Greek for Beginners

by Jackie Braun

  Nick wasn’t laughing now. “I am familiar enough to know that Stavros pours more money down his throat than he puts back into his company. He took over when his father died two years ago. In that time, he has had to let go more than half of his employees. He is not a bad man, but neither is he a good businessman.”

  Although she wasn’t normally one to air her complaints to a stranger, weariness had her muttering, “Terrific. Just terrific. I’m here for a vacation. God knows, I’m due for one. I haven’t had a day off work in two years. I’ve worked overtime and taken every crappy assignment I was handed without complaint so I could save up money for...for...” She waved a hand and tried to reel in her emotions. “Anyway, I was counting on the vacation described in the brochure—first-rate accommodations, air-conditioned motor coaches for sightseeing with a knowledgeable guide, authentic Greek cuisine at some of the country’s best restaurants. Is this company going to be able to deliver on any of its promises?”

  “No.” He didn’t hesitate at all, making that one word all the more damning.

  Darcie closed her eyes briefly. “Of course not. Half of my luggage is missing. What showed up is, well, the half I wish were missing. Not that it really matters, given that my dream vacation is turning out to be a bust and I haven’t even gotten out of the airport yet.” She sighed. “I should have taken the condo and Rufus.”

  “Rufus?”

  “Also know as the spawn of Satan. He’s a cat,” she added when Nick continued to frown. Not that her explanation made anything clear. She shook her head. “Never mind. Trust me when I say, this is the story of my life.”

  “Come.” Nick smiled. “You can share this story of your life on the drive to your hotel.”

  Why not?

  Darcie decided to listen to the little voice telling her that Nick Costas wasn’t a threat. After all, it was the same little voice that had told her to cut all ties and run where her ex-fiancé was concerned, so she figured it knew what it was talking about. It had taken her several years to pay attention the last time. She only had two weeks in Greece. She was going to make the most of them. Starting now.

  “In the mood for a good laugh, are you?” she asked wryly.

  Nick smiled again. Oh, he was in the mood...for something. A diversion at the very least, and he figured he’d found one. A pretty one, too, given the woman’s tumble of chestnut hair, wide-set Aegean blue eyes and a body that would have made the ancient goddesses green with envy.

  He’d come to the airport that day with every intention of leaving Greece and returning to his home in Manhattan. He’d booked a flight to New York, a flight that would be boarding shortly without him. Just as well. He’d been angry with his family and their unabashed matchmaking and had allowed his emotions to cloud his judgment.

  Of course, he would have to be back in Greece within a fortnight anyway. No amount of irritation would cause him to miss his brother’s wedding. He would never live down the talk otherwise. And there was plenty of that already since Pieter was marrying Nick’s childhood sweetheart, Selene.

  Half of Athens was gossiping about it, waiting for a fight to erupt between the brothers. Nick was determined not to indulge the gawkers, as awkward and, yes, painful, as the situation was. He lamented the strain between him and Pieter. He regretted the division in his once unified family. But neither could be helped. The best he could do was to gather up his dignity and feign indifference.

  “Allow me,” he told Darcie and took over pushing the trolley. Five steps later, he nearly took out a bank of unoccupied chairs.

  “It wants to go in circles,” she warned.

  She was shaking her head and smiling. He liked her smile. Her lips were inviting even without any added gloss. A lovely diversion, he thought again.

  And why not? He was entitled. He had no strings to tangle him up. He hadn’t had those since Selene. That was the way he preferred it, too, as he’d pointed out to his grandmother that very morning when Yiayia expressed concern about his ongoing single status. Nick had no such concerns. What he had was a plan, a meticulously crafted five-year plan to grow his auction business. After that, he might start thinking about settling down, but never again would he allow his heart to be broken. Once was enough.

  “Is this part of the story of your life?” he asked Darcie, motioning to the wayward cart.

  “That’s right.” She lowered her voice to a confidential whisper. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but since you’re being so nice, I feel I owe you the truth. I’m a magnet for bad luck.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. Swear.” She traced a cross over her very impressive chest.

  Nick followed the progress of her fingertip before allowing his gaze to lift to her lips again. “Perhaps your luck is about to change.”

  TWO

  While she waited for Nick to retrieve his car from the long-term parking lot, Darcie called Becky. Even if she didn’t think Nick was a psycho, she decided it would be wise to let someone know she had arrived safely in Athens and was now in the hands of a stranger. Calling her parents was out of the question. Ditto for her sisters. That left Becky, who answered on the fifth ring.

  “Someone had better be dying,” her friend muttered ominously, and Darcie realized it was the middle of the night in Buffalo.

  “I’m not dying, just checking in,” she said. “Sorry I woke you, Becks. I forget about the time difference.”

  “Darcie? Oh. Hey.” She pictured Becky struggling to a sitting position on her bed and trying to force the cobwebs from her head. “Is everything okay?”

  Darcie scuffed the toe of one shoe against the pavement. “Sort of.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Well, my flight arrived on time, but I’m missing half of my luggage. The good half.”

  Becky had helped her pack, so she commiserated. “That stinks. On the bright side, now you have a valid excuse to buy more clothes.”

  “Yeah.” Like Darcie could afford to do that. She coughed and continued. “Oh, and there’s been one other small glitch. No one from the tour company was at the airport to meet me.”

  “What? That’s ridiculous. You need to report them to the Better Business Bureau or something.”

  “I know. Apparently, the owner of the company is a lush.” She forced out a laugh. “Figures, right? I mean, Tad got such a good deal on this vacation there was bound to be a catch.”

  Becky muttered something obscene about Tad. It wasn’t anything Darcie hadn’t heard before. Her friend had been quite vocal in her dislike of him. That had been a source of contention between the two women in the past, but no longer. She found herself wondering what Becky would make of Nick.

  “I hope the rest of the trip goes smoothly,” her friend said.

  Unfortunately, based on what Nick had told Darcie, she had her doubts. She told Becky as much.

  “What are you going to do? Can you get a refund and hook up with a different company?”

  “I don’t know.” The fine print on the package said the price was nonrefundable, but Darcie planned to try anyway. She figured she had nothing to lose. “In the meantime, I have a ride to the first hotel on the itinerary. The tour group is supposed to stay there for a couple of nights. That should give me time to see if the company is going to be able to deliver on any of its promises and, if not, make other arrangements.” At least she hoped it would.

  “Good. Darcie, if you need money—”

  “No. I don’t. But thanks.” Not only could Becky not afford it, but she’d also been generous enough already, letting Darcie crash at her apartment until she found a place of her own. That certainly beat moving back in with her parents, even temporarily. What thirty-year-old woman wanted to do that?

  Darcie took a deep breath then and, keeping her tone nonchalant, said, “You’re going to
love this. The person who agreed to drive me is this insanely gorgeous man with an accent that is to die for.”

  There was a slight pause before Becky asked, “You’re taking a cab, right?”

  “No. Actually, I met this man in the airport and he...offered to drive. He showed me identification,” she hastened to add. “His name is Nick Costas. He lives in Manhattan, but he’s from Athens originally.”

  “Darcie, I don’t know,” Becky began, worry evident in her tone.

  “What happened to, ‘Have a fling and get ur sexy back?’ Hmm?”

  “Well, I didn’t actually expect you to take my advice! When do you ever listen to me? I mean, if you listened to me, you never would have given Tad the time of day, much less wasted six years of your life engaged to him.”

  Point taken. Becky had told Darcie from the start that Tad was a first-class mama’s boy and would stay that way.

  “Relax. I’m not having a fling. It’s only a ride to a hotel. Nothing more.” Except maybe in her fantasies.

  “Okay, but call me when you get there.”

  “I will.”

  “Promise me, Darcie. I’m not going to be able to go back to sleep until you do.”

  “I promise. I’ll call.”

  She hung up just as Nick’s car pulled to the curb. Unlike the other boxy subcompacts parked nearby, it was a sleek, low-slung convertible.

  “Nice car.” She tapped a finger to her lips as she studied its graceful lines. “A 1963 Porsche, right?”

  He nodded slowly. “A 356 Super 90 Cabriolet, to be exact.”

  “Fully restored?”

  “Yes, but with original parts. And I have a certificate of authenticity from the manufacturer.”

  “Ooh. That pushes up its value.”

  “It does.” Nick tilted his head to the side. “How is it that you know so much about automobiles?”

  Darcie chuckled at his incredulous expression. “I work for a classic car magazine. I guess I picked up a few things along the way.”

  “You’re a writer.”

  She frowned. Not for lack of wanting, she thought. “No. I just check the facts of articles other people write.”

  “Which magazine might that be?”

  “Automobile Enthusiasts Monthly. It’s relatively small and based in Buffalo. You probably haven’t heard of it.” Darcie hadn’t until Tad’s friend had offered her the job just before her engagement.

  “I have a subscription. I find it very factual.” He got out of the car and stood beside her. “What else can you tell me about this particular model Porsche?”

  “Well, as I recall, it was very popular in America when it first came out.”

  “It still is among collectors.”

  “And you’re a collector.” It made sense. A man with a Park Avenue address likely would have the disposable income to indulge his whims, even ones that ran into six figures.

  But Nick was shaking his head. “I collect for others. As much as I like this automobile, I will not be buying it. It will go to whoever pays the most to possess it. It is what I do for a living.” He pulled out a business card, which he handed to her. It read, Costas Classic Auto Sales and Auctions.

  “Impressive.”

  “It would appear that you and I have two interests in common.”

  “Two?”

  “Classic cars and...” His smile could have melted a glass and made it clear what that other interest was. She smiled in return and hoped the laughter that followed came off as worldly rather than the sort fueled by giddiness and nerves.

  “Let me take your bag,” he said.

  The Porsche had a rear engine, meaning its trunk was in the front. When Nick opened the compartment, Darcie eyed the small space.

  “Gee, maybe it’s just as well the airline lost one of my bags. I don’t think both of them would fit in here. I guess when you own one of these babies you have to travel light to travel in style.” She glanced at Nick, a question forming. “Where’s your luggage?”

  The left side of his mouth rose. “On a plane bound for New York.” At her puzzled expression, he added, “I was planning to fly back today.”

  “Why did you change your mind?”

  “I decided I was being rash.”

  “So you missed your flight and offered assistance to a perfect stranger instead,” she replied dryly. Talk about rash...and flattering. Just wait until she told Becky that. Her friend was going to hyperventilate. As it was, Darcie’s breathing was a little uneven.

  “A stranded stranger,” Nick corrected. His smile was full-blown this time and very effective. “One who is also very beautiful.”

  Her heart fluttered and she blinked. “Oh.”

  “You are blushing.”

  “I, um...” She waved a hand, not certain how to reply.

  “Surely, you have been told before that you are beautiful?”

  “Of course I have.” She rolled her eyes. “All the time, in fact. We’re talking daily. It gets old.”

  The truth was no, at least not in the past several years. Tad wasn’t one for compliments. Even during the courtship phase of their relationship, pretty words had been few and far between. After he’d slid an engagement ring on her finger? Forget about it.

  “You know how I feel about you, Darcie. That should be enough.”

  Maybe it should have been. But it wasn’t. Every now and then, especially when she was PMSing and feeling bloated and unattractive, a compliment would have been nice.

  And then there was his mother. Evil Evelyn, as Becky had dubbed her. The older woman was quick with thinly veiled digs about Darcie’s appearance, including her good “birthing hips.”

  “You are beautiful,” Nick said again. “And your blush only makes you more so.”

  This time, Darcie accepted the compliment with what she hoped was a gracious smile. Beautiful. Why not? Wasn’t beauty in the eye of the beholder? And what a beholder.

  Nick opened the car door for her before heading around to the driver’s side. It was another small courtesy that made her feel like she’d stepped into some sort of fairy tale.

  “Shall I put up the top?”

  “No,” she told him. “Leave it down. I can use the fresh air after all those hours in a stuffy airplane.”

  And, okay, in her fairy tale, a ride in a Porsche convertible only added to the romance.

  He was seated behind the wheel now. “Even if it means tangled hair?” He reached over and coiled the end of one lock around his index finger. If he wound it any tighter, she would be forced to lean closer to him.

  While their gazes held, she blindly plumbed the depths of her oversized purse until her fingers encountered an elastic band. Pulling it out with the same verve a magician uses to produce a white rabbit, she announced, “I believe I have a solution for that.”

  Nick eyed the elastic band a moment before uncoiling the lock, and she hastily tugged her hair into a ponytail.

  “Very clever, but you missed some.”

  This time, he made contact with more than her hair. His fingertips were warm against her cheek as they corralled the wayward strands and tucked them behind her ear. The gesture might have been construed as friendly if not for the gleam in his dark eyes or the Richter-scale-worthy effect it had on her pulse.

  A car horn blasted behind them. Its driver yelled something in Greek. Nick yelled something back in the same language, but his tone was more circumspect than annoyed, and his expression could only be described as pleased.

  To Darcie, he said, “People are in too much of a hurry. I prefer to take things slowly. Rushing is no good.”

  With that, he turned the key in the car’s ignition. The Porsche’s powerful engine growled to life and they were off.

  Nick wasn’t familiar wit
h the hotel listed on her itinerary, but he plugged the address to The Santor into his cell phone and downloaded directions as he merged into traffic.

  “It should take about forty minutes to get there,” he said as they left the airport behind.

  Darcie settled back in her seat, determined to take in the sights along the way. Not only was this her first time in Greece, but it was also her first trip abroad. Indeed, other than a couple of weekend jaunts to Toronto with Becky, she’d never been outside the United States. Despite the passing scenery, however, she remained almost painfully aware of the man seated next to her, and her gaze kept returning to his profile. God, he was handsome and he’d made it plain that their attraction was mutual. This might not be a fling exactly, but it was awfully damned flattering to have such a good-looking man paying attention to her.

  When he turned and caught her staring, she blurted out, “Were you always so buff? I mean, a car buff. Were you always a car buff?”

  “Car buff?”

  “Interested in cars,” she clarified, relieved that her slip of the tongue hadn’t made it past the language barrier.

  He nodded. “My uncle raced them for a time, and the summer I turned sixteen, I traveled with him on the European Grand Prix circuit.”

  “That sounds exciting.”

  Nick smiled in agreement. “It was. Very.”

  “Did you ever race?”

  “I considered it at one point, but no.” He shrugged. “Ultimately, I was more interested in the cars—that is to say their overall design—than how fast they could travel on a closed course. So, when I was eighteen, I bought a 1957 Porsche Speedster I found advertised in the newspaper.”

  “Wow. Nice first car.” Hers had been her grandmother’s ancient sedan. It was the size of a small country and guzzled fuel like a college student guzzles coffee while studying for final exams. Darcie had happily traded up to the decade-old compact she still owned.

  Nick was chuckling. “Not really. It needed a lot of work, which is why I could afford it. I spent the entire summer tracking down all of the parts to rebuild its engine.” His smile was both nostalgic and proud.