Consequence of the Greek's Revenge

by Trish Morey

  EPILOGUE

  THE SANTORINI CHAPEL she’d chosen with Alexios to exchange their vows was small but beautiful, white-walled and blue-domed on the outside, an explosion of colour illuminating the inside. Frescoes lined the walls and ceiling, intricate carvings framing the altar, with tall gilded candlesticks providing the golden, flickering lighting.

  The perfect place for a wedding. The perfect time.

  Athena slipped her arm in Loukas’s as they waited for the cue to make their entrance. He patted her hand and smiled at her. ‘Are you nervous?’

  ‘A little,’ she said, though not quite sure if it was butterflies she was feeling, or the fluttering movements of her unborn child. She rested her hand over the lace of her gown covering her bump and smiled.

  Their unborn child.

  Hers and Alexios’s.

  Because neither of them had wanted to wait a moment longer to be married.

  ‘Before we begin,’ her mentor beside her said, ‘there’s something I’ve been meaning to say to you.’

  Athena looked up, the look on her colleague’s face so anguished, she feared for a moment that something must be wrong. ‘What is it?’

  He tugged at the unfamiliar shirt collar of his unfamiliar suit and gave a little cough, and Athena sensed it was emotion he was choking back on. ‘I’m honoured to be the one you chose to give you away,’ he said. ‘You are the daughter I never had and now you are giving me the gift of a family I never had. I wish you a long and happy life with the man you love.’

  Her heart swelled. ‘Thank you, Loukas. There’s nobody I would rather have with me on this day.’

  He patted her hand. ‘But that’s not all. Because, I’m proud of you, Athena, so proud of all you have become and all you have achieved. And I know, this is only the beginning. You deserve to have a wonderful life.’

  The lenses of her eyes turned smeary. Her teeth squeezed down hard on her bottom lip to stop the tears so close to being shed from escaping. It was the speech a father should give his daughter on her wedding day, the words her own father had never managed to utter to her face. To hear them at all was a wedding gift like no other.

  She reached up and kissed his weathered cheek, delighting him if his chortle was any indication. ‘Thank you for all you have done for me, Loukas. Meeting you was the best thing I have ever done.’

  ‘Right now I’ll settle for second best,’ he said with a smile, as the music changed, signalling their cue.

  There was a murmur of voices as they set off slowly between the gathered guests, heads swivelling. Just a few of their colleagues from the university, a scattering of employees from the Kostas Foundation, even two of her old friends from high school, who’d come all the way from Melbourne.

  But it was the man waiting for her at the front who held her gaze. The man whose eyes drew her to him like the moon tugging inexorably at the sea. The man whose eyes shone with so much love, she felt a burst of sunshine light up her soul. And for one moment, she wondered why she should be so lucky to have found a man who could do that with just one glance. She wondered what she had done to deserve to be so happy.

  She reached his side and he gazed down at her. ‘You look beautiful.’ And as she smiled back up at him, staring into his handsome face, it was only then that she noticed the faint sheen on his brow, as if the heating was turned up too high against the outside’s winter air.

  ‘I love you,’ she whispered, and his hand squeezed hers in reply, before the priest began the ceremony that would join them as husband and wife.

  Afterwards everyone toasted the newly-weds with champagne and ouzo at Alexios’s Venetian palace, the terrace strung with lights that twinkled and swayed in the wind swirling over the cliffs, the waters of the caldera dark until the clouds parted, and made way for the setting sun to rain down its golden blessings.

  It was hours before the guests departed, hours before Athena and Alexios were alone and could consummate their marriage in the time-honoured way. It was tender and slow. A time to cherish and worship. A time for their bodies to commit to each other, echoing the words they’d exchanged earlier.

  ‘I was worried, you know,’ he said, after their lovemaking, ‘at the church, I mean.’

  He was sitting on the bed with his back against the bedhead, her head in his lap while his fingers toyed lazily in her hair. Her scalp was humming at his touch, her entire body humming after their lovemaking. ‘What were you worried about?’

  ‘That after everything that’s happened, that you might have second thoughts. That you might change your mind. When I saw you on Loukas’s arm, actually there, actually walking your way towards me, it was one of the happiest moments of my life.’

  ‘We weren’t even married then.’

  ‘I know. But it was in that moment that I realised I’d been holding my breath, just in case you decided you could do better.’

  She took hold of the hand in her hair and squeezed it. ‘But I would never have done that, Alexios. How could I do better than marry the father of my child and the man I love with all my heart? How could I do better than marry the man who is perfect for me in every way?’

  He rested his other hand on her growing baby bump, over where their unborn child grew. ‘I’m not perfect, Athena. You know that, more than anyone. Thank you for giving me a second chance. I promise to try, every single day, to be the man you deserve, and the father our baby deserves.’

  She smiled, warmed bone-deep by his promise and his sincerity-laden words. ‘I know you will,’ she said. ‘And maybe perfect was the wrong word. Maybe perfect is overrated. Because I know my father was far from perfect. I realise now he was ruthless and selfish and he hurt people along the way. But he was still my father, and I can’t hate him. I’ll never hate him. Not when he gave me the greatest gift of all.’ She brought his hand to her lips, and kissed the back of it, the gesture of his that she had always loved. ‘You.’

  ‘Athena...’ His voice was a choked rumble, her new husband’s eyes blinking hard against the moisture that misted their surface. He gathered her up in his arms, half lifting her, half sliding down the bed, until they were body to body, face to face. ‘God, woman, do you have any idea how much I love you?’

  She opened out her arms to him in invitation, her lips curling into a knowing smile. ‘Show me.’

  And he did.

  * * * * *

  If you enjoyed Consequence of the Greek’s Revenge by Trish Morey, you’re sure to enjoy these other One Night With Consequences stories!

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  Keep reading for an excerpt from Bound by a One-Night Vow by Melanie Milburne.

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  Bound by a One-Night Vow

  by Melanie Milburne

  CHAPTER ONE

  ISABELLA BYRNE PUT down her coffee cup in the crowded café with a sigh. Husband-hunting would be so much easier if she actually wanted to get married. She. Did. Not. The thought of marrying someone was enough to bring her out in hives. Anaphylactic shock. A stroke. She wasn’t the girl who’d been planning her wedding day since the age of five. She wasn’t a hankering-after-the-fairy-tale fanatic like most of her friends. And now that she’d put her ‘wild child’ days behind her, even the thought of dating made her want to vomit.

  She was Over Men.

  Izzy looked at all the couples sitting at the other tables. Was no one single any more in London? Everyone had a partner. She was the only person sitting by herself.

  She could have tried online dating in her find-a-husband quest, but the thought of asking a stranger was too daunting. And the small handful of friends she might have considered asking to do the job were already in committed relationships.

  Izzy folded her copy of her father’s will and stuffed it back in her tote bag. No matter how many times she read it, the words were exactly the same. She must be married in order to claim her inheritance. The inheritance would go to a distant relative if she didn’t claim it. To a relative who had a significant gambling problem.

  How could she let all that money be frittered away down the greedy gobbling mouth of a slot machine?

  Izzy needed that money to buy back her late mother’s ancestral home. If she failed to claim her inheritance, then the house would be lost for ever. The gorgeous Wiltshire house, where she had spent a precious few but wonderful holidays with her grandparents and her older brother before he got sick and passed away, would be sold to someone else. She couldn’t bear the thought of losing the one place where she had been happy. Where she and Hamish and her mother had been happy. Truly happy. She owed it to her mother and brother’s memory to get that house back.

  There was twenty-four hours left before the deadline. One day to find a man willing to marry her and stay married for six months. One flipping day. Why hadn’t she looked a little harder this month? Last month? The month before? She’d had three months to fulfil the terms of her father’s will, but the thought of marrying anyone had made her procrastinate. As usual. She might have failed at school but she had First Class Honours in Procrastination.

  Izzy was about to push back her chair to leave when a tall shadow fell over her. Her heart gave an extra beat...or maybe that was the double macchiato she’d had. She should never mix caffeine with despair.

  ‘Is this seat taken?’ The deep baritone with its rich and cultured Italian accent made her scalp prickle and a tingling pool of heat simmer at the base of her spine.

  Izzy raised her eyes to meet the espresso-black gaze of hotel magnate, Andrea Vaccaro. Something shifted in her belly—a tumble, a tingle, a tightening.

  It was impossible to look at his handsome features without her heart fluttering like rapidly shuffled cards.

  Eyes that didn’t just look at you—they penetrated. Seeing things they had no business seeing.

  His strong, don’t-mess-with-me jaw, with just the right amount of stubble, always made her think of the potent male hormones pushing those spikes of black hair out through his skin. A mouth that was firm but had a tendency to curve over a cynical smile. A mouth that made her think of long, sensual kisses and the sexy tangling of tongues...

  Izzy had taught herself over the years not to show how he affected her. But while her expression was cool and composed on the outside, on the inside she was fighting a storm of unbidden, forbidden attraction. ‘I’m just leaving so—’

  His broad tanned hand came down on the back of the chair opposite hers. She couldn’t stop staring at the ink-black hairs that ran from the back of his hand and over his strong wrist to disappear under the crisp white cuff of his shirt. How many times had she fantasised about those hands on her body? Stroking her. Caressing her. Making her feel things she shouldn’t be feeling. Not for him.

  Never for him.

  ‘No time for a quick coffee with a friend?’ His mouth curved over the words, showing a flash of white, perfectly aligned teeth. An I’ve-got-you-where-I-want-you smile that made the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand up and pirouette in panic.

  Izzy suppressed a shiver and forced herself to hold his gaze. ‘Friend?’ She injected a double shot of scorn into her tone. ‘I don’t think so.’

  He pulled the chair out and settled his lean athletic form into it, his long legs bumping hers under the table. She jerked her legs back as far as they would go but it wasn’t fast enough to avoid the electrifying zap of contact.

  Hard. Virile. Male flesh.

  Izzy began to push back her chair in order to leave but one of his hands came down on hers, anchoring her to the table. Anchoring her to him. She snatched in a breath, the warm tensile strength of his hand making every female hormone in her body get all giggly and excited. Every cell of her body vibrated like the plucked string of a cello. She looked at his hand trapping hers and disguised a swallow. Heat travelled from her hand, along her arm and all the way to her core like a racing river of fire.

  She gave him a glare so cold it could have frozen the glass of water on the table. ‘Is this how you usually ask a woman to have coffee with you? By brute force?’

  His thumb began a lazy stroking of the back of her hand that sent little shockwaves through her body as if a tiny firecracker had entered her bloodstream. Pippity pop. Pippity pop. Pippity pop. ‘There was a time when you wanted more than a quick coffee with me. Remember?’ The glint in his eyes intensified the searing heat travelling through her body.

  Izzy wished she could forget. She wished she had temporary amnesia. Permanent amnesia. It would be worth acquiring a brain injury if she could eradicate the memory of her seduction attempt of Andrea seven years ago at one of her father’s legendary boozy Christmas parties. She had been eighteen and tipsy—deliberately, dangerously, defiantly tipsy. Just like she had been at every other party of her father’s. It had been the only way she could get through the nauseating performance he gave of Devoted Dad. She’d been intent on embarrassing her father because of all the behind-closed-doors torment he put her through. All the insults, the put-downs, the biting criticisms that made her feel so utterly worthless and useless.

  So unloved.

  So unwanted.

  She’d foolishly thought: How better to embarrass her overbearing father than to sleep with his favourite protégé?

  Izzy pulled her hand out from under Andrea’s and rose from her seat with a screech of her chair along the floorboards. ‘I have to get back to work.’

  ‘I heard about your new job. How’s that going for you?’

  Izzy searched his expression for any sign of mockery. Was he teasing her about her job? Or was he just showing mild interest? There was no note of cynicism in his tone, no curl of his top lip and no mocking glint in his eyes, but even so she wondered if he, like everyone else, thought she couldn’t get through a week in a new job without being fired.

  But, whatever he was thinking behind that unfathomable expression, Izzy was determined not to lose her temper with Andrea in a crowded café. In the past she’d created more scenes than a Hollywood screenplay writer. But how she wanted to shove the table against his rock-hard chest. She
wanted to throw the dregs of her coffee cup in his too-handsome, too-confident face. She wanted to grab the front of his snow-white business shirt until every button popped off.

  How like him to doubt her when she was trying so hard to make her way in the world. To her shame, it was one of many jobs she had won and lost over the years. Her reputation always got in the way. Always. Everyone expected her to fail and so what did she do?

  She failed.

  She had found it hard to settle on a career because of her lack of academic qualifications. She had bombed out during her exams, unable to cope with the pressure of trying to measure up to the academic standard of her older brother, Hamish. She hadn’t been one of those people who always knew what they wanted to be when they grew up. Instead she’d drifted and dreamed and dawdled.

  But now she was clawing her way back, studying for a degree in Social Work online and with her job at the antiques store. Which made her all the more furious at Andrea for assuming she was lazy and lacking in motivation.

  Izzy kept her chin high and her eyes hard. ‘I’m surprised you haven’t come in to the shop by now and bought some hideously expensive relic to prove what a filthy-rich man you are.’

  His lazy smile tilted a little further. ‘I have my eye on something far more priceless.’

  She snatched up her tote bag from the floor and hoisted it over her shoulder, sending him another glare that threatened to wilt the single red rose on the table. ‘Nice seeing you, Andrea.’ Sarcasm was her second language and she was fluent in it.

  Izzy wove her way through the sea of chairs to pay for her coffee at the counter but, before she could take out her purse, Andrea came up behind her and handed the assistant a note. ‘Keep the change.’

  Izzy mentally rolled her eyes at the way the young female assistant was practically swooning behind the counter. Not at the size of Andrea’s tip—although it had been more than generous—but from the mega-charming smile he gave the young woman.

  Was there a woman on the planet who could resist that bone-melting smile?