"And Nick. Okay, he'd danced with her once. He didn't need to dance with her again. And yet a third time…"
Efi stared at her. "Shut up, Kiki."
Her friend was all doe eyes and shoulder shrugs. "What? If I were you, I'd have let him know in no uncertain terms that his attention was a little over the top."
"She's my cousin, for God's sake."
"She's a sexpot."
That Aphrodite was.
And as one dance led into three, with Nick gladly playing to her cousin's apparent need for extra attention, Efi had felt as if her heels were growing shorter and her clothes too big until she feared she might disappear altogether.
She swiped a bit of eyeliner from under her lashes and sighed. "I don't know why I'm wasting my time. I'll never look as good as Aphrodite."
"I wasn't aware that's what you were trying to do."
Efi put away her makeup and leaned against the counter, away from the mirror next to her friend.
After a long silence, Kiki asked, "You know her well?"
"Who? Aphrodite?" She nodded. "Yeah. I spent a couple of summers with her in Greece. The other kids used to call her Scarecrow and she wore glasses and had the biggest nose that side of the Atlantic. My father used to joke you could see her nose coming five minutes before the rest of her arrived."
"Well obviously she grew out of all that."
And then some. "I used to feel sorry for her. Used to stand up for her. Kept her company when the other kids would leave her behind."
"And she thanks you by monopolizing your groom at your wedding party."
They both thought about that for a moment. Then Kiki moved so that she was standing in front of Efi. She gave her a quick once-over, then a more thorough one.
"What?" Efi asked, looking down at her pink dress.
"I don't know. I was thinking this thing is a little too plain."
"It was expensive."
"Fashion is something you buy. Style is something you are."
Style? This was her style.
Kiki stuck her right hand inside the bodice of Efi's dress. Efi gasped and grabbed her arm. "What are you doing?"
"Copping a feel, what do you think I'm doing?" She wiggled her fingers against Efi's breast. "I'm trying to improve on your cleavage."
"By groping it?"
Kiki smiled wickedly. "It is said that the more you massage them, the bigger they grow." She glanced at her own modest chest. "So much bullshit, really. Now, would you let go of my hand so I can do my job?"
"Which is?"
"To help my best friend feel better by looking better."
Efi released her grip and watched as Kiki shoved her breasts up then adjusted her bra so that instead of flat skin with the hint of shape under the dress she now had two swells of visible flesh.
Efi moved to put things back the way they were.
"Don't! I'm not done."
"What are you going to do next—roll up the waist of my skirt and make it a mini like we used to do in middle school?"
"That's an idea, but … no."
Instead she tugged on the belt where it was loosely lying against one hip. She tightened it, further accentuating her narrow waist.
"You know, I'd like to breathe again at some point tonight," Efi complained.
"Screw breathing. It's overrated."
Efi laughed and swatted her friend away.
"Here, try these on."
Kiki had kicked off her shoes. Only they weren't shoes, really, but towering skyscrapers with six-inch spike heels.
"Uh-uh. I hate heels."
"And the shoes you now have on hate you." Efi made a face and considered her low-heeled pumps.
"Forget it," she said, beginning to loosen her belt and put her bra back in order. "I am who I am. And it's who I am that Nick asked to marry. If I go out there the way you want me to, everyone will know I'm jealous. That's not what I want them to remember about the days leading up to my wedding."
Kiki's gaze was on hers in the mirror. "And you? What will you remember?"
Efi didn't want to think about that right now. Hopefully she would remember only the good things and let the rest of it fade away into the blurry recesses of her mind.
CHAPTER FOUR
Day four
Efi slowly awakened to the sound of raised voices downstairs. She plucked her brass wind-up clock from the side table and squinted at it. Just after nine.
She jackknifed upright in bed, nearly putting her sister Diana's eye out with an elbow. Just after nine!
"Hey, watch it," her sister grumbled, then rolled over on the double bed. Diana's room had been commandeered by visiting relatives.
"Sorry." Efi slapped the clock back to the table, tried to peel her eyes the rest of the way open, then decided she could see well enough as she got up, pulled on her pink oversize robe and dashed for the door, tripping over the blankets that comprised her sisters Eleni and Jenny's empty makeshift bed on the floor because their room had been taken over by even more relatives.
She paused in the upstairs hall, listening to the voices downstairs.
"No, you take this back. This isn't ours." Very definitely her mother.
"Look, lady, it has your name on it. It's yours." A man's voice, unfamiliar but obviously impatient.
"It's not mine. That might be my name, but those aren't my things. You've made a mistake. You'll have to take this back to your truck and bring me the right package."
Efi moved toward the stairs and bumped straight into Aphrodite, who had taken over Diana's bedroom along with her parents. She squinted at the other woman who had a good six inches on her and looked drop-dead gorgeous while Efi felt like death warmed over.
"Morning," she mumbled, then made her way around her cousin.
She quickly took the steps in her bare feet, not stopping until she nearly bumped into her mother.
"What's going on?"
The way Penelope and the deliveryman in a brown uniform looked at her, she supposed it might not have been a bad idea to make a pit stop in the bathroom before coming downstairs.
Her mother waved at the deliveryman. "He's trying to make me sign for a package that's not ours."
Efi accepted the package, looked at the return address, her mother's name on the mailing label then took the handheld computer from the deliveryman and signed for the already opened package.
"Thank you," the man said with a long-suffering sigh.
"Don't mention it."
Efi closed the door after him.
"What did you do that for? That's not our stuff."
Efi led the way into the kitchen, ignoring the twelve relatives of varying ages and sizes milling about the thankfully large room.
Penelope was on her heels. "Where are your slippers? You're going to catch cold running around without your slippers."
Efi gave an eye roll that hurt her head, put the box down on a part of the table that wasn't otherwise occupied by boubounieras, food or coffee cups, and opened the flaps to stare at the contents.
She squinted at the multicolored candy Hawaiian leis, sure she was seeing things.
At least half of the relatives in the room gathered to look over her shoulder.
"Told you," Penelope said, pulling out a handful of the party favors. "Not ours."
She had to give her mother that. The contents of the box weren't something they had ordered.
Efi fished around inside the box until she came up with the packing invoice. "300 Greek eye pins" was typed clearly in the contents column. Essentially small flat blue stones with an eye painted on either side that had been used by the Greeks to ward off evil for eons. Her mother had ordered the pins for the guests to wear to keep evil well away from the church and the wedding ceremony.
Penelope had put the leis back in the box and was now pacing back and forth across the room, weaving around relatives. "Bad omen, receiving the wrong package like this. Bad."
Several of the female relatives nodded in response. A couple
of them even crossed themselves and sent a prayer up to the Virgin Mary, while the male relatives merely grunted in response, which could mean agreement or disagreement, depending on how you wanted to take it.
Aphrodite chose that moment to join them.
Efi sank down into a chair, then leaned forward to remove the bag of Jordan almonds goosing her. "We still have three more days to go until the wedding. Plenty of time to get the right package."
"What? What's going on?" Aphrodite asked.
Efi stared at her, wishing she'd die or disappear even as one of their relatives quietly explained the situation to her.
Her mother stopped in front of Eli. "No. you don't understand. The damage has already been done. The ceremony is cursed."
More cross-signing and Greek prayers went up. And if she wasn't mistaken, Aphrodite looked a little pleased.
"Oh, Mom, stop it already. I'm the one who's supposed to be a nervous wreck. You're the one who's supposed to be trying to calm me down."
Everyone stared at Penelope.
"Since you're not a nervous wreck?" her mother asked.
She had a point. For some reason Efi wasn't nervous at all about the upcoming nuptials. She looked at Aphrodite. Well, okay, maybe a little. "Have at it, then."
She got up, poured herself an extra large cup of coffee, then picked up the cordless receiver, searching for the phone number of domeafavor.com.
"What are you doing?" her mother asked.
"Straightening this out, of course. Somewhere out there a bride is wondering why they got a box full of eyes instead of the leis here." She stared at her mother. "I just hope she's luckier than me in her choice of mothers."
"My daughter, the comedian."
Later that morning at the pastry shop, Efi idly wondered if maybe her mother had been right; her wedding was cursed. Or rather, it was beginning to look as if everything surrounding it seemed to be bad news. Forget the leis—not only had she found Phoebus securely ensconced at the shop, her sister Diana appeared to have been training him all morning. Which meant her father's intention to edge her out was going according to plan. With one little caveat: Phoebus couldn't seem to tell the difference between the refrigerator and the ovens.
"I'm going to kill him," Diana said, emerging from the kitchen with soot covering her face and the front of her white apron.
Efi stood at the counter near the register making notes, not officially working. "I'll come visit you in prison."
Phoebus burst through the swinging door to the kitchen, screaming. Efi figured out why as he passed her on his way outside: the back ties to his apron were ablaze. Diana ran after him, but he didn't need her help as he tore off the apron then stamped out the flames, trying to get a look at his own backside to make sure it was untouched.
Efi shook her head. Then again, maybe it wasn't her wedding that was cursed, but her father for thinking he could replace her.
In fact, two of the things that had happened that day didn't bother her, because she'd been against them anyway. The Greek eyes had always reminded her of fish eyes despite the pretty blue stone. She'd shuddered when her mother ordered three hundred for the guests to pin to the front of their dress clothing at her wedding.
As for Phoebus…
"I quit."
Efi looked up from the notebook to find Phoebus facing her. "Bully for you."
"Tell your father it's going to take a hell of a lot more than he's paying me to put my life on the line."
"Consider it done," Efi agreed.
And with that Phoebus exited a second time. Diana stood holding the charred remains of his apron.
"Papa is not going to be happy."
Efi shrugged. "He'll get over it."
"And what about me?"
She wasn't sure she was following her younger sister.
"What if Papa's right and you won't want to return to the shop after you get married? I can't work here. I've got one more semester and I become a nurse. I don't want to run this shop."
Not her sister, too. "I'm not going to change my mind about the shop, Di. I'm coming back to work right after my honeymoon."
Her sister stared at her long and hard then thrust the ruined apron at her and untied her own. "What are you doing?"
"Going after Phoebus, of course."
"Why?"
"Because I'm not willing to take the chance, that's why." She took her purse from behind the counter. "Besides, I don't want to hear it from Papa when he finds out Phoebus quit."
"But the guy has absolutely zero ability in the kitchen."
"Yes, well, from what I hear it took you three months to learn how to set the oven timer, so I'm willing to cut the guy a little slack."
Diana moved toward the door.
"Wait."
Her sister waited.
Efi left the two aprons on the counter, and moved to stand between her sister and the door. "I've got errands to run, so you can't leave."
"This is just a ploy to stop me from going after Phoebus."
Maybe. "I'm not the one on the clock today—you are. So you stay, I'll go." She picked up her notebook.
"And Phoebus?"
"Call him."
With that, Efi left the small, dim shop that she wanted to change into a showplace and stood outside, the midday sun warming her. She shouldn't have come downtown. Then again, the choice had been between staying at home being fussed over by her mother and the relatives who had taken over their house, listening to them talk about curses and omens and bad events that had happened in their family since the beginning of time, or coming to the shop and discovering she was being replaced.
She fished her cell phone out of her purse—there was only one person capable of making her feel better.
Nick answered on the first ring.
"Meet me at the apartment. Now," she said, wondering why she hadn't thought of this before.
"I'm there," he responded, his voice sending anticipatory shivers up and down her spine.
The simple apartment on the fringes of Grosse Point was large and airy and one of the few things she and Nick had agreed on until they could afford to make a down payment on a house. The furnishings, of course, had been another matter. He'd wanted everything large and covered in leather and dead animal pelts, while she worshipped the very ground Martha Stewart walked on. So they'd compromised and the apartment that they would spend their first full night in Sunday after the reception smelled of a rich burgundy leather recliner, and was dominated by a pink-and-white-striped sofa with flowered throw pillows. The dining room was left empty because her grandfather Kiriakos had said he wanted to buy them a set.
The bed, however … the bed was her dream, the water bed Nick had wanted having been ruled out because it was against the lease in the third-floor apartment. Efi let her purse drop to the foyer table then walked toward the door that hid the wrought-iron creation in the other room. Covered in white eyelet lace and tons of pillows of varying sizes and shapes it looked like a picture snipped out of a magazine. And considering she'd designed it from just such a picture, she couldn't have been happier.
And, of course, despite Nick's grumbling about it being too feminine, he'd quickly realized the other uses for the iron posts.
Efi smiled as she ran her palm over one of the iron posts in question. In twenty-four hours the place would be packed with relatives, but now it was empty. Tomorrow night was the official krevati, which in Greek literally meant "bed" but also symbolized the making of the marital bed by single women in the family and other traditions designed to bring the newly married couple happiness and fertility. Of course, the event would be followed by food and drink and dancing in the apartment.
No one need know that only a day before, the bride and groom had already "baptized" the bed in their own intimate way.
Efi began stripping out of her clothes, anxious for Nick to be there so they could have those all-important few minutes together they'd been trying to steal in what seemed like forever.
One whip of the coverlet and the decorative pillows went flying. She climbed between the Egyptian sheets, the material silky against her bare skin, then drew the sheet up to her chin. Changing her mind, she draped it to lie against her stomach, then struck a pose of lazy invitation, waiting for the moment Nick would walk through the door.
She heard his key in the lock and swallowed in anticipation. A quick crunch of her hair and she smiled in wicked pleasure.
Her cell phone chirped from where she'd put it on the bedside table. Damn, what a mood breaker. She groped to turn it off. Probably her mother. She flipped the receiver open to punch the silence button, only to find that it was Nick's name in the display screen…
And looked up to see her mother standing in the bedroom doorway…
CHAPTER FIVE
Day five
The irony of the situation wasn't lost on Efi, although she was hard put to find any amusement in it. Just the day before she had been caught by her mother in bed waiting for Nick, her excuse that she'd stopped by for a quick nap making not a dent in what she and her mother knew was the truth. Namely that she was hoping to finish what she and Nick had started in the pantry those days ago.
And now, some thirty hours later, in the same apartment, both sides of the family were crammed into the small place, on the same bed—however remade and minus her—the single women decorating it with rose pedals and koufetta, sugar-coated almonds. Efi wasn't all that sure how she felt about Aphrodite being one of those women, her long dark hair silky and swaying as she bent over the bed. She supposed it was a good thing her cousin didn't know which side of the bed she was going to sleep on or else she might find a series of strategically placed pins protruding from the mattress.
At any rate, Kiki seemed as tuned in to Aphrodite's suggestive intentions as Efi and thwarted the beautiful woman at every turn. If Aphrodite tried to make eye contact with Nick, Kiki stepped in the way. When Aphrodite tried to test Efi's perfume on the dresser, Kiki took the bottle out of her hands and put it back down. The moment Aphrodite positioned herself so she was in front of the women, Kiki edged her out of the way. At one point Kiki jostled Aphrodite so hard the other woman nearly fell headfirst into the connecting bathroom. Efi thought it good that she hadn't fallen, because Kiki likely would have locked her in for the duration of the krevati.
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