by Holly Rayner
After a few moments, Zoey found her voice and prepared to use it to refuse the offer, as tempting as it was. Just at that moment, however, her office door flew open.
“Hello again. I just thought I ought to check on you two.”
Zoey sighed inwardly. It was her mother.
“Have you worked everything out?” Melinda asked, giving her daughter a significant look. “We always strive to give our clients the best experience possible.”
“I think we may have hit on an acceptable solution,” Stelios answered her. “In fact, we were just discussing that when you walked in, weren’t we, Ms. Forde?”
Zoey found herself under a full court press. Between her mother and her client, there was simply no way out of it that she could see.
“Yes, we were,” Zoey finally replied, fighting to arrange her features into a smile. “Mr. Zakiridis thinks he might enjoy a date with me, and I’m happy to give it a try.”
“Well!” Melinda exclaimed, exuding surprise, though if Zoey knew her mother at all, she had doubtless been in the hallway, listening the entire time. “That’s absolutely wonderful. When is this happening?”
“I have an opening in my schedule tomorrow at six. If that works for you I can pick you up at your home.”
That would be fine,” Zoey replied, a little stiffly. “I look forward it.”
“So do I,” replied Stelios. “I’d better go now. I’m glad we had the opportunity to work through this.”
So saying, the Greek quickly walked out of the office. Moments later, Zoey and Melinda watched through the window as he left the building and jumped into the black town car.
Glaring darkly at her mother, Zoey sat down at her desk and went to work.
For what might have been the first time ever, Zoey truly appreciated her job because it kept her from thinking about Blake or Stelios, or just what the enigmatic Greek billionaire could be planning for the rest of the day. She spent the next few hours going through her profiles, answering emails, and matching her clients, happy to be able to escape from her thoughts.
All too soon, the workday came to an end, and Zoey marched toward the subway with a hopeful air about her. This time, no one bothered to offer her a seat, so she gripped a pole and let her thoughts wash over her as she made her way back to Brooklyn.
***
Why did Stelios want to take her out? It was a question that wouldn’t leave Zoey alone. She was wearing her nightgown and sitting in her living room, on a beige cloth sofa that she had had for years. A glass of wine rested on the coffee table in front of her, like some sort of counselor. Why was Stelios coming tomorrow to take her somewhere? Why does a billionaire date someone out of the blue?
Her best guess so far was that he needed somebody to make him feel better and restore his reputation after the Brie Hudson disaster. He was using her. That made sense to Zoey. After all, her own mother was using her for almost the same reason. But at the same time, everything he had said to Zoey the other day had seemed genuine, and none of it had made him sound like the type of person that made a habit of using people.
“What else could it be?” she asked herself, taking a long sip of the wine. No other answers came to her, or rather, none that were plausible. She considered for a moment that maybe he had seen something in her that touched him, but she dismissed that idea at once.
“This isn’t a fairy tale,” she told herself firmly. “Men don’t just appear for no reason and sweep women off their feet. Everyone has some sort of agenda.”
As soon as she said it, she felt slightly ashamed of herself.
There was a time, not all that long ago, when Zoey would have embraced Stelios’ date proposal. Back then, she wouldn’t have sat up half the night pretending to watch television, and searching his words for ulterior motives. She had been more trusting, more open, and more hopeful. In those days, she had looked at each day as its own adventure. But Zoey had still been in college back then; yet to take up her post at Melinda Forde and learn that everyone had an angle, no matter how clever they were at hiding it.
Zoey was ashamed that her job and her mother were succeeding in killing the trust and openness she once felt. She decided to try to put her conspiracy theories away for the time being and meet Stelios the following day with an open mind.
SIX
To Zoey’s relief, the next day was Friday. Friday night normally meant the weekend, and a temporary reprieve from Melinda Forde, but today it meant something completely different. At six o’clock that evening, a billionaire was coming to take her out.
Her mother had been so excited, she’d given her the day off “to get prepared”. It was obvious she wanted her daughter to use every trick in the book to turn their date into a relationship. For her part, Zoey wasn’t sure how she felt about the billionaire Greek. After all, she had only met the man twice, and in both of those cases, her mother had been there.
When six o’clock came, Zoey was no closer to knowing what she felt for Stelios, but she was finally ready for their date. Her makeup was subtle, but finished with a bold red lip, and her dark hair had been crinkled to perfection. She wore a luxurious white cashmere sweater that she had gotten in the sale of the century, and completed her look with black slacks and flats, which straddled the line between formal and casual. A new smartphone rested inside her clutch and bore the same number as the old one.
Despite herself, Zoey felt her heart quake with excitement. And that was before the peals of the ringing doorbell filled the room.
Striding over quickly, she opened the door to a beanpole of a driver in a stylish gray uniform. He looked fairly young and had an elongated face. A thin little mustache sat atop his upper lip.
“Good evening, Ms. Forde. The car is waiting downstairs. I’ve come up to escort you, if you’re ready.”
“I am. Thank you,” she replied, thinking it was thoughtful of Stelios to have someone escort her downstairs.
Outside her building, Zoey saw the familiar town car. With the ease of habit, the driver glided past and held the back door open for her.
“Where’s your boss?” she asked the driver when she didn’t see Stelios inside.
“He would like that to be a surprise, miss. Step inside and I’ll drive you to him.”
Feeling excited and a little cautious, Zoey followed the instructions and her driver took off, expertly weaving through New York traffic.
When it felt to Zoey that a good half hour had passed, she asked the driver, who wasn’t overly communicative, how much farther away their destination was. At that moment, they pulled in front of Xenia, possibly the most exclusive Greek restaurant on the East Coast. People came from all over the country to sample the cuisine, especially wealthy immigrants from Greece longing for a taste of home.
Zoey was by no means surprised that Stelios has chosen a Greek restaurant for their encounter, and she was thankful she could consider herself something of a fan.
The driver came around and let her out, allowing her to see the magnificent structure properly. The building was made of black marble and took up a huge part of the block. There was an exquisite outdoor café area, cordoned off by artful, wrought-iron gates. Zoey guessed that the restaurant was at least three stories high, and she could glimpse a lavish balcony area on the top floor. To the right of the building was a triangular field filled with tiny holes and surrounded by small, colored spotlights. Every few moments, water would jet out of the holes in different patterns, and the lights would make the streams change color. The doors were made of heavy oak, and the top half of each one bore a circular painting of pastoral Greece. It was breathtaking.
Again, the driver passed her, and with more of an effort than Zoey would have thought necessary, pulled open Xenia’s door.
Zoey stepped inside and beheld the vestibule with awe. It was larger than she had expected, and lit with a massive chandelier. On the wall to her right, in engraved, golden letters, were quotes from several of Ancient Greece’s most famous philosophers and st
atesmen. On the wall to her left was a skillful rendering of Mount Olympus and the Twelve Olympians.
Beyond the vestibule was the restaurant itself, a huge area that was nonetheless lit to feel intimate and private. A dozen or so rectangular tables bore starched, white cloths, and fine china. Along the far wall an intricately-decorated staircase led to the upper floors.
Zoey was still taking everything in when a sudden, magnificent crash rocked the restaurant, and the smell of smoke began to fill her nostrils.
“What in the world is going on?” Zoey said, to no one in particular—as far as she could see, the restaurant was empty. Had someone broken in? Was something on fire?
She thought about running outside while she still had the chance. She had just turned in the direction of the door when a small, clear, “ahem” stopped her in her tracks.
Zoey turned and beheld a skinny boy, about sixteen years old. He wore black slacks and vest, and had an eager face, wavy hair, and a pencil-thin mustache.
“Good evening, miss,” he said politely. “My name is Ravi. I’m one of the busboys here. Are you looking for Mr. Zakiridis?”
“Er…yes,” Zoey replied skeptically. “Yes I was. I was supposed to meet him here. Is he in the restaurant?”
“Yes, miss. Follow me.”
Zoey was a little unsure, but didn’t seem to have too many better options, so tailed the boy down a long hallway at the very rear of the restaurant. The farther they walked, the hotter it got and the more loudly Zoey heard the banging of pots and pans.
At last, they arrived at a pair of padded swing doors.
“Just through there, miss. I was just finishing up when you arrived, so I’m going to get going now. It was a pleasure meeting you.”
Zoey thanked Ravi as well as she could over the clattering of the pans.
As the boy went back toward the front, she turned and plunged through the doors, and there, battling back a cloud of smoke, was billionaire real estate mogul Stelios Zakiridis.
He wore a pair of black slacks, a white, collared shirt, and an apron covered in splatters of grease. His sleeves were rolled up to just over the elbow, revealing two rather muscular forearms. A sheen of sweat lay on his forehead as he fussed over a baking pan full of dough and meat. Even from where she was standing, Zoey could tell it was badly burned.
What on earth does he think he’s doing? she wondered. Why is he working in the kitchen?
“It’s supposed to be kreatopita, a savory pie that marries wine and herbs, ground beef and buttery phyllo dough. What I seem to have done, however, is to marry heat and grease to create a large charcoal briquette.”
“Not to be rude or anything,” said Zoey, trying not to betray her confusion, “but what are you doing back here? I thought we had a date.”
“Indeed we do, Zoey, and this was supposed to be it: a homemade dinner in the best Greek restaurant outside of Greece. You see, I actually own the place. It’s one of my most cherished investments, so I thought this would be the perfect place for a date. I sent my driver to bring you here and paid the staff to go home for the evening. Everyone but Ravi, that is, who was helping me set up the dining area. He should be gone by now too. I was hoping to have this done by the time you got here so I could impress you with my amazing cooking skills. As you can see, though, I may have bitten off more than I can chew.”
“In that case, you’d better let me help,” said Zoey, pulling off her cashmere sweater to reveal a black polo underneath. Placing the sweater on a clean, unused table, she donned a spare white apron and walked to the Greek’s side. “Now let’s try it together,” she said. “What’s the first thing we need to do?”
Stelios put the baking pan he was holding down and grinned. “The first thing we need to do is dice two onions.”
Zoey tried desperately not to show it, but after everything that had happened to her recently, Stelios’ romantic surprise was having a profound effect upon her. A billionaire—a man who could literally have whatever he wanted—had nearly burned down the kitchen of his own five-star restaurant trying to impress her. She felt weightless and impossibly heavy all at once, but she had to focus; Stelios had just slipped a sharp knife in her hand.
His hand gently cupped her left one, pushing the fingers into a loose fist on top of an onion he had just cut in half. His right hand gripped the knife handle, just behind Zoey’s right wrist, and guided it to a point on the onion a hair’s breadth away from her fingers.
“Use your left hand to feed the onion into the blade,” Stelios said, slowly guiding her, “while the right one rocks the blade through it.”
“And I’m not going to cut my fingers?” Zoey asked worriedly as the sharp blade fell incredibly close to them.
“No,” Stelios smiled. “Your knuckles are going to keep that from happening. Plus, the more you do it, the easier it gets.”
When the onions were sufficiently diced, Stelios chopped up some dill while Zoey crumbled a block of feta. The Greek was working much more slowly than before, and Zoey noted there was far less banging than she had heard on the way in.
“Who taught you how to cook, anyway?” Zoey asked, watching Stelios measure cups of wine and chicken broth. “Did someone show you how or are you just trying to look like you know what you’re doing?” she said with a playful smile.
“A little bit of both,” Stelios laughed. “My mother loved showing me how to cook her food. I remember her saying, ‘You may be in America now, but you should always have something from your country’. She used to make the most wonderful tirokroketes. You’d happily fight people to get to them.”
“And tirokroketes are…?” Zoey asked, as she fetched butter and ground beef from the fridge.
“Basically, they’re fried cheese balls.”
“That sounds delicious. My mother and I never really did any cooking together, except once, when I needed to make brownies for a school fundraiser. We got all the ingredients together and my mom dug up a cookbook she’d bought when I was about four. For some reason, she’d never used it. We put everything in the bowl, but we didn’t have a mixer, so I volunteered. The stuff was so thick I thought my arms would fall off, but I wanted to do it myself. My mom kept cheering me on as I stirred, and in the end, it came together.”
“I hope your brownies turned out better than my first attempt,” he said, shaking his head and tossing onions into the pan.
Zoey didn’t have the heart to tell him that they had. Instead, she asked him about the restaurant.
“I bought the place about four years ago. I was feeling kind of homesick, and I wanted something that would remind me of Greece and my family. I had to work really hard to get it to where it is now—the previous owner was a terrible manager, and did a lot of skimping to save money. The guy wasn’t big on upkeep, and it’s taken me a long this time to deal with the damage from that. I used to think I’d never get everything fixed. But now,” he said as Zoey introduced the ground beef to the pan, “nearly everything’s been handled, and the restaurant has been a success.”
“That’s wonderful,” said Zoey over the hissing of the oil. “I couldn’t help noticing how beautiful everything looked on the way in here.”
“Thanks. I was very enthusiastic about the design. I’m glad the décor impressed you, even if I couldn’t.”
“Oh, you’re a very impressive person, Stelios,” Zoey said. “You just needed to slow things down a bit.”
“I think you’re right,” the Greek replied, as he started on a reduction. Thanks to you, we’ll soon have a meal we can stomach.”
“Thanks to us, you mean, “Zoey insisted with a smile. “I was having trouble cutting an onion five minutes ago, remember?”
Over the next forty-five minutes, the two worked together, cutting the phyllo to fit a baking pan. Following Stelios’ instructions, Zoey buttered eight sheets of the stuff and layered it in the pan. Stelios topped that with the meat, and Zoey added eight more sheets. They popped their creation into the oven, sure this tim
e that the effort would succeed. When it did, they congratulated each other as a rich, warm scent wafted through the air.
It had barely been an hour, but Zoey was beginning to feel at home. She was surprised to find a soft little smile wouldn’t leave her face. Stelios was just starting to tell her about the first time he made kreatopita when every light in the kitchen flickered violently.
“Shit,” Stelios exclaimed, just a loud whirring noise filled the air.
