Greek Passions - A Greek Billionaire Box Set

by Holly Rayner

  “You’re beginning to sound like a programming director,” Kristos said, smiling. “Perhaps you can do that when you’re done recovering.”

  I laughed, remembering that was what I was supposed to be doing: resting and delegating to other people. Instead, I had insisted on working on a new television program and looking after the world’s most energetic baby.

  I shook my head “no”. “I’ve really enjoyed writing A Game of Chance, coming up with characters and places for them to inhabit. There’s no limit to the creativity you can call upon. That’s what I really want to do.”

  “Well, based on your work so far, I think you’ll excel at it,” Kristos replied. “I’ll support you in absolutely any way I can, but there’s something I need you to do for me first.”

  “And what’s that,” I asked, mildly curious.

  “You know those yellow footie pajamas you bought for Jacob?”

  “Yes,” I answered, staring at him. “What about them?”

  “I want you to burn them. Set them on fire.”

  I gave Kristos a bemused look. “And just why should I do a thing like that?”

  “I don’t know what it is, but whenever he’s wearing them, he has more energy than any baby should. He crawls faster, so he’s harder to catch, and boy does he squirm when you pick him up. Plus, he kicks out when you carry him. Those pajamas are dangerous!”

  I was having trouble hearing him, I was laughing so hard. “For heaven’s sake,” I sputtered, struggling to stop quaking, “they’re just pajamas.”

  “That’s what you think,” Kristos returned with a sigh.

  ***

  Two weeks later, I put the yellow pajamas away in an attic trunk after being begged to do so by nearly the entire staff. I was in the middle of reviewing the screenplays for the third and fourth episode of my show and needed to get the work done before filming could start.

  I had converted a room across from the nursery into my study, and that’s where I was toiling away. I was very proud of the little room. It really was a thing of beauty. The carpet and curtains were a deep crimson, a golden map of the world, framed in black, hung on one wall, and a large bookshelf covered the other. The shelf was piled with reference books, style guides, and other useful tomes. Sure, I could have just looked that stuff up online, but web pages don’t make a room look better. My desk sat under the window, so that I could use the sunlight when I worked in the morning. It was dark now, so I was using the room’s recessed lighting to work on my office desktop. It had two monitors: one for my work, and another to broadcast video from the webcam I’d installed in the nursery.

  I could see that Jacob was in his crib, fast asleep for once. Kristos had tucked him in twenty minutes ago, but where he was now, I didn’t know. I was just thinking that he was probably somewhere else in the house, trying, like I was, to get some work done, when the door of my study popped open. Standing in the doorway was Kristos, bearing a tray. On it was a vase containing a dozen roses, two glasses, and a bottle of champagne.

  “You’ll pardon the intrusion,” he said, sidling in and placing everything on the edge of my desk, “but I do believe the two of us need to celebrate.”

  “Not that I’m one to turn down the offer of champagne,” I replied, surprise written all over my face, “but tell me, what’s the occasion?”

  “Two things, my love,” he replied with a flourish. “Roughly a year ago today, we met in a parking lot, and an argument ensued that was destined to change my life. Also, your masterpiece, the show that brought us together will soon be on the air, coast to coast.”

  I smiled warmly. “I was just thinking the other day how far away the day we met seems. These last months with you have been like a whole new life for me.”

  I took the glass Kristos had filled for me, and sniffed the gorgeous red roses. I didn’t know whether I could still blame my hormones for it, but my thoughts were becoming more sentimental by the minute.

  “A toast,” Kristos began. “To Emma Johnson. I don’t care what anyone says; I was a poor man before I met you. You are brilliant and beautiful, like the sun, and each day I spend with you is a treasure rarer than anything I could build or buy. You have given me all my heart’s desires: love, companionship, and someone who will call me father. I only hope I have given you as much love and joy as you have given me. I only hope I have succeeded in making you smile, for so long as eyes can see, so long lives love. May it be life to thee. To Emma Johnson!” he said, raising his glass.

  I was speechless, and felt tears starting to well up in my eyes. I clinked my glass against his, and we drank in silence. Then I kissed my man tenderly. Between looking after the baby and all the new work we were doing, we hadn’t made love in nearly two weeks. Unless Jacob started crying in the next ten minutes or so, I thoroughly intended to do something about that.

  “Dinner is waiting for us in the dining room,” Kristos panted, when he was finally able to talk again.

  “Dinner can wait,” I replied firmly, leading him toward our bedroom. And wait it did, for most of the night, while Kristos and I enjoyed each other’s company. As it turns out, we really missed each other, and made a supreme effort to make up for lost time.

  TWENTY-TWO

  A few weeks later, Kristos and I were invited to attend the premiere of Penny Lane, and I finally got to watch the show I almost starred in. At the press conference beforehand, the producers spoke about the whole complicated mess that happened before the show, and showed some of the scenes I had acted in. Then my replacement came out.

  Her name was Jenny MacTaggert, a gorgeous redhead who could hide her Scottish accent at will. If you squinted, she looked a little like me. Soon, Ann Montgomery was standing beside her, outlining the hurdles she had gone through to bring this reboot to television. We moved through to the screening room, and the world saw what I had seen in rehearsals: Ann’s sharp with and cleverness dominated one scene after another. Jenny did an excellent job, and I could tell that this new Penny Lane was destined to become as legendary as the old one.

  At the after party, I went up to Ann and Richard Morris, the show’s producer, to congratulate them both. They were relieved to hear that they wouldn’t be competing against A Game of Chance for viewers; I had finally learned that our time slot would be eight in the evening, and Penny Lane would come on an hour before that. We talked about old times for a while, and then Richard implored me not to give up acting completely. I told him I’d consider, but I knew that was bull before it left my lips. I had fallen in love with writing, and I had no intention of ever going back.

  Penny Lane, as I had predicted, was a runaway success, but I had to wait for what felt like forever for my moment in the sun. Four months of filming turned into seven as production was plagued by unexpected delays. By the time A Game of Chance began its last weeks of filming, Jacob was just over eleven months old. I was fighting with him, as I did every day, because he never just allowed me to put on his onesie. After a few exasperating minutes, I said “Jacob, darling, won’t you please get in your onesie.”

  “Onesie!” Jacob cooed back at me.

  At that, I dropped everything and called Kristos. It took a bit of doing, but I got him to say it again, and we both spent the rest of the day jumping for joy. Granted, onesie isn’t usually the first thing a baby says, but it was my son’s very first legitimate word. He eventually got around to mama and dada shortly before his first birthday, around the same time that, after everything we had gone through to make it happen, A Game of Chance finally appeared on the air.

  From the moment I saw Melanie Pond quietly sitting at her desk, surreptitiously penning a few lines of her novel, I knew we truly had something. She was bringing my character to life with unbelievable ease. Francis interacted with her so well that it didn’t really feel like television. It felt like we had slipped a hidden camera in someone’s office. I dashed around the internet, looking for reviews, and I found them: dozens of stellar, glowing articles, dripping with prais
e. My very first effort as a writer had gone far, far, better than I, or anyone, could have imagined.

  “Congratulations!” Kristos cried when I showed him the reviews. “Now the whole world knows that Emma Johnson is one hell of a writer. And on that point,” he continued, smiling wryly, “I feel I should ask you something. A friend of mine, Rue Golden, is struggling to piece together an educational children’s show. She knows what she wants to do, but not how to make it interesting for the children to watch it. I was wondering whether you would like to write up a concept for her.”

  “That sounds like exactly the kind of thing I want to start doing. Where are her offices?”

  “Upper part of North Hollywood,” Kristos replied. “I don’t think you’ve been back there for some time.”

  It had been more than a year since I’d stepped foot in North Hollywood. I hadn’t gone back since the day my landlady decided to steal my ultrasound, and I was not, by any means, eager to return. I was afraid it would feel too much like paying a visit to the life I used to live. But what Rue wanted to do was far too tempting. I called Stanton immediately, and in a few moments, I was on my way back to where all of this began.

  There was nothing especially eye-catching about the exterior of Rue’s offices. They were housed in a dingy, white, three-story building with a worn sign. Things looked marginally better inside. The walls were paneled in oak, but it was heavily scratched. The elevators looked like they might have been impressive one or two decades ago, but now, they were almost certainly a deathtrap, I took the stairs up to Rue’s office, and went inside after announcing my presence with two or three knocks.

  “Come right in, Ms. Johnson,” Rue said. She had short, auburn, hair, and spoke with a decided Southern accent. “I want to congratulate you on the success of A Game of Chance.”

  “Thank you,” I replied. “Kristos told me about your project. He says you’ve come to some sort of impasse.”

  “And he’s not wrong. I have a basic idea of what I want to see. Three kids teach the kids at home how to study better, how to do research, stuff like that. Problem is, it’s all dull as watching paint dry. I need a way to put a little jam on it, as my granpappy used to say.”

  “You could make them detectives,” I replied. “Junior detectives that try to solve crimes in their neighborhood. They could teach everything you want the kids to learn as skills you need in order to find the clues and solve the case.”

  “That’s an amazing idea!” Rue replied, beaming with awe. How the heck did you think that up so fast?”

  “I put together a few ideas on the way here. If you’re ready, we can write out a concept for the screenplay. “

  “I’d love to. No time like the present I always say.”

  We set ourselves to work for the next few hours, bouncing ideas off of one another, and slowly sharpening my original concept. Of course, it would be weeks, even months before the first television cameras got involved. Still, the work was exciting. The two of us were working on something that millions of children around the world would remember for generations. It was a daunting task, but as I told Rue, I had done it before. A Game of Chance was proof of that.

  “All I had for that one was a laptop and an idea,” I told her. “You’ve got a lot more than that, so don’t give up.”

  I held on to that idea when it was time for me to go back: don’t give up. It began to drive me, and I realized that nothing in North Hollywood or anywhere else held any power over me, and my creative mind. I had nothing to fear.

  I felt exhilarated as I sped back toward the mansion. In that moment, I felt like the luckiest woman in the world. Not just because I had a beautiful son, had healed the rift with my parents, and my mother was on the road to recovery; I was lucky because in my new career, I could quite literally live my dreams. It was crazy to think about where the whole thing started, but it always stuck with me. My life had changed forever one day on Date Roulette. A reality show. A game of chance…

  Holly Rayner

  The Greek Billionaire’s Marriage Matchmaker

  By Holly Rayner

  Copyright 2016 by Holly Rayner

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part by any means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the explicit written permission of the author.

  All characters depicted in this fictional work are consenting adults, of at least eighteen years of age. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased, particular businesses, events, or exact locations are entirely coincidental.

  Table Of Contents:

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  ONE

  Zoey Forde sat sullenly in her seat in the badly-lit subway car, squeezed horribly by the rather rotund gentleman sitting beside her. A large crowd of people had shoved their way on board at the last stop, and were jostling for space like blocks in a badly-played game of Tetris. The armrest was beginning to bite into her leg, but she didn’t complain—she knew she was lucky to be sitting at all. She tried to enjoy it while it lasted; she was sure she wouldn’t be so lucky when she had to change trains.

  Twenty minutes had passed since the dark-haired beauty had left her Brooklyn apartment. She had not been in a particularly sunny mood then, but now, tucked in among a forest of bodies, she was perfectly miserable.

  There has to be an easier way! she thought to herself, before she remembered the alternative to the underground sardine can was the New York traffic. The subway might have been bad, but that was a fate worse than death.

  Zoey swore quietly, but not quietly enough.

  “Hey, lady! Watch your language! There’s kids around here!”

  She sighed deeply, while several people laughed. It wasn’t even nine in the morning, but a ten-year-old was already telling her off.

  She ignored the kid who’d reprimanded her, as well as the guy standing to her right, who kept tossing creepy glances in her direction. Zoey kept an eye on him. She carried pepper spray in her purse, and she was not afraid to use it.

  “And there’re twenty more minutes of this, at least,” she murmured, frowning at the wrinkles the close quarters were putting in her cream business suit.

  Desperately seeking a distraction, Zoey fished her smartphone out of her purse, and went straight to her favorite news site.

  The first article she saw was about some Hollywood mogul who was producing a show his girlfriend had come up with. Zoey shook her head at that, but tried not to dismiss the girl’s talents just because she was sleeping with her producer. The next story she came to was about a senator in Washington, DC who was resigning because of a sex scandal. That seemed to happen so often that Zoey wondered how the entire Congress wasn’t female by now. Finally, her eyes alighted on a story that instantly caught her attention.

  “Former actress Emma Knightly, 25, famous for her show-stealing performances in the Marble House trilogy, today announced she is divorcing 55-year-old millionaire fast fashion designer Eddie Brooks Jr. The couple were married on April 7, 2015, just a year and two days ago. Sources close to Ms. Knightly tell us the marriage broke down almost immediately.”

  Zoey didn’t bother to finish the article, looking instead for an e-book to read, hopelessness welling in her veins. She clearly remembered the day the Knightly woman had stepped foot in her mother’s agency—no one that had been there would ever forget it. She had glided in, wearing the long white satin dress of the 1940s songstress she had made famous in her Marble House movies. Her bleach-blonde hair
was cut short, and she wore what looked like a diamond tiara. She moved her thin white limbs in imitation of a queen, and pointing regally at the secretary, demanded to be announced.

  “This is supposedly the city’s premier matchmaking service,” she had started in arrogant tones, “but I doubt you’ll be able to find someone worthy of a date with me. I very nearly earned an Academy Award, after all…”

  Emma had continued her boasting until Zoey’s mother, Melinda Forde, swept into the elegant reception area. Feeling something very much like disgust, Zoey saw her mother’s ersatz smile and heard her rolling, sycophantic, voice.