by Jackie Braun
Obviously, he was troubled by what his grandmother had said. Was it merely Nick’s pride that was injured? Did he still feel so betrayed by his brother that he was unwilling to act as his koumbaro? Or did Nick continue to harbor tender feelings for Selene?
They were in the cable car, descending from the hilltop, when he surprised her by bringing her hand to his mouth and planting a kiss on the back of it.
“What was that for?”
“An apology. I have not been very good company today.”
“You have a lot on your mind.”
“Yes.” He nodded, then added, “Thank you, Darcie.”
She blinked at that. “For what?”
“For not pushing me on this matter the way my family is.”
She managed a smile. Those questions she had would go unasked and unanswered.
* * *
For the second morning in a row, a knock sounded at the door as Darcie was making a pot of coffee. Nick. Her heart picked up speed and her body temperature shot up by several degrees as she recalled the tenderness with which he’d made love to her the night before. Where that first coupling during the day had been frenzied and rushed, Nick had been exquisitely slow and thorough the second time.
As for those questions that had troubled Darcie earlier in the day, they were forgotten. Surely, the man who made such sweet love to her could not still love someone else.
She was smiling as she opened the door, a comment about being insatiable ready on her lips. But it wasn’t Nick who stood on the stoop. It was Selene.
“Forgive me for being so rude and not calling first,” the other woman said in halting English. She smiled nervously as she clutched her handbag to her chest. “I hope I did not catch you at a bad time.”
“No. Not at all,” Darcie replied, trying not to feel self-conscious in a pair of jersey cotton shorts and a tank top that doubled as her sleepwear.
Thank goodness she had at least dragged a brush through her hair and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Meanwhile, Selene looked picture-perfect in a cotton skirt and sleeveless blouse. Even in a pair of high heels, she barely came to Darcie’s shoulder. The old Darcie would have slouched. This Darcie squared her shoulders and settled her hands on her “good birthing hips.”
“May I come in?” Selene asked.
“Of course.” Darcie stepped aside. It seemed odd to be welcoming Nick’s former girlfriend and soon-to-be sister-in-law into his house, but neither woman commented on it. “I just poured myself coffee. Would you like some?”
“Please.”
They made their way to the kitchen, where Darcie got a cup down from one of the cupboards.
“I don’t know how to use a briki. I hope this is okay,” she said, pouring from the carafe of the automatic coffeemaker.
“This is fine. Thank you.” After stirring in an obscene amount of sugar, Selene took a delicate sip. To her credit, her grimace was barely detectable.
Darcie sipped her own coffee. Silence ensued as the women eyed one another.
“So...” Darcie expelled a breath.
“This is very...”
“Awkward.”
“Yes. You must be wondering why I am here.”
“Um, a little,” Darcie admitted. She didn’t ask if Selene had ever been in Nick’s home before. Quite honestly, she didn’t want to know.
“As you must be aware, there is a...strain between Pieter and Nick. It goes back years to when...when Pieter and I began to date.”
“Because you used to date Nick,” Darcie added, figuring it best not to tiptoe around the big white elephant sitting in the center of the room.
Selene closed her eyes briefly, nodded. She looked miserable. Ridiculously put-together and gorgeous, but miserable all the same.
“Pieter is...I do not know the English word to describe it.” Selene set her coffee down on the counter and paced to the window. “He loves his brother very much.”
“I’m not trying to be rude, but you loved Nick at one time, too.”
“I did or at least I thought so. Nick and I, we were so young when we began seeing each other. I was a teenager, barely one year out of school. I thought I knew my heart, but my feelings for him changed as time passed.”
Darcie was in no position to cast stones. After all, she’d thought she’d loved Tad. She’d accepted his proposal of marriage and then had spent six years making wedding plans, a couple of those years living under the same roof. She’d been a lot older than Selene at the time, too.
“You didn’t want to relocate to another country.”
Selene shook her head. “I love it here. Greece is...home.”
“It must have been difficult when you realized how you felt about Pieter.”
Selene nibbled her lower lip. “It happened...slowly. At least for me. Pieter and I have known each other for so long. We started as friends. After Nick moved to New York and we broke up, Pieter would call. Checking up on me, he said.” Her expression turned soft and her smile was nostalgic. “We started meeting at a café in town after work for coffee. Then it became drinks at a tavern in the evening. At first, we talked about Nick. How much we both missed him. Then we just talked. About everything.”
“And you realized how much you had in common,” Darcie said, her thoughts turning to Nick.
“Yes. We liked the same things. We wanted the same things in life.”
“You were falling in love.” Darcie wanted to ignore the voice whispering that she was in the same predicament. Could this really be the Big L?
“The first time Pieter kissed me, I had never felt that way before. Then he told me he loved me and confessed that he had been in love with me for a very long time. We both cried, because by now I was in love, too. But...” Selene pinched her eyes shut. When she opened them, they were bright with unshed tears. “I never meant to come between brothers.”
Darcie didn’t doubt the other woman’s sincerity. Selene’s pain was nearly palpable. Still, she felt the need to point out, “All the same, Nick felt betrayed. He trusted Pieter.”
“Pieter never betrayed Nick’s trust. Nick and I were no longer a couple. Even though we had done nothing wrong, we both felt guilty at first. We even stopped seeing each other for several weeks, but...” She lifted her shoulders. “Eventually, we could not deny what was in our hearts.”
“I’m happy for you.” How could Darcie be otherwise? “But I’m not sure I understand what this has to do with me.”
“Pieter’s mother and grandmother have tried to bridge the gap between the brothers.”
“By trying to set Nick up on dates,” Darcie mused. “He told me.”
“They did not know about you at the time,” Selene hastened to add.
“I know.” How could they?
“They want him to be happy. That is what we all have wanted for him. And now he is. He has found love again.”
Selene smiled. Darcie nearly choked. She rested a hand on her chest. Her heart beat unsteadily beneath it.
“About that, I don’t know that I can claim the credit.” Could she?
“I do not understand what you mean.”
“Nick and I haven’t been seeing each other for very long.” As in less than two weeks. And even though they’d made love, neither of them had attached a label to their feelings.
“The length of time does not matter. He is happy. Anyone who knows him can see that.”
Okay, Darcie would give her that. And she had to admit, she was pretty darned happy, herself. But... “It’s not like you and Pieter.”
And it wasn’t. Not by a long shot since they would be saying goodbye soon, and their future, assuming they even had one, was far from determined.
Selene was nodding. “I understand. Pieter and I denied we were in love at first, too.”<
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“Oh, hey. Look, I’m not denying anything. It’s just that...and Nick and I aren’t...he hasn’t said...” She swallowed.
Selene’s smile was serene. “He loves you, even if he has not said so. Yiayia is right about the two of you.”
Darcie squinted at Selene through one eye. She was going to regret it, but she had to know. “What is Yiayia saying?”
“She has seen the way Nick looks at you. The way you look at each other. She says it is a good sign.”
Even as Darcie’s heart kicked out a few extra beats, she was protesting, “But I’m not Greek!”
“And still Yiayia likes you!” Selene chuckled softly before sobering. “Our wedding is in just two days. The only gift Pieter and I want, the only one that truly matters, is Nick’s blessing.”
Uh-oh. “I don’t know what you expect me to do, Selene.”
The young woman reached across the table and took Darcie’s hand in both of hers. “If you could just talk to him. Please.”
“It’s not my place.” And hadn’t Nick already thanked her for staying out of it and not pushing? But Selene looked so heartbroken, Darcie found herself softening. “What would I say to him? What could I possibly say that Pieter and the rest of the family haven’t already?”
“I do not know,” Selene admitted on a ragged sigh. She let go of Darcie’s hand and rose. “I am sorry to have bothered you.”
“It was no bother. Really.”
They were at the door when Selene said, “At least Nick will be at the wedding. For a while that seemed doubtful. Even with you at his side, I know this will not be pleasant for him.”
Darcie swallowed. She wouldn’t be there. He would be on his own.
Selene was saying, “Perhaps I am being selfish in wanting more for Pieter’s sake.”
Her words struck a chord in Darcie. For Pieter’s sake. Not her own.
“Love isn’t selfish,” Darcie murmured when the door had closed.
Nick had told her that very thing after his argument with Pieter. At the time, he’d seemed to be examining his old reasons behind the brothers’ feud. She had an idea.
Darcie hadn’t pushed, but she cared about Nick too much not to offer a little nudge.
ELEVEN
Something was on Darcie’s mind, but Nick couldn’t figure out what. Women were rarely a mystery to him. But then, Darcie had been from the very beginning. Not mysterious in the way some of the women he’d dated back in New York tried to be. Darcie wasn’t one to play games. For her, seduction wasn’t an art that she practiced. She came by it naturally.
Nick would be lying if he said he hadn’t enjoyed the little pieces of herself she’d revealed in their short time together. Or if he said he wasn’t looking forward to seeing, learning more. All of which made her looming departure from Greece more disconcerting. Their time together had been amazing and sweet, and was proving all too brief. Already he was trying to think of ways to prolong it. But to what end? The answer he kept coming up with left him staggered.
Was he falling in love?
For her last night in Athens, Nick had made reservations for dinner at one his favorite restaurants, determined to show her a wonderful time and, as a side bonus, to keep his own mind off the fact that his brother’s rehearsal dinner was that same evening. Nick had no official role in the wedding, but he’d still been invited. Both he and Darcie had.
“That sounds nice,” Darcie said when he had called to confirm their plans. Then she’d thrown him completely when she added, “But you need to cancel the reservation. I’ve decided I’m going to make dinner for you here.”
“You are? And what will be for dessert?” he’d asked.
“I think you know.”
She’d sounded a little breathless. And Nick had been torturing himself ever since with fantasies of her prancing about his kitchen, wearing a little white apron and nothing else.
When he arrived at the house just after five o’clock, however, the kitchen was missing both a cook and a meal. Darcie was on the terrace, reclining on one of the chaise lounges with a glass of chilled wine in her hand. Her eyes were closed, her face tilted toward the sun. She was wearing a tank top and shorts that ended high on her thighs and her tanned legs looked ridiculously long. Her feet were bare. Her toenails painted a festive shade of tangerine.
“I thought you were making dinner?”
“That was just part of my ploy to lure you here.”
He leaned over and captured her smiling lips for a long, thorough kiss. “Should I be worried for my safety?” he asked as he straightened.
In answer, she set aside her wine, grabbed his tie and tugged him back for a second kiss.
His breathing ragged, he said, “Perhaps we should take this inside and skip ahead to that dessert you promised.”
“Sorry.” She sounded seriously contrite. “I’m afraid there’s no time. You’ll be late.”
“For?”
“Dinner.”
He couldn’t think straight with his hormones staging a riot. A common occurrence around Darcie. “I canceled our reservations, remember?”
She inhaled deeply before letting out her breath. “I’m not talking about the restaurant. I’m talking about Pieter and Selene’s rehearsal dinner.”
He snagged the wine she’d set down and took a sip, stalking to the terrace’s rail. “I am not going.”
Darcie stood and joined him at the railing. “I want you to reconsider. In fact, I am asking you to.”
“Why?”
“Because if you don’t go, Nick, you’re going to regret it. Just as you will regret not playing a meaningful role in their wedding.”
“It is not as simple as that!” he shouted.
But Darcie was undeterred. “I’m not saying everything will magically be all better. But it’s a start. This rift between you and your brother, it will never truly begin to mend otherwise.”
“And to think I thanked you for not interfering,” he said dryly as his temper began to simmer. He shoved a hand through his hair. “I know you mean well, but this is not your business, Darcie. You are a tourist here on holiday. This is my life!”
She didn’t back down, even if just for a moment she looked as if she’d been slapped. “I may only be a tourist, Nick, but your family thinks otherwise, which is why Selene came to see me.”
Nick didn’t bother to mask his surprise. “Selene was here? What did she want from you?”
“From me? Nothing.” Darcie waited a beat. “What she wants is something only you can give. She wants you and Pieter to be brothers again. In short, what she wants, Nick, is your blessing on their marriage. Not for her sake, mind you. For Pieter’s. Love isn’t selfish, remember?”
Nick swallowed. He recognized the lump lodged in his throat as guilt, and that was before Darcie said, “Selene asked if I would talk to you. She thought you might listen to me since we’re supposedly a couple. You know what?” Darcie poked a finger in his chest. “I got the feeling that she would have gotten down on her knees and begged if she felt it necessary. It is that important to her. To both of them.”
Nick closed his eyes as emotions tumbled fast and furiously inside him. His anger of a moment ago had drained away. As for the betrayal he’d felt for so long, that was gone, too. It had been ebbing for a while now, he knew, the last remnants disappearing as he’d gotten to know Darcie. The emotion that remained was undiluted shame. He hung his head as it crashed over him like a rogue wave.
“I’m sorry.” Darcie’s hand was on his back, her touch tentative. Where a moment ago her tone had been confrontational, it was apologetic now as she said, “I don’t mean to cause you more pain, and I know I have no business whatsoever interfering in your personal life, but I said what I said because I care about you. Deeply. I want you to be happy. And,
frankly, Nick, in addition to having regrets, you’ll never truly move on with your own life until you let go of the past.” Her voice hitched when she added, “And you haven’t done that.”
He turned. “You think I still love Selene?”
“No. Well, maybe I’ve sort of wondered,” she admitted softly. She made her tone light when she added, “I know you’re insanely attracted to me and all, but—”
Was that all it was? He didn’t think so, but what he really needed Darcie to know right now was the absolute truth. “I do not love Selene.”
“Oh. Good. That’s really good.” A smile fluttered briefly on her lips before she added, “But you’ve held so tightly to the past, Nick, that you’re robbing yourself of a future with your brother and the family you clearly adore.”
She understood him so well, better than any woman ever had. His conscience flared as he thought of how only a moment earlier he’d called her a tourist just passing through. He owed her an apology, but he didn’t trust his voice enough to speak. Darcie apparently took his silence to mean something else and continued.
“You’ve helped me start over these past couple of weeks. I only wanted to return the favor. For what it’s worth, I believe Selene when she says that she and Pieter did everything they could to deny their feelings for one another.”
“I know.”
“Did you also know that when they realized they were in love they even stopped seeing each other for a while?”
“No.” The news didn’t sit well with Nick’s conscience now that he no longer saw himself in the role of the injured party. He said softly, “I think I always knew Pieter had not set out to betray me.”
Just as he knew he had been selfish in his expectations of Selene. Nick had disregarded her feelings to follow his dream. Then, even after they had parted ways, he’d somehow still expected her to change her mind, to—what? Pine for him? Because it would have soothed his pride. He didn’t care for what that said about his character.
