Page 38 of Taming Achilles

“Anything else?” The impertinent man asked.

“No, that was all,” I said, then took a shot. “Are you open 24/7?”

“If our clients are breathing, we’re open.”

I hung up after an awkward goodbye, and brought the phone against my lips.

So she had been calling an agency after all. But something about the whole thing smelled fishy. I’d normally jump to my computer and get so far up their ass that I’d comb through each and every one of their personnel files. But I didn’t have the will for it.

I crawled into bed and tucked the blankets around me. Moving up, I snuggled against her back, one arm underneath her neck and the other embracing her waist. I held her close to my chest.

I half expected her tense little body to fight me off, but she didn’t. Instead, those squared shoulders relaxed, her hips relaxed, and her legs stretched out, our feet tangling together. It felt like old times.

With her strawberry hair against my chest, my neck, my nose, I fell asleep to the scent of her skin, the lily perfume still faintly lingering at her throat. I dreamt of snow in Venice, and of a different ending. An ending where I proposed to her in San Marcos Square among the angry, fat pigeons and the tourists, and the vendors with their carnival masks.

We should have been married five fucking years ago. I needed to know why that fate wasn’t mine. Wasn’t ours.

But prying secrets from this woman was like pulling blood from a stone.

But I was a Campbell. George fucking Campbell, formerly a Major in the British SAS, now a partner in the world’s leading security company. I was secretly one of the world’s best hackers. Let her try to hide from me. It would make no difference.

Chapter 18

Pippa

I spent that morning in fitting after fitting for Ray Rodina. Then they had me in makeup and hair, and I barely had a clue where I was or what I was doing. But it was exciting.

Ray had met me at the door, bouncing on his toes as I walked in and embraced me with an enthusiasm that I had never felt before.

“You’re prettier in person,” he exclaimed. “She’s prettier in person!” he repeated, saying it to his staff who stood with folders and tablets in their hands, nodding in agreement.

I could have been a troll and they would have agreed that I was the loveliest person in the world if Ray Rodina had declared it so. One does not disagree with geniuses.

All the while, Geo hovered in the background in his Navy Blue Indochino suit, raising a brow or rolling his eyes each time we discussed hemlines, and flattering pleats and patterns. When we spoke animatedly about the right height for a slit, I heard him audibly groan, his hands in his trouser pockets as he went to stare out the window.

Nevermind that he was wearing a $500 designer suit, and a Rolex watch that cost the same as a down payment for a modest house. The hypocrite.

Ray sewed me into his chosen dresses himself, chattering about his boyfriend, his love life, his love of Greek statues. He custom made his mannequins to look like Athena, with the missing arms, because they inspired him.

“You are my muse!” he had sung to me as he adjusted hemlines and barked orders to his staff as they skittered about like drones, grabbing this and that thread.

Ray’s diligence to every single detail left me awe-struck. He knew that genius and creativity wasn’t enough to be a success. Efficiency, attention and diligence made the cream rise to the top. It was refreshing to see that ethic in a creative.

It distracted me from the turmoil that twisted my insides all morning.

I awoke at dawn with his arms around me. He was warm, and awake. He was staring at the side of my face with an intensity that felt so familiar. Like we were kids again. It slammed me with all the regret, pain and misery of the last few years because I knew it was all an illusion. You can’t change the past. It will forever taint the present. The longer Rhodes was out there, the less certain I was of even having a future.

Geordie didn’t say a word all morning, and had driven me here with Hugo in tow. Hugo wasn’t exactly talkative, so we sat in silence. I crossed my hands on my lap as we drove through the desert-scape of Los Angeles to the site of the wedding that cursed me to my fate.

After last night’s fiasco, I was happy for silence. I didn’t care to talk about the confessions I had given so freely in the dark. I hoped that the sunlight would make them evaporate away.

I texted Brett, and he said he’d meet me at the show. I knew that my current state of affairs wasn't working. He wouldn't keep his distance, and I couldn’t keep my secrets. The possibility of ripping myself away from Geordie’s side again filled me with an unbearable ache. It hurt just like the first time. Maybe more, because I had let myself believe that we had a chance at something again.

Hope was a dangerous thing.

“You’re exquisite,” Ray said, as he did my makeup himself. “You are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

His compliments helped lift the heaviness in my heart.

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