he was, and what he did. She’d said the Stephanopoulos family would take them in as their own. And they had.

“Congratulations, Dad,” Simon said, hugging his father fiercely. He’d missed out on his dad’s first wedding and was proud to be there for the second.

“Thank you, Simon.” Roger kissed him on the cheek and grasped him by both arms. “It means so much to me to have you here. Especially this time. Not only is it legal, but Tomas can adopt you and make you fully, legally, one of our own.”

Tomas heard his husband’s words and pulled out of his father’s arms where he’d been hugging him. The spitting image of each other, he glanced into Spiros’s eyes, smiled, and stood tall, but kept a hold of his hand. “Yes.” He gazed fondly upon Simon whom he’d come to know as a son. “I can now legally adopt you as my son, too. You’ll officially be a part of the Stephanopoulos family.” Setting his father’s hand down gently, he hugged Simon. “Thank you for being here and for the happiness you’ve brought to Roger. I appreciate it so much.”

“Well…it’s brought a lot of happiness to me, too,” Simon told him and gazed adoringly at his parents. “With Mum gone and no siblings, this has become the only family we have on my side. So…I guess it’s brought happiness all round.”

“It has.” Roger hugged and kissed his grandchildren Stella, sixteen, and Liam, thirteen. “And I get to see my grandchildren grow up.”

“Ah, I don’t hate to interrupt this Dencott family gathering, but some of us actually want to get in for a hug,” Cabot proclaimed and pushed through the family to get to his uncles. “Congrats, Uncle T.” He threw his arms around Tomas’s neck, held on tight while his big blue eyes crumpled and he willed himself to not cry. Tomas had been his biggest supporter during the last eleven years since he’d finally come out as gay and acquired HIV in 2007. And, except for his twin, Antonio, and his husband Tony, he was closer to Tomas than to his own father, or to his Uncle Pedro. The help they’d given him when he needed it the most was always appreciated, even in the last few years when he’d legally wed Tony in England and found a surrogate for their two children. Their son, Antonio III, was two, and their daughter, Jennifer, was six months old.

“Thank you, Cabot.” Tomas hugged him back twice as hard, sensing the emotions skyrocketing around his nephew. For all the years he’d wanted children and never been able to have any due to the diseases he’d suffered from 1981, it was Cabot, the rebel of the family until 2007, whom he considered as close as a son could get. Even though he knew it drove his brother, Carlos, wild at the thought of his son being closer to his uncle, he also knew Carlos was grateful for all Tomas had done for his son. Tomas cast a curious glance at his brother who was standing next to the front pew and their mother, with a sour look on his face. Tomas grinned in delight.

Carlos saw the grin and scowled. “Yeah, yeah, T, we get it. And Cabot, you’re not the only one who wants to hug Tomas, so get out of the way.” He passed Roger with a pat on the arm, pulled Cabot from his brother’s arms, and saw Cabot roll his eyes to which he scowled harder, making Cabot grin and slink off. “Come here, you.” Carlos pulled his brother into his arms and kissed his cheek. “Congrats, little brother. You’re finally legal like the rest of us.”

Tomas’s face lit up like a lightbulb. “We are. Only took forty-one years, but finally.”

“Finally, my God.” Pedro came up the rear and enveloped both of his elder brothers. “Forty-one bloody years to the day. How come you get two ceremonies and we don’t?” He grinned at Carlos over Tomas’s shoulder. “I feel left out.”

“You always feel left out,” Carlos returned. “Comes with being the baby of the family.”

“You always did feel you were missing out on stuff,” Tomas told Pedro. “But, in reality, it was me. At least in our twenties.” Memories flooded back of the late ’70s and early ’80s and pain of recognition fled over his face.

Carlos saw it and hugged tighter. “We soon made up for it, though, with your wedding, and the holidays. All the things we did to make your time count.” He didn’t like remembering 1981, the year he’d lost and regained his brother, and forced those memories aside. “So, let’s go make some more.”

“Yes, let’s.” Tomas pulled out of his brother’s embrace and hugged his way through the family who still crowded around.

As Jenny watched, a soft smile on her face, her left hand firmly in Spiros’s, she noted how many had come and gone. Her parents were long gone, as were her older siblings and some of their children. Only her three younger sisters and younger brother were left. Most of their children were still alive, and half of them were there, plus some of their kids had come as had all of her own. She felt a tickling at her left ear and looked over her shoulder to see her beautiful golden-haired great-granddaughter. “Hello, Carys, my baby.” She lifted her hand to tickle her cheek and got a giggling laugh in return.

“Gate-Gamma.” The very cheeky four-year-old kissed her great-grandmother’s cheek. “I love you, Gate-Gamma.” Carys leaned over the back of the pew to kiss her great-grandfather. “Gate-Gampa.”

“Hello, Carys, you’ve been a very good girl today,” Spiros replied, a twinkle in his eye.

“I think she’s getting antsy,” Diana told them, struggling to keep her youngest in her arms as she tried wriggling herself free. “I might take her outside.”

“Are we going, Mama?” Jaqueline, Diana’s seven-year-old, asked. “Is there going to be cake at the party?” She’d had her fill at her grandma and grandpa’s party, as well as Great Uncle Pedro and Aunt Angie’s party, but could definitely go for thirds. Both girls were dressed in frilly dresses designed by Diana, and her cousin Alena, for Haus of Stefan, their fashion company. Ever since they’d started having children, children’s clothing was all the rage at HOS, especially since there were more girls than boys being born.

“We’ll go in a moment, sweetie,” Jenny told her, getting a kiss from Jaqueline. She spotted Charles Kensington, Diana’s husband, with their ten-year-old son Adam who was sitting quietly, and noted how all three of the Kensington children had the same golden-brown looks and blue eyes of their mother. Diana Villiers Stephanopoulos Kensington, was the daughter of her eldest son, sixty-five-year-old Carlos, and his wife, eighty-one-year-old former supermodel, Vivian Villiers. Glancing at the family, she readied herself to stand. At ninety, she was still fairly fit and spry, but did use a walking stick with a jewel-encrusted handle to help her. It also had a hidden implement in the handle, a sneaky little piece that her sons had found for her birthday. Spiros had a similar cane, but without the blade.

“Need help, Mama?” Tomas quickly moved to her side and helped her stand.

“I’m fine, my baby. This heat is doing my bones and muscles good. Although you might need to help your father.” She watched Carlos and Pedro help Tomas get Spiros on his feet. At ninety-three, Spiros’s age was catching up with him and hunching him over.

“I’m fine, my sons,” Spiros told his boys. “Just a little creaky.” He waited a moment until he was steady on his feet and then joined hands with his wife in the same place they had married sixty-six years previously. “But I agree with your mother, the heat is doing these old bones good.” They moved slowly down the aisle and out into the sunshine. It was a beautiful November day in Armidale, New South Wales. A balmy twenty-eight degrees, there was not a cloud in the sky, and the scent of spring flowers drifted on the breeze that ambled aimlessly along.

The family had been in Australia for barely a week, having arrived on the first of November, and celebrated Carlos and Viv’s, and Pedro and Angie’s anniversaries first. All three brothers had married one after the other back in November 1977, and with it being almost one year to the date that gay marriage was passed in Australia, they had been planning this trip for a whole year. Back in 2017 when they’d celebrated their fortieths, they’d then watched in trepidation as their country had the referendum on whether or not to pass the law. They had, and so this trip was a year in the making, especially when they had thirty-seven plus family members in the same place at the same time in the same country. Not to mention Jenny’s family.

Jenny watched as her grandchildren and their families, plus her siblings’ families, boarded the buses she had hired to transport the majority of the family, and for those who couldn’t take the buses, they had chauffeured limos. She carefully stepped into her and Spiros’s limousine and watched her sons help their father. Carlos and Viv, Pedro and Angie joined them, while Tomas and Roger made sure everyone was safe and settled into their vehicles before climbing into the limo.

“You could have had your own car, my baby,” Jenny murmured as they set off. “You didn’t need to come with us.”

“Of course we did, Mama.” Tomas leaned over and squeezed her hand. “We’re family. Where you go, we go. That’s the way it’s always been, and that’s the way it always will be.”

Jenny teared up. She’d raised her three babies to be mature, independent men, to love, respect, and honour themselves, their parents, and their partners. Her sons had done magnificently. Squeezing back, she took in her middle son, resplendent in his tuxedo, the spitting image of his father at the same age. His dark, grey tinted hair was slicked back as it always was, the silver-framed glasses enlarged his big brown eyes, and he had a smile that spread ear to ear.

Roger sat beside him, also in a tux. His brown hair had greyed through, and his dark eyes were soft with happiness. Pedro, her youngest at sixty-one, sat beside Roger in a black suit and shirt, while Angie sat opposite him in a black satin dress that flared around her stilettoed ankles. Viv was next to her in a soft blue chiffon creation from Haus of Stefan, and Carlos was beside her.

Her three boys had proved themselves to be the men she had raised, the men she would fight for until her dying breath.

“I can’t believe the church we got married in is still standing.” Spiros stared out the window at the changes Armidale had progressed through since they’d married in 1952.

“Neither could I.” Jenny grasped his hand. “But it was. And since Tomas said he wanted the ceremony here, we started planning. Even the hall where we had our reception is still up and running, so we’re headed there now.”

“Will it be big enough?” Spiros asked, noting the warmth from his wife’s hand.

“Absolutely.” She smiled at her doting husband of sixty-six years. “They’ve added on over the decades, but since most of the family won’t be there, there’ll be more than enough room. Regardless of how many great-grandchildren we have now.”

“Three more this year,” Carlos piped up and gazed fondly at his mother. “Who knew Cabot was going to be a father. Antonio, too. It’s weird…” He frowned slightly at the memories of the last four decades. “I always figured Diana would marry and be a mother, but somehow, with the way Cabot was going, I never really took him for being a husband, let alone a father.”

“He’s done a lot of growing up in the last eleven years,” Tomas replied and leaned across in front of him to take Carlos’s hand. “He’s got great parents and uncles, and even greater grandparents who all pulled for him to get better and grow up. And he did.”

“It took contracting HIV to do it.” Carlos’s comment had a tinge of snideness to it. Even though he loved his son, it still irked him that he’d been so blatantly disregarding of his sexual health that he’d contracted HIV, a disease he would never be free of.

“There’s no point still clinging to the past, Carlos.” Tomas saw the furrowed expression on his brother’s face and knew he was not fully over the fact. “Cabot’s more than proved he’s matured far beyond any of our expectations. He’s become an activist and advocate, helps out at the AIDS centres we have, does videos and books, and raises money for research.”

“Yes,” Jenny interrupted her son, making him look at her. “He has far exceeded our expectations. You need to let it go, Carlos. They have Antonio and Jennifer now, and both babies are HIV free. He’s become the responsible son you always wanted.”

Carlos let out a strangled sigh. “I know,” he relented. “But…I still…” Unable to come up with a word, or phrase, to explain his feelings, he shook his head and sighed again.

“Hold anger towards him eleven years on for being stupid enough to contract it,” Jenny supplied. She knew her son like the back of her hand because he was exactly like her, and there were still moments she wished Cabot didn’t have HIV, and even the odd moment she wished Tony didn’t have it either, or at least while he was with Cabot. But those ships had both long sailed, and nothing could change the fact her grandson and his husband had both contracted HIV via an assault from the same man one year apart. “The past cannot be changed, Carlos,” she murmured, deep in thought. “If it could, there would be so much I would change.”

“Mama?”

Jenny came out of her reverie to find all six of her children, and her husband, staring at her in surprise. A soft sigh escaped her as she prepared her next words. “So much has happened in our lives, your lives, the kids’ lives. Not all of it good. There’s so much I wish hadn’t happened, I could change, I could relive, but then…” She took a deep breath, and her brow furrowed. “It wouldn’t, maybe, make us as strong and close-knit as we are. Our foibles, our wrongs, our mistakes, choices, words and actions, they could’ve all been so different, so…” Her eyes closed and she breathed softly in thought.

“Mama? What’s wrong? Are you okay? Are you ill?” Tomas’s voice was soft as he held her hand. “What is it?” He knew the year had been tough for his mother. After turning ninety in May she had laid out her plans for her and Spiros’s belongings, which children, grand and great-grandchildren everything would go to. She’d launched into a detailed instructive course with the grandkids for when it was time for them to take over the business, and had handed the reins of Stephanopoulos Inc over to him, Pedro and Carlos, although she was still in charge in name and signature until her death.

“I’m fine, my baby,” she murmured and opened her eyes. “Just…this year has been one for reflection of life and family, and who knows how long your father and I have left.” She raised a hand to quieten their protests. “And thinking about it all, filling out the scrapbooks every year as I do, all of the people we’ve lost, we’ve gained…” Shaking her head at the memories, she went on. “I would change everything that happened to you boys in 1977. I would take away your illness from 1981,” she glanced at Tomas, “I would take away the assaults on Cabot and Alexis, and Angie and Viv long before that, I would take away the kidnappings, and deaths, and poisonings, everything that everyone ever did to all of you, my babies.” Jenny looked at each reflective sad face. “I would change all of it. Take away your pain and suffering, the pain and suffering of your children…but…in doing that…” Her eyes closed again and she breathed steadily. “It would more than likely change everything about us and who we are now. How close we are, how we’ve evolved as a family unit all because of those experiences we’ve had since 1977. We would be different. Not us. And I like us. I like who we are now and what we’ve become, and we’ve become that from the life experiences we’ve all had. We wouldn’t be who and what we are without them. And regardless of how much you might still want to kick and scream about Cabot, Carlos,” she said as she pointedly looked at her son, “we cannot change it. And, if it wasn’t for that diagnosis, he might not have turned into the very mature and adult Cabot we have now.”

“Oh…there are times he’s still very much that brat from 2007,” Carlos replied with a nod of his head. “You can see it in his eye, or when he stomps his foot when he doesn’t get his way. That child is still very much alive in him. It likes to rear its ugly head every now and then.”

“Steele Stefan.” Pedro grinned. “I saw him pop out just last month when baby Antonio threw his shitty nappy in his face.” Laughter flew around the limo.

Steele Stefan was the moniker Cabot had gone by in his modelling days. From fifteen to thirty, Cabot and his twin Antonio had been known as Steele and Phoenix Stefan. But, after Cabot’s diagnosis at twenty-five, they’d slowed down on modelling and quit at thirty when they’d both got married.

“See what I mean, he’s still very much a brat,” Carlos managed through his tears of laughter at the image of Cabot and baby Antonio. The whole family had seen it happen. “And when he pops out, it reminds me of 2007 when he contracted HIV and the massive amount of crap he put us through.”

“But without that,” Jenny went on, “he wouldn’t be the man he is now. He and Antonio are both husbands with children and have matured beyond our expectations. As much as I’d love to change so many things in the past, it would change everything that is now. And I love what we have now.” She nodded out the window. “And we’re here. My, it has been expanded upon since our reception.”

What used to be an average reception hall off the main street of Armidale, was now a massive two-storey building with multiple spires, rounded archways, disability ramps up either side of the larger set of stairs, a circular driveway, and a car park to the side. The owners had wanted to keep the original building, so it had been turned into the lobby and renovated.

The car pulled to a stop out the front, along with the others, and the boys, Viv, and Angie piled out.

“Papa, do you want your chair?” Tomas leaned down in the doorway. “It will save you walking all the way.”

“Yes, my son,” Spiros murmured. “I am feeling a little worn out.”

Tomas and Roger quickly pulled the chair from the boot of the limo and set it up with the cushion and blanket. “Here you go. I’ll help you out.” Tomas helped his father from the car and into the chair that Roger held onto. Once Spiros was settled, Roger pulled the chair away and Tomas and Carlos helped Jenny out of the car.

Straightening her pretty blue and pink chiffon top with matching blue pants and slip-on flats, Jenny carefully walked up the stairs, with the help of her sons, and inside to join her husband and children. She watched as her family piled in, and then as her grandchildren, and their partners and children, managed to get themselves in with three prams and multiple strollers. The menagerie of her adult grandchildren trying to wrangle twelve children of their own made her smile. That smile turned into a chuckle, which turned into dainty laughter that echoed through the centre’s large and luxurious lobby.

“What’s so funny, Mama?” Angie asked, bemused by Jenny’s sudden laughter.

“Your children.” Jenny pointed at the mussed hair, frazzled expressions, and toddler taming that was going on. Except with Danté. At twenty-five, he hadn’t yet got to the stage of marriage and children.

Danté shook his head at his siblings and cousins then noticed the amused looks his parents, uncles, and grandparents were giving them. He strolled over and casually slung his arm around his grandmother and kissed her cheek. “I’m so glad I’m not a part of that, yet. They all look utterly useless.”

Jenny laid a hand against his chest. “Oh…you will be…one day.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” he quipped. “Look at them. Useless.”

Smiling, Jenny looked up at her youngest grandson who’d grown to six foot one like his older brother Dominic. With his dark brown hair and brown eyes, he’d turned into quite a mature looking man for his age, and had girls and women fall at his feet when he DJd in the family’s club. “It will happen for you one day, my baby. You’ll know when the right one comes along, and then it will be on like Donkey Kong.”

“Grandma!” Danté complained, a look of horror on his face that his grandmother still used such terms, much to the laughter of his parents and aunt and uncles. “I can’t believe you still use that phrase. How old is it?”

“It doesn’t matter how old it is, it’s true. When the right girl comes along for you, you’ll know. Don’t you worry.”

“I’m not worried.” Danté gazed down at her still bright blue eyes. “Coz I’ve still got my favourite gal, hey!” His head flew forward and he looked over his shoulder to see his father. “What’d you do that for?”

Pedro had playfully smacked him up the back of the head. “Stop trying to charm your grandmother, you kids have always done that when you want something, and today’s not the day to do it. It’s Tomas and Roger’s day, so help your grandmother inside so we can get on with the festivities.”

“Who said I wanted anything?” Danté argued, but did as he was told when he saw the look on his father’s face. “All right, all right, I’ll help Grandma. I’m not after anything.” He helped her into the reception room, that had the capacity for a thousand people, and led her over to the side where the tables and chairs were placed for their immediate family.

The room was cavernous, with a high ceiling, a stage opposite the door, a huge dance floor in front of it, and carpeted dining space around it.

The club supplied luxurious seating for Jenny and Spiros as matriarch and patriarch of the family, but Spiros chose to stay in his wheelchair while Jenny took the cosy velvet-covered throne style chair they had made for her.

As everyone found their seats at the tables placed around the dance floor, Jenny watched on fondly. Tomas and Roger were to her left, with Carlos and Viv, Pedro and Angie opposite them. The family sat in order at the tables with Simon and Deidre and their children at the next table with Diana, Charles and their children, followed by Cabot and Antonio with their families, and then Alena, Dominic and Alexis with theirs. Danté sat with his best friend Nick Gatos and his parents, Mike and Maggie, who were Angie and Pedro’s best friends since 1977, his sisters, Summer and Melody who were Alexis’s best friends, and Doctors Dan Ardent and his husband Derek Blaine who’d been integral honorary members of the family since 1981 when Dan treated Tomas for his AIDS symptoms. Jenny’s siblings and their families were spread out at the tables that were placed around the dance floor until they were opposite the head table.

A late lunch was served and then speeches were made.

“I want to thank Mama and Papa, of course, for standing by us all these years.” Tomas held his glass aloft. “Last year when we celebrated our fortieth wedding anniversary, it was tinged with some sadness.” His eyes moistened at the thoughts he needed to turn into words, and blinking back the tears, he took a breath and continued. “We had watched for forty years, the continuing saga of gay marriage, and gay rights, not only in Greece, but America and here in Aus. And finally…” He looked down at his mother beside him and held the hand she offered. “Australia, last year, made gay marriage legal and official.”

Cheers and applause flew around the room with a few whistles thrown in.

“Thank you.” Tomas grinned, only waving three fingers of his left hand that held his glass so he didn’t spill any. “Roger and I watched with a twinge of sadness in 2014 when our nephew Cabot was able to legally wed Tony in England.” He glanced down the tables at his nephew who smiled and waved his fingers at everyone. A touch of Steele Stefan coming out as he primped at the attention. “And we wondered when Australia would follow suit. Well, four years after my nephew, and forty-one years after our first ceremony, Roger and I can now finally say…we are husband and husband.” He held his glass up and the room cheered more. “So, without further ado,” Tomas gushed. “Let the festivities begin…again!”

Waiters took away plates and refilled champagne glasses, and Pedro stripped off his jacket and headed for the stage where the DJ decks were still set up from the previous two nights for his and Carlos’s anniversaries. He unbuttoned his shirt, rolled up his sleeves, put his headphones on, and set the needle on the first record. “Everyone give a shout out to my brother Tomas, and his newly legal husband, Roger,” he said into the microphone. “We’re gonna rock all night, and celebrate until morning, with all the hits from the ’70s, ’80s and right through until today. At some point, Dom and Danté will take their turn, so you’ll see they’ve still got it and can keep up with their old man, but for now, let’s rock this joint, Armidale.” He spun around and flung his arms in the air. At sixty-one, he still had what it took to be the best DJ in the world, and most certainly the best in Greece, still taking to the decks every Friday night in the family’s club, SB3, on Mykonos. His sons ran the rest of the week and had been trained that year to run SB3 and the family’s music label, Sync. When it was time for Pedro to step down, the company would pass to his four children, with each running aspects of the family empire, particularly, the music side.

Pedro danced to his left and boogied to his right, all while watching his family hit the dance floor. He was the proud youngest son of the two most incredible people he knew, Australian born Jenny, and Greek-born Spiros. He was the proud youngest brother of the two most incredible brothers anyone could ever have, Carlos and Tomas. The proud husband of Angelina, and the proud father of the four most amazing children on the planet, Alena, Dominic, Alexis and Danté. And was now the proudest grandpa, after bragging to Carlos, of the five most amazing little human beings on the planet. Five-year-old Ava, and three-year-old Harper, the two most adorable little girls on the planet in their frilly pink and blue party dresses and shiny shoes, who giggled and held hands as they bounced around, and one-year-old grandson Hunter, all by his eldest, Alena. He watched the girls on the floor with their mother, looking just like Alena with their big blue eyes and dark curly hair.

Alena’s husband, forty-three-year-old singer-musician, Luca Saint, had been married into the family for seven years. An Italian American, he was tall, dark, and devastatingly good looking, suiting Alena’s looks as a couple. They had made music together on stage and off. He watched them dance together in a rhythm he shared with Angie, one of passion and fire, even after all these years.

His gaze wandered to his eldest son. Thirty-five-year-old Dominic, or Dom Stefan as he went by professionally. He was married to thirty-two-year-old Australian Greek Davina Smythe. They had met two years ago and hit it off instantly, and recently celebrated their first wedding anniversary. They had baby Christopher who was a healthy six months old and sleeping in his pram being watched over by Jenny and Angie. He saw Dom pull Davina into his arms and kiss her.

Pedro watched his eldest two children and memories of him and Angie came flooding back. His children were experiencing the love, passion, and fire they’d experienced decades earlier, and he was glad that the love his mama had instilled in him, he and Angie had instilled in their children. He gazed over the crowd for his other two and found Danté talking to Nick. “Always working,” he murmured, proud of his son for starting up his IT Web Solutions business eleven years earlier at the tender age of fourteen, and making it a massive success. They employed many people in Mykonos and Greece and had built quite a business. Danté had grown into quite the young man at twenty-five, taking on maturity and adulthood, unlike Dom and Cabot who hadn’t at the same age.

He lowered his eyes and saw his daughter, thirty-year-old Alexis, sitting at the table with her doctor husband, forty-year-old Marcus Wellcroft. They’d only met last year and quickly fallen in love and married earlier in the year. She was holding his youngest grandchild, three-month-old Marais, and a doting mother she was, gently rocking her baby back and forth. Her smile was electric with happiness and Marcus was a doting father, leaning over and gently rubbing his daughter’s cheek.

Pedro’s smile was soft as his gaze wandered down the room towards his wife who sat next to his mama. Both were watching him with soft smiles. His smile broadened at having been caught getting sappy about his family, and he blushed and glanced away. But, after a thought, he turned the music down and spoke into the microphone. “Has anybody ever said what an awesome family we are?”

The crowd looked up at him and all replied, “Yes,” before breaking into laughter.

“Good.” Pedro nodded. “Because we are, and I am so damn proud to be a member of it. I have awesome parents, awesome brothers, an awesome wife and sister-in-law, awesome kids and nephews and niece, and now even more awesome grandkids and great-nephews and nieces. We are all so damn awesome that I’m going to play this song.” He stopped long enough to pop on Everything is Awesome from the Lego Movie soundtrack, and when the first beats of the song came on, the adults groaned, but the kids screamed in joy and jumped around holding hands. Ava and Harper were joined by Jaqueline and Carys, and three-year-old Izabella, Antonio and Maria’s eldest daughter. He watched as two-year-old Antonio, and one-year-olds Valentina and Hunter bounced up and down as their parents held their hands, dancing with their cousins and siblings. His smile softened. Yeah, he was one damn lucky guy indeed.

“He’s happy,” Angie said as she watched her husband’s face.

“He should be. He has everything anyone could ever want,” Jenny replied, glancing from her son to her daughter-in-law. “Go and be with him. You don’t need to watch the children all night.” Her eyes turned to Christopher, still soundly sleeping, and she added, “You’re both incredibly lucky. Just as your father and I are, and have been.” Her eyes found Angie’s. “Go on, join your husband. We’ll watch Christopher.”

“You sure?” Angie moved to stand, but thought better of it. At fifty-nine, the Stephanopouloses were the only parents she’d known since she was eighteen and had married into the family. Pregnant with Alena, and desperately alone after her father’s death, her in-laws were a godsend in her hour of need and she’d taken to them as they’d taken to her.

“Go,” Jenny encouraged, and managed to pull the pram around so it was in front of her and Spiros. “Or go and dance with your grandbabies, just as Spiros and I used to back in the ’70s and ’80s. Remember when Alena and Diana were young and we’d take them to Studio69?”

Angie laughed. “How could I forget? They were the princesses of the ball.”

“That they were.” Jenny gazed at all of her grandchildren, grown-up adults having kids of their own. Her eyes teared over at the long-gone memories. There were times when they were happy for a few years and sad for the next few. The late ’70s, and early to mid-’80s were a hell of a time as her whole life had been, but those years had seen a lot of upheaval in her personal and family life, all for it to settle down come the late ’80s. The ’90s and most of the noughties had been wonder-filled years, but reverted back to upheaval in the mid-to-late noughties when Cabot had gone off the rails only to be brought back from the brink of death with his diagnosis. The years following repeated the cycle they’d experienced three decades earlier. Weddings and babies as the grandchildren got married and had children of their own.

“The next generation is here and growing by the minute,” Jenny murmured, her gaze wandering back and forth. She had three sons, three in-laws, seven blood grandchildren and one about to be adopted. Eleven blood great-grandchildren and three by marriage, with three being born that year. So far, her ninetieth year hadn’t gone so badly, and they were planning on spending the rest of November in Australia and would probably stay until May at least to have a good long dose of Aussie sunshine and spend what could be the last time with her remaining siblings.

“Mama?”

It brought Jenny out of her memories and she took Angie’s hand. “Go and dance with your babies while you can, my baby. Time is just too short.”

Worried by her mother’s words, and knowing that year had been tough on Jenny, Angie frowned and glanced at Pedro, who was too busy dancing to an ’80s hit, so she looked out to the dance floor, longing for her grandbabies.

“Go, Angie,” Jenny urged. “We’re fine. And we have three doctors in the house if we need anything.” Her eyes flitted from Angie to Marcus, to Dan and Derek. “All very capable doctors.”

Angie’s slow grin faltered. “I know. It’s just that I sense something.”

“What?”

Angie stared into her mother’s eyes. “That you know your time is up and you’re getting ready to leave us.”

“Not for a good while, yet, I hope.” Jenny squeezed her daughter’s hand. “It was just time to prepare the family, that’s all. It had to be done one day.”

“I know,” Angie rushed on, pushing her black hair out of her face and behind her ear. Even after all these decades, it was still straight and black, with the help of dye in a bottle, of course, just like Pedro’s. “It’s just I sense something, we all do, and we’re not sure what.” She kissed Jenny’s hand.

“Don’t fuss,” Jenny reassured her, taking in Angie’s big brown eyes, dainty features, and slim figure. “Go and be with your grandbabies while you can. Go.” She gestured out to the floor and watched her great-grandbabies dancing around, huge grins on their faces, and lit up eyes. They were all beautiful and took after their parent’s. “Go.”

Angie sighed and watched her mother-in-law’s twinkling eyes and smile as she stared happily at the children. “Okay, Mama. Yell out if Christopher needs help.”

“We’ll be fine,” Jenny told her and watched as Angie slipped off her black heels and swished onto the dance floor in a sea of black satin. Her elegant evening party dress had been designed by Alena for Haus of Stefan.

“Are you all right, my love?” Spiros had seen the look on his wife’s face and heard the tone of her conversation with Angie. He’d also sensed something was not quite right and wondered if something was going on that she hadn’t told him. “What is it, Jenny?”

A soft sigh passed her lips and she turned her head to her husband. “Just memories, that’s all. Memories of us, and how we came to be. Our life here in Australia, and then moving to Greece, our children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and how they’ve all come to be. The love and the loss…” Her voice trailed off and her brow furrowed. “So much…so many memories that we have, so much love for and from our babies. Why, just eleven years ago we were all doing that Flair magazine article on the family and how we’d managed to build a family empire, or dynasty, or whatever word was used.” Jenny’s lips turned into a grin. “That’s what we’ve built, unbeknownst to us at the time, 1977, when I wanted Stephano’s money for what he’d done to our boys—”

“Jenny, there’s no need to mention his name,” Spiros murmured, surprised that she had.

“I know, but where would we be without that money? Certainly not able to fly around the world on a whim, or start up businesses, or buy homes. What Stephano did to our boys made us all closer. And what happened to Tomas and Roger made us more so. We’ve grown from that.” She grasped her husband’s hand and smiled. “We’ve made us who we are, without us, we wouldn’t be. Our kids and grandkids wouldn’t be, and neither would theirs.” She noted the tears in Spiros’s big brown eyes. His hair was fully grey now, and thinning all over, but he still had the moustache she liked from the late ’70s. He’d kept it all these years just for her. It was the one constant she had to look forward to every morning when she woke, and every night when she went to bed. Spiros and his tickly moustache. It was thin and grey as well, but he’d kept it just for her. Not that it did much tickling anymore. They hadn’t made love in over five years, but they still kissed and cuddled every night, and the fires still burned brightly in both of them. “We have our family, because of us,” she went on, leaning towards him as the music and lights surrounded them. “Our family is because of us and what we did with that money. What we turned it into and made of it. After we told the grandkids the story in 2007, it brought thirty years of everything to a close. The final chapter, if you will. And all of the kids have been able to move on with their lives, and meet and marry partners just as ambitious as them to start a new generation of Stephanopouloses just as we’d planned. Look…” She waved her somewhat withered hand over all before them and saw multiple generations of lineage along with her siblings’ families. “Look at them. We made this. We created magic.”

Spiros chuckled. “Yes, my love, we did. But you seem very melancholic. Is it all the planning you’ve done this year? Our estates and wills, signing over the company to the boys, deciding who will get what. Has all of that made you this way? In a weird mood none of us can put our finger on...” He worried for his family, his wife especially since she’d carried the burdens of the family for decades once they’d moved back to Greece in 1981 upon Tomas’s illness. It was all hands on deck. Stephanopoulos Meats needed running, they’d built SB3, Sync and S’Reel, taken over TheWindmill Hotel and multiple buildings, homes, and office spaces, plus businesses as the grandchildren grew. The family also had Prologue Press, their publishing house through which they published all of their books.

And even though they’d hired managers for each, Jenny kept her hand in it all until this year, whereas Spiros had retired from running his family’s meat shop and from managing SB3 back in 1995 at the age of seventy. Jenny kept on doing her weekly business meetings with her managers and accountant until it was time to hand it all over to their sons. She’d had been training them off and on for about ten years, but that year, it was time for them to step up and take on Stephanopoulos Inc. or S.Inc. as it was affectionately known. Not only was it time for them to manage the company as a whole, but to start training their children to run their parts of the business.

Carlos had S’Reel, his movie production company, and Stefan Productions with Pedro who had Sync. Tomas and Roger had In Shape, their gym and personal training business, along with three AIDS care homes in Miami which Simon and Deidre were helping out at. Cabot and his husband Tony DeLuca also helped out at the gym and with the care homes, and Cabot and Alexis had the Mykonos Assault and HIV/AIDS Support Centre. Diana and Alena not only ran Haus of Stefan and Styled by Stefan but Villiers Style that Viv had originally started in 1980. Danté had IT Web Solutions with Nick, as well as DJing with Dom at SB3 and working at Sync, and Antonio was getting into documentary and movie making.

Every single one of the family was busy in some way, and it had been time for Jenny to pass it on, so they could have a few more years with some peace and quiet. Except…that hadn’t happened…

Spiros glanced at each member of his family, smiling as memories came flooding back. All the years, all the tears, all the times that made it worth it.

“What do you think Mama and Papa are smiling about?” Carlos asked Viv as they danced on the floor with Diana, Charles, and six of their grandchildren. At sixty-five, Carlos still had the same golden-brown hair his mama gave him, and always denied he used hair dye to help it along. He was reasonably fit and healthy thanks to Tomas and Roger, and all the good food his mama and brother had made over the years. He was also an extremely successful movie writer, director and producer. He noticed the sneaky grins his parents gave each other and the quick set of kisses they enjoyed, thinking that no one was watching.

“Aw, I think it’s sweet.” Diana was happy that her grandparents were still happy and in love after sixty-six years of marriage. “I hope we’re like that,” she told Charles. At forty, she and Charles had been married for nearly eleven years, their anniversary being at Christmas, and had three children to show for it.

At fifty-one, Charles Kensington had been an author and the family photographer for the last decade. He’d been a famous photographer when he’d met Diana when she was the tender age of nineteen, and at their first shoot, he’d fallen in love. He had still been grieving the loss of his wife and daughter a year earlier and knew that love with the nineteen-year-old goddess was just not going to happen. Over the next ten years, his apathy for models and the world of modelling became maddening, and his obsession with Diana had heightened, but upon being kidnapped in a war zone in 2007, after spending a weekend with the beautiful Diana, he’d been rescued by Jenny’s security team and found out Diana was pregnant and pining for him, just as he was pining for her. So, he had a lot to be grateful for thanks to his grandmother-in-law. “So do I,” he finally replied, giving his wife a quick kiss.

“Gamma, dance Gamma,” Carys called to Viv. She was dancing between her grandparents and holding hands with Vivian and Jaqueline.

Viv’s laughter floated around them. “I remember when your mama would say that to her Gamma, it just seemed like yesterday.” She glanced laughingly at her daughter. “It was just like yesterday when you were four years old and calling Jenny Gamma.”

Diana giggled. “Wasn’t it? My goodness. How many years ago was that? Times have certainly passed.” She smiled at her mother, still so elegant at eighty-one. Her golden-brown hair swayed gently against her shoulder blades, her petite slim figure still cutting a rug on the dance floor. And even though Diana had inherited her mother’s beauty, she’d inherited her father’s and grandmother’s famous blue eyes, and an assuredness about life and who she wanted to be. She glanced to her father, still the same Carlos Stephanopoulos she’d always called daddy, with his bright blue eyes that crinkled in the corners as he smiled at her. She smiled back and moved over to him, threw her arms around his neck, and kissed his cheek. “I love you, Daddy. You and Grandma are my rocks.”

Carlos, teary from the unexpected moment, wrapped his arms around her waist and hugged back. “I love you too, my baby. You’re my only daughter, and I’m so glad Viv and I had you.” His eyes caught Viv’s which were just as teary as his own, and he laughed lightly. “No time for tears, my baby, this is a celebration.”

Diana had been watching her grandparents hold hands and kiss over her father’s shoulder. “Look.” She nodded in their direction. “They’re still so happy and together all these years later. And you and Mama are still together and happy all these years later, and Uncle Pedro and Aunt Angie, and Uncle Tomas and Roger.” Her eyes scanned the room, moving from person to person as she spoke. “I hope all of us are as happy and together when we get to our forty-first and sixty-sixth anniversaries.” Her eyes lingered on her good looking husband, and her arm slid around his waist as his slid around her shoulder. “Do you think we’ll still be together in another thirty years to celebrate our fortieth, or forty-first anniversaries?”

“Oh, I think I’ll be able to manage that.” Charles kissed her lips lightly. “Although, I’ll be old by then. You’ll have to look after me.”

“Old! Pfft!” Diana exclaimed. “You’ll only be in your eighties. Grandma’s ninety and Grandpa’s ninety-three; you’ll be fine.” Looking into her husband’s sparkling green eyes, she noted the greying temples and odd streak through his brown hair. Charles had held up well the last ten years after recovering from the kidnapping, and he was fitter and healthier than ever, which was why their sex life was still explosive, even after three children, whom she loved and fiercely adored, just as her mama and daddy loved her, and her grandparents loved everyone, Something they’d all inherited from generation to generation was to love, protect, and honour each other, from siblings, to cousins, to parents, to grandparents. You love, honour, and respect, and protect where, when, and how you could, and they did that as a family unit. The closer they were knitted together, the better they could do it, and the more protected they were against the world.

“Dance, Mama, dance.” Carys tugged on her mama’s hand. At four, she was far from the youngest of the entire family, but she was the youngest of her own, and she knew that meant lots of hugs and kisses from everyone.

Diana looked down at her baby and saw the spitting image of her from that age. The memories bolted through her like a wild brumby. “Oh, my goodness, it’s like I just went back in time to when I was saying that.” Lifting Carys into her arms, she kissed her chubby cheek. “Having fun, my baby?”

“Yes, Mama.” Carys’s curly-haired cherubic head bobbed. “Lots of fun.”

“Just like when you were four.” Viv’s memories took her back. “God, that was so long ago.” She took her daughter and granddaughter into her arms and hugged tightly. “I love you, my babies.”

“We love you, too, Mama,” Diana replied as her father held them all.

“Aw, look at them.” Tomas’s smile was melancholic as he watched his niece, and brother and sister-in-law. “So sweet.”

“And Carys and Jaqueline are just like Diana when she was little,” Roger murmured against his lover’s cheek. They were slow dancing to an ’80s hit with a funky beat, but it didn’t urge them to go faster. They slow danced to pretty much everything. It was what they did, what they do, slow dance in each other’s arms to fully appreciate the moment together, and take those few moments to be fully in the moment.

“Yes, they are,” Tomas agreed and turned his attention to his husband. “Can you believe we are finally legally married?” He tenderly pushed some hair back behind Roger’s ear. “I love you.”

Roger’s grin slid ear to ear. “I love you, too. But you already know that, otherwise, we wouldn’t have been together for forty-one years. You know…” His gaze swept over his husband’s face, taking in the tanned skin, big brown eyes, and salt and pepper hair. “The legality never bothered me. We’ve loved each other all this time, stayed together all this time, and legal, or not, it never changed how I felt about you, not one iota.”

“Naw, Roger.” Tomas blushed. “I love you, too. Happy forty-first anniversary, and happy wedding day, since it’s now officially legal.”

“Happy anniversary, my love.” Roger kissed him tenderly before pulling him closer. Regardless of the music, they had a few moments of peace before tantrums pulled them back to earth.

“No, Mama, no hold my hand.” Harper Avery Stephanopoulos Saint placed her chubby little clenched up hands on her hips and frowned at her mother.

“Don’t you no me, missy,” Alena told her daughter as she flicked aside a wayward strand of hair in exasperation. She was holding her youngest child, Hunter, by the hands as he tried to stay upright and dance. Harper had started getting testy over something insignificant, and Alena had grabbed her hand to pull her close so she could warn her to stop the tantrum.

Harper was having none of it. “No, Mama! I’ll tell you no all I like.” Her big blue eyes stared defiantly at her mama, and her little red bow-shaped lips stubbornly pursed together. Her curly black hair, cherubic cheeks, and hands on hips stance made Angie burst out laughing.

“Now you know what I had to put up with when you were little,” she told her daughter. “You didn’t get this with Ava, but you’re certainly getting it with Harper. And just wait another year, or two, with Hunter, then you’ll know what I went through with all of you.” She danced beside her family, marvelling at the gorgeous little girls she had for grandbabies. They were spitting images of Alena when she was little, and it made Angie relive more than a few memories on a daily basis. She grasped Ava’s hands and watched her bounce up and down to the song currently playing. “Want to join in, Harper? Wanna hold Glamma’s hands?” Glamma, something Angie had no problem being called since she was glamorous and a grandma, held out her hand and expected Harper to take it.

Harper, being the independently minded child she was, shook her head until her curls bounced in a rhythm of their own. “No, Glamma, no hold hands. Harpa no hold hands. Harpa no be told off by my mama, or anyone else.” She crossed her arms and kept shaking her head. “No, no, no.” Her foot stomped, and in a heartbeat, her daddy swung her into his arms.

“Stop all this nonsense at once, Harper Saint. I’ll have none of it,” Luca told his daughter. Meeting Alena on her 2010 European tour, he’d instantly fallen for the dark-haired beauty and more than happily joined the family in 2011 when he married her. And while not happy about the airtight prenup he had to sign, he knew he’d more than get all he wanted out of the most famous family in the world. He tickled his daughter under the chin and she burst into giggles.

“No, Dada, no tickle.” Her laughter was contagious as she flung herself over his shoulder, eyes closed, enjoying the moment from her doting father. If anyone could get Harper out of a tantrum, it was her daddy.

“How come she does that for you and not me?” Alena asked, flustered and annoyed at her husband for being able to defuse the bomb that was her daughter. She watched her mother lift Hunter into her arms and smother him in kisses, then take a hold of Ava’s hand.

“Because I’m her daddy,” Luca stated simply, holding his daughter in his arms. “I don’t tolerate her bad moods, or accept no for an answer. And I smother her in kisses.” He blew a raspberry on his daughter’s cheek, making her burst into a fit of giggles all over again.

“My Dada loves me.” Harper kissed her daddy back. “Mama no love Harpa,” she declared, eyeing her mother’s surprised look.

“What the…?” Alena placed her hands on her hips. “Of all the—”

“Just like you,” Angie cut in. “She’s so much like you she may as well be you.”

“I was not like that when I was four!” Alena exclaimed, waving a hand in her daughter’s direction. “I did not act that way.”

“Oh, yes you did,” Angie quipped. “Wouldn’t do a thing I told you to do, but burst into a fit of giggles if your father lifted you, or your uncle Tomas took care of you.”

“That’s because I’m a prince, don’t you know,” Tomas cut into the conversation he was overhearing. “May I have this dance, Princess Alena?” He half bowed and held out his hand to the laughs and giggles from the family.

Alena smiled, curtsied and took her uncle’s hand. “Of course you can, Prince Tomas.” She slipped into his arms and hugged him tightly; remembering back to the time at Disneyland when she’d first called him that. She was only three, a year younger than Harper, but the memories still stung. “I love you, Uncle Tomas.”

“I love you too, my little A-ena.” Tomas squeezed back, using the name she’d called herself when she was little because she couldn’t pronounce her ls. “And don’t worry about Harper; she’ll grow out of it. You did.”

“Yeah, at twenty-nine years of age,” Roger murmured over Tomas’s shoulder. “Took long enough.”

Alena laughed and remembered back to 2007. “Yeah, it did, and took something pretty damn horrific to make me get over myself.” She glanced over at her baby sister, Alexis, still sitting at the table holding her daughter and beaming with such happiness as she looked from her child to her husband. “She’s finally happy after all this time.”

“Yeah.” Tomas was still melancholic as he and Roger looked Alexis’s way. “She’s with a man, in a solid relationship anyway. She was always happy. Just missing something.”

“You think she found it?” Roger asked, gazing at his niece.

Tomas smiled at Alexis radiating happiness. “Better with Marcus than Lorenzo.”

“Ugh,” Alena groaned. “I’m so glad that’s long over. It was so weird and awkward that my little sister was dating my ex-boyfriend.”

Luca’s ears pricked up and he listened in. He’d never known the full story of Alena’s relationship with Lorenzo, or what Alexis had to do with it, and no one had told him.

“It would have been,” Tomas said. “But you were all adults and moved on with your lives, and now Alexis is happily married with a baby girl of her own.” His eyes teared up at his youngest niece holding her daughter and the trials and tribulations she had gone through after being raped back in 2007. She’d started dating Lorenzo six months later, a doctor whose way through med school his mama had paid for. Lorenzo had dated Alena years previously, but broke up a few months later. It didn’t stop Lorenzo trying it on years later with Alexis and it had lasted five years. Now, Alexis was newly married and a mother, and Marcus seemed like a great guy. The family had only been introduced to him mid-2017 when he’d started working at the assault clinic Alexis had with Cabot. They’d started it up after their assaults and had made a huge success of it. Such a success, that Dr Marcus Wellcroft had moved to Mykonos especially to help out and had fallen in love in the process.

Tomas watched his nephew-in-law kiss his wife, saw her face light up like a Christmas tree, and saw her notice the family watching. She blushed, smiled, and ducked her head down.