by SR Jones
Does he mean the Cretan Katzakis?
Marijuana growing hoodlums who terrorize all who live within a ten-mile radius of their land, they are seriously nasty. They once shot a tourist who had wandered onto their land, and they didn’t go to prison because the local cops didn’t dare charge them. They live like animals, though, despite the money they have. Their home is a total shit hole. I visited once a long time ago with Stamatis, and I swear I didn’t stop itching for a week.
“The guys on Crete?” I am hoping he denies it.
“Yep.”
“You got anything to say about that?” I’m risking a lot asking him this, but he has to know I am aware he’s her father.
“What can I do? I stepped in once, I can’t keep doing it.”
I don’t have feelings for Maya, hell, I don’t particularly like the girl, but fuck me, she can’t be married off to those people and shipped off to Crete. “I don’t think Maya will fit in with their family.”
“Neither do I, and I am talking to Spiros about this, but ultimately, he is her father. He has the final say. I’ve got to go. Tell Damen to rein it in around Costas.”
Crap. Now, I have a dilemma. Do I tell Damen? Do I tell Maya? I am sure if I do she can get her mother to put her foot down. Both options are fraught. I have an inkling Maya might try to run if she thinks her father is about to ship her off to Crete. Tell Damen, and I risk him showing his hand to Stamatis.
There’s so much old-fashioned bullshit honor and other ancient patriarchal crap tied up in all of this. I know what some of the more traditional families can be like. There are few of them left around, but I know.
Damen thinks I’ve lost my mind dating Sophia, but I haven’t. It’s a favor to her, nothing more. Her father wanted her to marry a friend of the family who was a good few years older than her, and she is dead against it. But no local boys want to ask for her hand, and frankly, there aren’t many young people left in the village these days. Our plan is, I date her, ask for her hand, and she moves to Athens with me, and then we split up, but she stays there and tells her parents she’s not going home. Once she’s away from them, out of the village, they’ll not be likely to come and fetch her back.
I need to find a moment to tell Damen the damn truth. I swore to Sophia I wouldn’t tell a soul. I know her from aged four, and she’s one of my sister’s best friends. I must tell Damen, though. He won’t say anything to anyone. At least then he won’t think I’ve gone and lost my damned mind and tied myself down the way he seems determined to do. It might make him see his situation with Maya more clearly, if he knows I’m not a misty-eyed fool in love. Love isn’t for the likes of us.
I’ll do it. When I get the chance, I’ll sit him down, swear him to secrecy, and tell him the truth about Sophia and me.
In the meantime, maybe I ought to warn Maya not to get too attached, because Damen will never be what she needs.
It’s been a weird few days. Things are tense between Alesso and I, which is not something I’m used to. He’s got more to say, I know it. He delivered a terse warning from Stamatis not to mess with Costas, and I get it, the guy is his son, but he’s a total screw up, and Stamatis needs to sort him out. Then he started a conversation twice, only to stop it when the first time Markos, and the second time, Maya came into the room. I’m thankful they interrupted us, as I’m not sure I want to hear more of his wisdom.
Alesso is worried for me the way I would be for him, and he’s probably right to be. Every day I start the day telling myself I should end this between Maya and me. Every night, I end the day crawling between her legs, the pull of her too much to deny.
I don’t love her, and I don’t believe she loves me, despite Alesso’s claims of her falling for me. Maya is tough, emotionally. She’s not clingy or needy, and she’s the only woman, other than my grandmother, to stand up to me the way she does. I’m not worried she’s got some raging case of insta-love for me. I do worry, though she might down the line, which is why I need to end this.
Maya hasn’t had much love in her life, and she craves it. I haven’t had much love in my life, and I fear it. We’re a disaster waiting to happen.
That night I take a shower, and get ready for bed. Maya is writing on her laptop in her room. She’s decided she wants to go to college, which makes me feel much better about our situation. She’s not planning on babies and a marriage to me, but college and a possible future in social work or charity work. I told Alesso the girl has her head screwed on, but he didn’t believe me.
I’m the one who is losing their mind. For the first time, I want something more than I’ve had before. Not marriage, not hearts and flowers, because Christ knows I’m not built for it, and I’d only let her down. Dating, though, being boyfriend and girlfriend would be good. I snort to myself. Boyfriend and girlfriend! I sound eighteen, not in my thirties.
I get into bed and take out the book I’m reading, some dark thriller where the crime world is described in lurid, but not realistic detail. Honestly, if we went around piling up bodies like the guys in this book, we’d have every cop in the country on our tails. They’ve dissolved someone in a vat of acid. There’s no need for such theatrics in reality. Simply wrap them in plastic sheeting, make sure not to get some blood on you or your car. Drive them out to the middle of nowhere and bury them deep, preferably in a hot environment, and you’re more than likely to get away with it. Not that I do my own clean up. Stamatis has guys who do that side of things, but I know how to do it if needs be. These guys in this book are dragging bodies out of houses and into car trunks without plastic wrap, and that’s going to leave a shit load of evidence.
The door between our rooms opens, and Maya is standing there, the light from the bedside lamp throwing her into stark relief. The juxtaposition between the grim tone of my thoughts and her beauty is jarring, and it reminds me again why we can never be. At some point, this woman deserves a normal life, not one with a fuck up like me. A man so messed in the head he prefers working for the mob instead of a nine to five.
I shake the gloomy thoughts away and focus on the woman smiling at me from across the room.
I let my eyes travel the length of her and swallow. She’s wearing a dusky pink baby doll negligee, and she looks sensual and curvy in it. Her skin shimmers in the soft lighting, and her hair hangs in loose waves. I might not love her, but I want her, and the wanting doesn’t diminish, only increases each time I have her.
This isn’t my usual pattern. Normally, I find a woman, slake my lust with her, and after a few weeks, or days sometimes, that lust diminishes until at some point, I end it. With Maya, each time I have her only fuels the fire for more. She’s an ever-present itch under my skin, but scratching only makes it worse.
“What you reading?”
“Some crime novel.”
“Oh, doing some research into new techniques? Kind of like a doctor reading Grey’s Anatomy?”
I throw a shark’s grin her way. “Get that perky ass over here, and shut that pesky mouth.”
She gives me a mock glare. “How dare you? I think on second thought, I’d rather sleep alone.”
She turns as if to go, but I’m moving before she can back out of the doorway. I have her slung over my shoulder before she can figure out what’s going on.
Throwing her on the bed, I stand over her and admire my catch.
“You’re looking awfully pleased with yourself.” She smirks at me, and I like this about her. The back and forth, the fact she might at times be wary of me, but she doesn’t let it make her compliant around me. She’s feisty and never boring.
“I’m admiring the morsel I’ve dragged back to my cave,” I say, mock beating my chest.
“Sadly, in those days, you’d probably be dead by now. You’d be old, if still alive, and some young buck would have stolen me from right under your ancient nose.” She gives a mock sigh and bats her eyelashes at me.
“Old? Ancient?”
“Yes, cavemen didn’t live long lives,” s
he informs me.
I mentally file away a note to look up the average lifespan of ancient humans just so I can fuck with her if she’s wrong.
“Thank God we live in the modern world, where you’re in your prime.” She lazily lets her gaze travel up and down my body, as if I’m the one on display in revealing lingerie, not her. “And what a piece of prime beef you are.”
“Are you objectifying me?” I demand.
“You’d better believe it. Why don’t you take those sweats off and let me see the goods?”
Only too happy to comply, I strip, making a bit of a show of it. When I’ve pulled my top over my head, I bunch it up before throwing it to one side, knowing it will make the muscles in my arms pop. Then I shuck my bottoms off and repeat the move.
“Sometimes, I wonder if you got that body to make you more dangerous, or if you worked at it because you knew it would drive women crazy.”
I don’t answer her because she’s already moving. Getting off her back, she crawls to the edge of the bed and crooks a finger for me to come close. When I do, she leans toward me and kisses my chest reverently. She takes her time, kissing across both pecs before licking one nipple and making me shiver. Then she works her talented way down my body, taking her time, savoring me.
This is another thing I like about her. She doesn’t simply lie back and expect me to make her feel good; she makes me feel good too. She makes me feel desired, something I’ve not really had before. I’ve had women tell me I drive them crazy in bed with my talented hands or my mouth, but Maya makes me feel as if she wants me as much for how I look, and who I am, as what I can do. It’s novel, but I like it.
“Someone ought to make a mold of you, then statues of your body can be put in all the major art galleries the world over,” she says against my stomach, before swiping her tongue right over the leaking head of my dick.
She moves down further, ignoring my dick again, and nudges at my balls, before sucking them into her mouth.
“Christ, Maya.” I put my hand on the back of her head and relish the warmth of her mouth.
Letting go with an audible pop, she looks up at me from under her long lashes, pulls my dick away from my belly, and swallows me down.
I hiss and arch into her mouth. She takes me deep and sets up a fast and greedy rhythm. My eyes drift closed, and I let myself enjoy the feel of it all, until the telltale tingle starts in the base of my spine. I pull her away from me, because I don’t want to come like this. I want to come inside her.
“Get on your hands and knees on the bed, facing away from me,” I tell her.
She does as I say, and I don’t tell her to take the baby doll off because I like the way it frames her ass, but I do rip the panties she’s wearing with it right off her hips.
Gasping, she turns her head to give me the evil eye. “This set was expensive.”
“It’s fine, I’ll buy you another exactly the same.” I slap her ass cheek once, loving the slight wobble of her firm flesh.
Wanting to see more of her, I nudge her legs further apart, taking time to admire her wet pussy before I line myself up and slam into her.
“Oh, God!” She drops her head, giving a lovely curve to her shoulders and back.
I take all of her in, from her pretty asshole winking lewdly at me, to her wet and swollen pussy grabbing my dick, to her back and luscious hair. She’s a wet dream, and I don’t think I’ll ever get bored of her.
Wanting to feel her next to me, I pull her up until her back is flush against my front, and she’s almost sitting in my lap. “Touch yourself,” I tell her.
She does as I say, her fingers reaching down to stroke herself, brushing against me every now and again.
As I slam into her, my hand tight over her belly, the other grabbing one of her full tits through the soft material of her negligee, all sorts of pornographic thoughts flit through my brain. The feeling starts again at the base of my spine, but this time I don’t try to stop it. Instead, I let go, emptying myself into her with a grunt. As I do, I think how hot it would be to fill her with my cum and make her pregnant. See her belly grow with my seed.
What the fuck? I pull out of her before I’ve finished coming, getting some on her ass cheeks. I don’t take the time to admire my mark on her skin, because I’m about to have a panic attack. Where the hell did that thought come from? I don’t want kids, not with her; not with anyone.
“What’s wrong?” She turns wide worried eyes my way. Her face is flushed, but I don’t think she’s come.
Not wanting her scrutiny, I give her what I hope is a sexy look, flip her over and go down on her, eating at her until she comes humping my face.
That night, as she sleeps soundly in my arms, I lay awake for what seems like hours.
“Just be careful, babe.” Stella gives me a soft look through the screen as we chat via our tablets.
I sigh and try not to be pissed at her, but she’s putting a major damper on my happy. “I know: he’s not the marrying type, don’t go getting myself infatuated, blah blah.”
I’ve been talking with her about how well things are going between Damen and me, and that’s her response. Be careful. Marvelous.
She smiles then. “Actually, he is kind of the marrying type, because he married your ass to save you. In all seriousness, I’m more worried that you’re the one who will hurt him.”
“What?” I’m incredulous.
“You’re young. You’ve not been in a relationship before. Most of us have already fallen in love two or three times by your age, and we realize it wasn’t love at all, and we’re ready for when the real thing comes along. I don’t say this to be horrible, but you’re a total newbie to all this. The feelings I had at sixteen when I went out with Jon Stavros and thought he was the love of my life until I realized he picked his nose and ate it, you’ve never had that. So Damen, he’s getting all your hormones, all your need to give and receive love projected onto him, and what if he falls for you? Falls for the intensity of it all, only for you to decide three months from now you can’t stand the way he chews his food?”
I know where she’s coming from, I truly do, because everything she says is true, except for her understanding of how I feel. It’s deeper, I know it is. I don’t love Damen, but I am falling in love with him, and I think he might, maybe, be feeling the same.
“Okay, I’ll take it easy,” I tell her, without any intention of doing what she says.
“Except for the sex part, of course,” she adds with a smirk. “It’s your duty to womankind to keep tapping that for as long as you can. Just don’t … don’t think it means more than it is. Enjoy the hell out of one another, and when this fake marriage is up, move on with your life. You know you can hardly be together anyway, the way the family dynamics are around all of this.”
And there she has me. Because she’s right. Ice creeps into my veins for a moment when I think about how Stamatis will react to Damen and me, how my own father might react. Hell, this is dangerous for Damen, and by allowing him to continue, I risk putting him in harm’s way. Maybe, I should stop this? If I care about him, surely I don’t want him in trouble.
The thought of it makes my heart ache. The idea of not being able to touch him ever again, to snuggle into him and smell his unique, sensual scent is horrible. I’m addicted to his touch, his size, his warmth. Being in bed without him will be cold and lonely, and I don’t know if I’m strong enough to face that right now.
“I’ve got to go,” I lie.
“Okay, babe. See you soon I hope; it’s been too long.”
“Definitely,” I say. Probably another lie, because I don’t know if I will see her soon. Part of me doesn’t want to if she’s going to keep dealing up downer truth-bombs.
I need comfort food, and I head downstairs and into the kitchen to grab some ice cream. The men are all in the den, playing something violent on the Playstation. A couple of my uncle’s other guards are here, so I don’t know if their get-together started out as a work thing an
d degenerated into a games afternoon, or if it was planned as that all along.
Not wanting to interrupt, I decide to return to my room and eat my ice cream while I read the latest Jilly Cooper.
My phone beeps, and I glance at it, expecting a text from Stella, but it’s from Mother.
I’m outside. Can you let me in discreetly? I need to talk to you, and I don’t want Damen to know I’m here. Xxx
I shouldn’t do it, because Damen ought to know about everyone who enters this house. But it’s my own mother for God’s sake, and while she might not have won any parenting awards, she isn’t a threat to me. Unlike my daddy dearest, who most certainly is.
Taking care to be quiet, I creep out of the kitchen and open the front door. Luckily the den is a way down the hall, and the guys are making a lot of noise, so no one is likely to hear me entering the code to disable the alarm and letting her in.
Once she’s inside, I lead her to the kitchen, close the door, and offer her a drink. She takes a glass of wine, surprise, surprise. She takes a sip of it, her red painted lips leaving a mark on the glass before putting it down and dropping her head into her hands with a sigh.
Why the dramatics?
“What’s wrong?” I ask her, a sinking feeling taking hold in my stomach.
“Your father is busy arranging another marriage for you.”
Nothing she said could have shocked me more. Is he insane? Didn’t my uncle have to sort out the mess he left behind when he did this before?
I shake my head. “So? It won’t happen. Uncle Stamatis won’t let it.”
She sighs. “I don’t think we can rely on him stopping it, honey.” She reaches out to me, brushing a strand of hair from my face and hooking it behind my ear.
It’s such a maternal gesture it makes my heart ache.
“Really? Because I think he will.” I can’t see him allowing this.
“You may be right, but if you’re wrong…” She takes another sip of the wine. “It’s a huge risk. If your uncle doesn’t come through, then you’ll have to go and live with these animals in Crete.”
