by Trish Morey
And if she was going to be realistic, what else could it be? Soon she would have to return to her life and her work at the Department of Antiquities. But for now, she thought, her eyelids finally feeling heavy, she would enjoy being treated as if she was special. As if she was cherished.
As Alexios made her feel.
She snuggled under the arm that encircled her shoulders, relishing the tang of his scent around her, salty and masculine, her body tingling at the memories invoked by the musky scent of sex. She sighed against him as her body relaxed against his. Might as well enjoy these days and nights while they lasted.
* * *
Slow and gentle. Sweeping and smooth. She awoke to sensation, to rhythm, to the feel of fingers against skin as his hand skimmed the curves of her body—knee to thigh, thigh to hip, and over, to that curve to waist and up her rib cage, to squeeze, tantalisingly close to her breasts before starting the slow slide down her body again.
Her breath caught, moving from sleep to wakefulness in sheer moments, everywhere his fingers touched suddenly alight, electric, and sparking with increasing desire with each sweeping stroke of his hands.
She stirred, purring, turning to be closer to him, to be able to reach for him and snuggle against his warm body.
He pressed his lips to her throat. ‘Did I wake you?’
She made a sound like a purr. ‘Mmm... Yes.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, his breath a warm whisper on her skin as he kissed his way across the curve of her shoulder, and lower, his lips pausing to capture one tight nipple.
‘Don’t be,’ she said, her body sparking into wakefulness now, before his mouth moved still further south, her belly tightening on a gasp at the brush of his whiskered jaw and the sudden realisation of where he was heading.
And as he parted her legs and dipped his head between, the flick of his tongue assaulting her senses, she remembered the thoughts she’d had when finally her body had surrendered to sleep. Who cared if this was permanent or not? There were worse things in life than having a fling with a man who made you feel as if you were the centre of his existence, even if it did only last for a few short days and nights.
* * *
She woke to the sound of her phone, and blinked, confused, into wakefulness. She was alone, the sheets alongside her cool, and she vaguely remembered Alexios kissing her, and promising he would see her later, after some meeting he had.
She yawned as she retrieved her phone, smiling when she saw who the caller was. ‘Professor, how are you?’
‘Where are you?’ her old friend and mentor said, sounding agitated. ‘I went to your apartment but there was no answer.’
‘I’m in Santorini,’ she said. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ he said. ‘It’s a ship. Divers have found the wreck of a Minoan ship loaded with ingots off the coast of Cyprus—and, Athena, even under the scum of millennia, the ingots have a gold-red glow...’
Sensation spider-webbed through her, an electric network that left her tingling from her head down to her toes.
Orichalcum.
The fabled reddish-gold metal of Atlantis, long thought a myth, until a few years ago, when a wreck had been found off the coast of Sicily. And Athena realised it wasn’t agitation she was hearing in his voice, it was excitement, the same excitement she now felt fizzing in her blood. A Minoan ship that would have sailed the length of the Mediterranean and beyond. A ship that would have sailed in the waters of Santorini as it was then, a wealthy and highly civilised hub of the Minoan trading world.
‘How many people know about this?’
‘Not many. A few fishermen.’
‘The site needs to be secured,’ she said, recalling the trouble the authorities had had with looting with the shipwreck found in Sicilian waters, and already out of bed and sorting through her clothes. ‘How soon can we mount an expedition?’
The professor tut-tutted at the end of the line. ‘That might not be as easy as we might wish for. I’ve approached the minister for funding, but it’s difficult—the department has been asked to cut back. The entire government has. To make an exception for one project...’
‘But they have to fund this! This is Hellenic Bronze Age heritage. If what you’re saying is right, this will be ten times more significant than the Sicilian discovery.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘It’s potentially the most significant discovery of its kind and this time in Greek waters. I don’t know what they’re thinking.’ Athena could almost see Loukas scratching his wispy grey-haired head in despair. She understood that the government was cash-strapped and needed to prune back spending, but it was ridiculous to delay and risk letting a find like this slip through their fingers, as it would if an immediate expedition couldn’t be financed. Word would spread, the looters and souvenir seekers would move in, and soon there would be nothing left to discover, and an opportunity to learn more about the Minoan civilisation would go begging. There had to be some way.
It hit her then, the fact that she was no longer a poor archaeologist, having to wait upon the success of grant applications and the largesse of benefactors.
She crossed back to her bag, dug out the card the lawyers had given her, along with an undertaking to help her at any time. They could start by helping her now.
‘Forget the ministry, we’ll do it ourselves. Make some calls, Loukas, and see if you can get a couple of boats and a team together. I’ll be on the next flight back to Athens.’
‘But how? Some will volunteer their time, but how are we going to find the kind of boats we need without funding?’
‘I’ll fund it.’
‘You?’
Athena smiled, thinking she might as well take advantage of this new mad world she had found herself in. ‘This might come as a bit of a shock, Loukas, because it sure did for me, but as of two days ago, it seems I’m a billionaire.’
* * *
Anton was waiting in his office when Alexios got there, one eyebrow arched at his late arrival for their morning appointment. ‘Yassou, Anton,’ Alexios said as he sat down at his desk, ignoring the sly question in his offsider’s eyes. It was none of his employee’s business why he’d kept the man waiting.
‘Everything is ready,’ Anton said. ‘As soon as you give the word, I will organise the paperwork transferring the girl’s shareholding in the Nikolides empire to you. The collapse of the Nikolides empire. First the property portfolio, then the shipping business, and finally, Argos island itself. All of it, delivered neatly into your lap.’
‘Good man,’ Alexios said, only half listening, glancing over the business emails that required his attention this morning.
‘Well?’ the other man pressed. ‘When do you want me to start the fireworks?’
‘I’ll let you know. Thank you, Anton.’
But the other man clearly wasn’t about to be dismissed. He leaned down, the knuckles of his fisted hands resting on the desk. ‘I thought you wanted this. I thought you wanted to avenge the wrongs after what Stavros did to your father.’
The hackles on the back of Alexios’s neck rose. ‘Did I ever say that I didn’t? There is no need to remind me of the plans I have been working towards for ten years. I’ll decide when the time is right. And I promise you, you’ll be the first to hear.’
His offsider bent his elbows before pushing himself from the desk, his mouth tight, his movements rigid and stiff. He looked like a man fighting himself.
‘Is there a problem, Anton?’
‘No, no problem.’ He spat out the words like bullets, the untruth he’d spoken crystal clear to see. ‘I just don’t know why you would want to wait.’
‘Why are you so worried? Is the plan at risk of being discovered if we have to wait one or two more days?’
‘Well, no.’
‘Then I will do it in my time, Anton. Not yours. Athena is hardly going to s
ign a stack of papers shoved under her nose without a good reason. I’m in the process of finding that good reason.’
The other man exhaled on a sigh, adding a curve to his lips that barely passed as a smile. ‘Of course. I have just worked so hard for this. To get this far...’
Alexios rose to his feet, sick of being spoken down to. ‘We have all worked so hard for this, no one more so than me. Which is why I intend enjoying every minute of it. The woman is almost exactly where I want her. The more she trusts me, the harder this will hit her. Don’t you agree?’
Anton nodded even as a tic plucked at his cheek. ‘Of course. Let me know. I’m ready when you are.’
‘Excellent,’ Alexios said, rounding his desk. ‘I will let you know when I am.’ He slapped his colleague on the back. ‘Thank you, Anton.’
This time the man took his cue. He nodded, briefly, before letting himself out.
Alexios sighed. If there’d been prizes for rat cunning at the Kostas Foundation School, Anton would have scooped the pool, but there were still lessons the former street kid had to learn. It was one thing to be keen to carry out your boss’s plans, it was another thing entirely to adopt them as your own.
Yes, Alexios would exact his revenge, nothing surer, but there was no desperate rush, not when the silken web he was building around her grew ever tighter. Whenever he gave the word, and only when he gave the word, the axe would fall. And the more Stavros’s daughter trusted him, the more it would blindside her.
The more it would destroy her.
And the more complete would be his revenge.
Meanwhile, the more time he would have to enjoy her.
* * *
The housekeeper reluctantly gave her directions to Alexios’s office, but only after Athena told her it was urgent that she see him. Even if this was just a short fling to him, she still owed him an explanation as to why she was leaving in such a hurry. She smiled as she hurried down the stairs, remembering his term of endearment for her and why he had called her that. She wasn’t his little dove, not really, just as she wasn’t fleeing, so much as making a tactical withdrawal.
Already she could see the sense in going back to work. This place and this man had woven some kind of magic spell around her. Santorini had always been able to do that. Alexios just added another layer to the spell.
Away from Santorini—away from Alexios—she could probably put what had happened the last couple of days into some sort of perspective. Back in her real life, whether in her shabby office in the concrete building that housed the Department of Antiquities, or out at sea, on an expedition that promised to provide more clues into the world of the ancients, this would all seem just a dream.
And Alexios had had his fun. Better for her to leave now than for him to tire of her and ask her to leave. At least she could leave with her ego intact.
She rounded the last corner as someone emerged through a door she knew from the housekeeper’s directions must lead into Alexios’s office. Backlit by bright sunshine from the room, for a second she almost thought it must be Alexios, until the man simultaneously lifted his hand and dipped his head—almost like a bow—before brushing roughly past her in the passageway.
‘Signomi,’ she said pointedly, thinking he was the one who should apologise, but there was no response, just the staccato slap of his shoes climbing the marble of the stairs behind her.
So be it. At least it meant the meeting was over and Alexios was free. She rapped on the door, heard a stern, ‘What is it now?’ and tentatively opened the door.
‘I’m sorry, I needed to see you.’
He looked up from behind his desk, immediately on his feet and crossing the floor to her. ‘Oh, it’s you.’ He lifted a hand to her neck, sliding it under the messy knot of hair she’d tied at the back of her head, and it was impossible not to lean into the warm stroke of his fingers. ‘I thought it was somebody else.’
She glanced over her shoulder. ‘You mean the man who just left? He didn’t seem very happy.’
His fingers stalled. His brows drew closer together, in his eyes a flash of concern. ‘You spoke to him?’
She shook her head. ‘Not really, he just wasn’t very polite. Anyway, that’s not why I’m here.’
‘Of course not,’ he agreed, relaxing a little, taking her by the hand and leading her to the windows opening to the caldera, where the warm salt air swirled and danced in the curtains and played with the ends of her hair. He leaned back against the door frame and turned her to face him, one hand smoothing the wayward tendrils of her hair. He smiled as the breeze promptly undid his good work. ‘But you are, so tell me what is so important that you need to tell me?’
His touch was warm where his fingers grazed her cheek, his breath tinged with coffee that she would taste if only she touched her lips to his, and it occurred to her again that she would miss this—that she would miss him. ‘I’m leaving, Alexios. I need to return to Athens immediately.’
‘No.’ His fingers froze, his frown returning. ‘That’s not possible.’
She laughed a little. His tone was suddenly hard, his words emphatic. In her wildest dreams she’d been hoping for disappointment rather than relief, but he sounded as if he was almost annoyed at her news. ‘I’m sorry, but I have no choice. I have to go.’
‘But why? You told me you had time off. Why do you have to leave now?’
She drew back, puzzled. He really was angry. ‘I do. But that doesn’t mean I can stay here for ever. I have my work. You have yours. And I think both of us knew this was bound to end some time.’
‘That doesn’t mean it has to end now!’ He rose to his feet, his back to her at the window, one hand raking through his dark hair.
‘Why are you so angry?’
He sighed, the tight-bunched shoulders visibly relaxing before he turned. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said with a smile. ‘My meeting could have gone better and then you took me by surprise. But tell me, what is so urgent that you have to leave? Would it help if I told you I wanted you? I didn’t want you to go?’
She smiled. Of course, it helped, but her ego more than anything. ‘I’d love to stay longer, but I have no choice. There’s been a discovery, the remains of a shipwreck, more than three thousand years old. It was carrying orichalcum—do you know how special that is? There’s only been one other ship found with such a cargo, and that was in Italian waters and nowhere near as ancient. This is a huge find. There are teams to be put together and expeditions to be arranged.’
‘And there is nobody else who can arrange these things?’
‘I’m sorry, Alexios,’ she said, cupping his jaw with her hand, gratified because he seemed genuinely disappointed and she was eager for him to understand. ‘This is my area of speciality. A find like this—it’s what every archaeologist dreams about their entire life. I’m not missing out on this.’
‘How long will it take?’
‘I don’t know. It depends on how soon we can make the arrangements. Summertime is best for diving, and already—’ She shrugged, looking out on the picture-perfect September day. ‘It won’t stay like this for long. We can’t delay.’
‘Then you won’t miss out. I’ll take you.’
She thought of her tiny apartment handy to the university but in a suburb Alexios would probably never have set foot in. ‘There’s no need.’
‘I’m not losing you, Athena,’ he said, taking her hands in his, squeezing them gently. ‘Not now, not after taking so long to find you.’
This time it was an entire swarm of butterflies that took off in Athena’s belly, their fluttering wings a cloud rising so high she had to swallow to prevent them escaping. She was so unprepared for this. She’d expected a few words of feigned regret, she’d expected a measure of relief from him that it was over, that it wasn’t him who had to break the bad news. Not once had she anticipated that he might want whatever was happe
ning between them to be any more than a quick fling. ‘In that case, I expect I’ll be in Athens when I’m not on site. There’s no reason we can’t meet up again, if that’s what you want.’
‘You know I do,’ he said, pulling her closer to his mouth. ‘You don’t get away from me that easily, mikro peristeri.’
Athena melted into his kiss, the heart inside her chest feeling warm and wanted, knowing it wasn’t goodbye, knowing it wasn’t the end, but that maybe, after the turmoil and grief of the last few months, her life was taking a new, happier path. A Minoan shipwreck to explore to fill her days, and this man, to share her nights. Could life get any better?
‘Go and pack your things and I will organise the helicopter.’
‘Oh, I’ve already booked a flight...’
‘Flights are for ordinary people, Athena. You are not ordinary. You are a very special woman. You fly with me.’
And the way he pulled her closer and kissed her made her want to believe him.
* * *
He stood at the windows, staring out over the island-ringed sea, watching but unseeing what was happening below on the sea, while she packed her belongings.
Her leaving was never part of his plans, at least not until he pulled her world apart and she fled, as destitute and broken as his father was.
But then, not even he, who had waited so long for revenge, could have planned for this eventuality. A shipwreck that dated back to the very period she specialised in—what were the chances?
But revenge wouldn’t wait. He wasn’t about to let her go when he was so close. His plan had changed direction once before. It could do so again. It would make no difference to the result.
Far below, a tender negotiated its way along the dock, disgorging its cargo of tourists wearing baseball caps and straw hats and who gazed agog up the steep steps that led to the town high above.
Like he suddenly was, changing his focus, because there was an upside in this latest development too.
And maybe it was better that when her world suddenly unravelled she’d be far away from here? Then he could simply walk away, leaving her to lick her wounds alone, the price she would pay for the sins committed by her father.