by Trish Morey
Of how she’d stopped and stared, transfixed by the life in an ancient work that had lain deep below the earth for who knew how many centuries. It was only then that she’d noticed movement in the shadowed corner of the pit and she’d seen the man kneeling, gently sweeping at the newly exposed tiles with a small brush.
‘Come on,’ her friends had said, eager to get to the beach, already bored with the discovery.
‘I’ll catch up with you,’ she’d said, unable to drag herself away, before calling out to the man, ‘How old is this? Do you know?’
He’d taken so long to answer, she’d thought he hadn’t heard her, until slowly he’d dusted his hands on his trousers and looked up at the teenager clinging onto the rough bird-wire barrier fencing off the pit.
She remembered his wizened face and his piercing eyes, eyes that were uncannily sharp in a face leathered with time and exposure.
‘Would you really like to know?’ he’d asked her, and she’d nodded, and so he’d let her sit with him while he’d taken a break and told her of the ancient Minoan civilisation that had shaped and dominated the Bronze Age Mediterranean region.
She told him that, growing up in Australia, she’d only ever paid lip service to her Greek heritage and she’d found herself fascinated, entranced by an ancient civilisation that had been so cultured and advanced.
And she told him how her life had changed direction that hot afternoon. Of how she’d forgotten all about the beach and the friends waiting for her as she’d found a new purpose, and owed it all to the professor who’d taken a thread of interest and woven it into a fabric that would underpin her future life.
‘I thought Loukas was an old man when I first met him,’ she said, ‘and that was years ago, and he’s still one of the most vital and interesting men I know I will ever meet.’
Alexios felt a stab of something like jealousy. Ridiculous when Loukas was clearly an old man. Ridiculous when Alexios didn’t even care. It made no difference to him if she admired another man, if she put him on a pedestal and sang his praises.
It made no difference to him at all.
Neither did her sad tale of redemption make any difference to what he had planned.
‘I’ve worked out a way to repay him though,’ Athena continued, her features once again animated. ‘I just thought of it tonight. Because there’s a chronic shortage in the university and museums, and a chronic shortage of funds with which to build new facilities, and a find like today needs to be showcased somewhere special. So I’m going to fund a new wing on the museum, and dedicate it in Loukas’s name.’
Alexios blinked, sitting up higher in his chair, suddenly fully invested in this conversation. ‘That will cost a lot of money. Millions.’
‘I don’t care. I have it.’
‘I know, but what if I wanted to help too? Do you think I might contribute to such a worthy cause?’
‘Would you be interested?’
‘I’d be honoured, if you let me donate. I don’t want my name mentioned anywhere, I just want to help.’
She shook her head slightly, her smile one of wonder. ‘Did anyone ever tell you, you are too good to be true?’
‘No,’ he said, not even trying to be modest.
But she soon would.
He signalled for the waiter, dropping a bundle of notes on the table.
‘Dinner was superb, thank you,’ she said as they left. ‘How do you know about this place?’
‘My office is right next door.’
‘It is?’ She glanced over at the building next door, the curtain wall of glass dark now, reflecting the street lights and the glow of the Parthenon high on the hill above. A moon had risen, hanging over the Parthenon like a giant pearl. ‘Show me.’
He wasn’t entirely sure if it was a question or an order, but he’d seen the spark of wickedness that had shot like a shooting star across her eyes, the spark that had mirrored his own need, and there was no way he was going to say no, not when his city apartment was ten whole minutes away. Who could wait that long?
She made small talk as he let them in, leaving the lights off, allowing the lights from the surrounding street to turn his offices into a play of grey and silver shadows and light. That silver light played over Athena, turning her from woman into goddess, prowling cat-like as if she was looking for something, glancing into cubicles, around doors, one finger trailing across a desk behind her. Conspiring with trailing the tendrils of her own special perfume—all woman, all sensuality—to lure him on.
‘Impressive,’ she said, walking two steps ahead of him. ‘How many people did you say you employ again?’
Had he said? He couldn’t remember her asking the question, let alone answering. His mind was one hundred per cent focused on one thing—to follow this game she’d started to its logical conclusion. ‘Something like fifty,’ he said. ‘Or maybe more than, at last count.’
She turned then, and he almost bumped into her. She put a hand to his chest, a gesture that went straight to his pulsing groin. ‘And where is your office?’
‘This way.’ He hadn’t intended his voice to come out so thick around the edges, but it was as if desire had clogged his throat, just as surely as it had curdled his brain.
His office door opened with a soft snick and a small gasp. Her gasp as she took in the sight of the glowing Parthenon-topped Acropolis above. And then she was spinning around, taking it all in, the space, the view and the light. She was liquid in the light. Quicksilver in motion. Almost glowing in her joy.
She was still on the high she’d been on when he’d picked her up, so different from the woman he’d met on Santorini that day, when she’d looked as if she had the weight of the world on her shoulders.
He’d had no trouble wanting her then—she’d still been beautiful, but she’d been hurting and confused and vulnerable and he’d had a reason to seduce her—but watching her now, waiting while she absorbed the view, only ramped up his desire. And he had more of a reason now than ever. He wanted to feel her quicksilver soul all around him. He wanted to be inside her and feel her luminescent and glowing all around him.
The shadows on her face darkened, her eyes gave a wicked gleam as she turned her face to the restaurant terrace they’d just left, diners still enjoying the view and their meals. ‘Can they see us?’
His arousal kicked up a notch. He liked the way she was thinking.
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Because you have a very big desk, Alexios,’ she said, already stepping closer and curling her fingers under the waistband of his trousers, ‘and I would very much like it if you made love to me on it.’
* * *
There were some things for which Alexios Kyriakos didn’t need to be asked twice. Kissing a woman at sunset, when she was all warm and supple willingness in his arms, was one of them.
Making love to this woman on his desk with the gods at the Acropolis watching on added itself to the list. Shoved the others out of the way and parked itself right at the top.
His hands found her bare shoulders, sliding his fingers around to undo the collar and peel away the bodice that had separated her breasts from his gaze all night long. Not any longer.
‘Not so fast,’ she said, stopping his hands with hers. ‘I’m still celebrating, remember?’ And she dropped to her knees in front of him, her hands at his belt. ‘Do you believe in luck, Alexios?’
‘Not really.’ Although he half suspected he was about to get lucky. ‘I think people make their own luck.’
She shook her head, her fingers working at his zip. ‘I’m not sure I agree, not in all cases. Because I don’t think I did anything to get this lucky. I was in that café in Santorini by sheer chance and yet somehow you sat down next to me. If that isn’t the most wonderful luck, I don’t know what is.’
He frowned a little. That wasn’t what he’d call it. ‘Then you�
��re right, it must have been luck.’
‘So very lucky. And I’ve been thinking about this ever since that first night we spent together. I’ve been wanting to return the favour.’
He groaned as she released him. He groaned because release felt so good, but also because if he didn’t get her on that desk, he didn’t know how long he would last, and he wanted her on his desk.
Her fingers found him first, curled around and encircled him, cool and long. Air hissed through his teeth.
‘My God,’ she said, her breath panting words against him, ‘so beautiful.’
It was then that he felt the lap of her tongue, and then another, testing his control. Tiny laps, purposeful, her tongue flicking now, testing and exploring, torture and bliss in the same carnal package.
She withdrew, giving him a chance to breathe, a moment to gasp in much-needed oxygen, and he took it. Only to feel her mouth take him in, punching the newly fought air from his lungs as her lips encircled him. Her lips sleek, a circle of warm silk, taking him deeper—so deep—into the hot cavern of her mouth, her fingers working him, cupping.
His eyes rolled back in his head, his hands fisted in her hair. She was killing him. Her lips, her tongue, her hands working in concert to bring about his end. And he wondered, with his one remaining brain cell, just who was seducing who. Because, if he didn’t get her on that desk, he was a dead man.
With a superhuman effort he took her shoulders and wrenched her upright, his hands finding purchase under the firm cheeks of her behind as his mouth savaged hers, tasting the musky scent of himself on her tongue. He got her to the desk, mouths still locked as he managed to undo her collar this time, peeling her bodice down, releasing her breasts to his hands, her rock-hard nipples pressing into his palms. He groaned again, torn, as he pressed between her legs and slid the silk of her skirt up her legs.
Long legs that went on for ever.
Long, smooth legs that didn’t end.
Until he suddenly realised there was no reason for them to end. No reason at all.
He groaned. ‘You’re not wearing any underwear.’
She lay beneath him, her legs curled around his back, her breathing ragged and hard like his, her eyes wild with want. ‘See what you do to me?’ she said, watching hungrily as his teeth ripped at the foil so he could roll protection on. ‘See what you have turned me into?’
Her eyes flared, her back arched as his fingers tested her, finding her slick and wanting, and there was no more reason to delay.
She gasped when he filled her, shuddering around him, her muscles clenching down so hard he had to fight to pull back so he could plunge into her again, and then again, his thumb teasing her sensitive nub as the rhythm built and inexorably built.
While the gods of the Parthenon looked on, she came apart around him, electricity and magic combined in one explosive package, and, with a roar in his ears and a cry born of triumph, he shuddered his own climactic release.
He was still slumped over her on his desk, his lungs desperate to replace the oxygen he’d consumed, when she reached over to kiss his cheek. And between her own frantic breathing, she uttered the words, ‘I love you.’
He stiffened at her whispered confession, the reaction so instantaneous and involuntary that he had to force himself to relax so as not to alert her.
How about that?
His plan had worked to perfection. He had the daughter of the man who had so badly wronged his father exactly where he wanted her.
It was time.
CHAPTER SEVEN
ATHENA WOKE ALONE and in her own bed to a flash of fear. Had she really confessed her love to Alexios last night?
Oh, God, she had.
But then she remembered how he’d collected her in his arms and kissed her lips and held onto her as if she was his most prized possession, and she knew he must feel something for her too.
So what that right after he’d apologised that he had an early morning meeting and that he needed to drop her home? And of course she hadn’t minded. How could she? But it was the first night she’d spent alone since she’d met him, and it rammed home to her just how much she enjoyed being with him and how much she missed him when he wasn’t with her. She missed seeing his sculpted face in the morning, his tousled hair, his shadowed jaw. His dark eyes watching her before he reached for her...
She shivered a delicious shiver just thinking about it. Anyway, she thought, climbing out of bed, she’d see him at lunch today to sign the paperwork. It had been his suggestion to establish a foundation to fund the new wing and it made sense to let his people prepare the paperwork. Much easier than explaining it to her lawyers, seeing as they were going into it together.
And this was on top of him wanting to contribute to the new wing in Loukas’s honour—how amazing was this man? No wonder she loved him.
Meanwhile, there were treasures to record and catalogue.
It was only when she got to the bathroom that she felt a bit queasy. The morning after, she figured—it had been a night of celebration, after all. But she had far too much on today to let a hangover get in her way, so she pushed through her queasiness and got ready for work.
It was going to be a good day.
* * *
He stood at his window, looking up at the Acropolis, while the stack of papers sat ready on his desk. All it required was a few signatures and it would be done. Sweat lined his top lip while his heart thumped loudly in his ears and the serpent in his gut fed on his anticipation and coiled and writhed. Ten years of planning, ten years of building so he would be in a position to avenge his father, was about to come to fruition.
Ten years.
‘You should never have betrayed my father, Stavros Nikolides,’ he hissed, through a too tight jaw. ‘You were never going to get away with that.’
Even death hadn’t saved him.
Because now the daughter would pay for the sins of the father.
Athena.
He would miss her.
The thought came from nowhere, so unexpected that it jolted him into motion. He turned away from the window and looked back at the waiting papers, topped with a page headed ‘Fund for the Establishment of the Loukas Spyrides Wing’. That paper did what it said on the box, and neatly hid all the pages below that would result in an entirely different outcome from that which she was expecting.
No, he would miss the sex. Would miss the look on her face when she hovered on the edge before exploding around him. Would miss her in his bed. Would miss her body within easy reach. That was all.
He thought about her last night, splayed out on his desk—this desk—thought about her whispered confession.
‘I love you.’
And he turned away again, the serpent tying his gut into knots.
She wouldn’t love him for long. She would hate him after this, and little wonder. That would spell the end of her inhabiting his bed.
Collateral damage.
But what did it matter? It wasn’t as if he cared what she thought of him. He wasn’t about to get sentimental, not now. What he cared about was that his plan was ready to be carried out. It was what he’d worked for this last ten years after all. Ten long years. And if he didn’t have this, then what had he been working towards? What was the point of his life?
No, when he was so close to avenging his father, so close to making good on his deathbed promise, there was no going back.
His phone buzzed. ‘Yes?’
‘She’s here,’ Anton said.
The serpent in his gut pulled tight.
‘Send her in.’
* * *
‘So many papers to sign,’ Athena said, as Alexios flipped to the next sticky note. He’d been through the pages of the first paper with her, explaining how the fund would be set up and operated, and she’d nodded her agreement with the arrangements. Th
e rest of it, he’d explained, was all formalities and authorities to act on behalf of the fund.
‘You know what lawyers are like,’ he said, ‘always wanting to dot every “i” and cross every “t”.’
‘That’s true,’ she said, signing her name yet again before Alexios flipped over more pages to the next sticky note. ‘I couldn’t believe the amount of paperwork the lawyers shoved in front of me the day I learned about my inheritance.’
‘And that’s it,’ said Alexios, after one more signature, scooping up the papers from the desk in front of her, and tapping them briefly on the desk before tucking them into a folder and out of sight.
‘That’s a relief,’ she said, putting the pen down. ‘I was getting writer’s cramp. Do you have a copy for me to take to my lawyers?’
‘No need for that. I’ve already arranged to have it scanned and sent straight through.’
She smiled. ‘Thank you. It sounds like you’ve thought of everything.’
‘Yes,’ he said unable to stop himself smiling in return. ‘I believe I have. Do you have to rush off back to work?’
She glanced at her watch and stood. ‘I really should. There’s so much work to do on the find.’ Her tongue found her top lip and she frowned a little. ‘Loukas would like us to put in some extra time to get everything catalogued. It might mean a few late nights, starting tonight. Do you mind if we skip dinner?’
He put his arm around her shoulders to walk her to the door, torn between disappointment and relief. He wouldn’t have minded one last night with her—a farewell tour of all his favourite places—but maybe it was better to make a clean break now. After all, what kind of low-life would he be if he’d stolen her fortune and then slept with her? He pressed his lips to her brow and breathed her scent for what would be the last time. ‘I guess I have to get used to sharing you with success. I’ll stop distracting you and let you concentrate on your discoveries—and maybe let you get some sleep in the process.’