Page 48 of Take a Chance on Greece

Alexis turned to me with a broad smile on his face.

‘She is. Eleni is having the baby.’

I couldn’t think of a more joyous reason for our first kiss to be interrupted, although I wondered if Alexis was also secretly wishing the baby could have held on for thirty seconds longer before making his presence felt.

How we got Eleni down from the roof garden and into Stephano’s car, I do not know, but somehow, the chaotic crowd of slightly drunk guests managed to pull together to make it happen. Stephano fortunately had stayed away from the booze in solidarity with his wife, so he was able to drive them safely to the hospital, as everyone cheered them off in the street. It would certainly be a party which would go down in Sami folklore.

‘What an amazing evening,’ I said to Alexis as we walked back to the Helios Hotel. My whole body was fizzing with excitement, both from the drama with Eleni, and with anticipation at what was about to happen between us.

Our fingers were entwined as we walked and every so often, he stroked his thumb across the palm of my hand, sending delightful shivers through my skin. When we reached the back streets, I took advantage of the lack of passers-by to pull Alexis into the shadow of a tree, pressing him up against its trunk while I whispered a husky invitation in his ear to continue the kiss we’d begun on Eleni’s rooftop. He responded with a trail of them, starting on my collarbone and moving slowly up my neck with tender torture until his lips were tantalisingly close to mine. Then the jarring bray of a donkey made us jump, interrupting our cocoon of intimacy and bringing us crashing back to awareness of our surroundings.

‘Our friend would like us to move on,’ said Alexis, as we both laughed.

He looped his arm around my waist, his hand resting on my hip, as we walked the last stretch back to the Helios Hotel, and made our way through the quiet gardens. In the meadow beyond the swimming pool, fireflies were darting around busily, sending sparks of light through the darkness. We paused on the dimly lit terrace.

‘You are home safely,’ said Alexis.

‘Would you like to come up?’ I asked, nerves and anticipation and happiness whizzing around my veins in a heady mix. I wanted nothing more than for him to agree, and I was confident that he would. Once again, I wondered how it had taken me so long to realise what was right in front of me. Without giving him a chance to answer, I reached up and kissed him, relishing the feel of his mouth on mine.

‘Please say yes,’ I breathed against his lips. I could feel his heart thudding against my chest.

‘Yes.’ The word was husky and faint, but it was there. But before my soul could sing, suddenly, he took a step back and ran his hand through his hair, his face clouded with confusion. ‘I mean, no. I shouldn’t. I can’t.’

‘Alexis, what’s the matter?’ I said, taking a step forward, trying to close the distance between us again. But that gulf remained, even though we were physically close.

‘There’s something you need to know,’ he said, the words stilted and uncertain. ‘And when you find out, you won’t want this at all.’

He gestured between us.

‘Alexis, that’s—’

But before I could finish my sentence, he took the words right out of my mouth with what he said next.

‘I know who Awesome Andreas is. I’ve always known.’

Chapter Twenty-Five

It felt as if the world had shifted, throwing everything I thought I’d known up in the air.

‘What do you mean, you know who Awesome Andreas is?’

It was a daft question to ask, because there had been no room for ambiguity in what Alexis had said, but I still couldn’t process the meaning behind his shocking statement.

‘I think I know who Awesome Andreas is.’

He’d stepped back from the ledge slightly with those words.

‘Youthink, or youknow?’ I pressed.

He took his glasses off, as if he couldn’t bear looking at me in proper focus. ‘I know,’ he admitted reluctantly.

‘So, you mean to say you’ve watched me run around chasing random guys purely because they’re called Andreas, you’ve watched me go through the emotional turbulence of putting myself out there and getting hurt, yet you’ve known all along who I should have been approaching?’ I fought to keep my voice steady, but the sense of betrayal was sending a physical ache throughout my body. Suddenly I felt very tired.

‘It sounds worse when you put it like that,’ he said, a tremor in his voice. ‘I know it was wrong of me. I’ve always known it was wrong.’

He started cleaning his glasses on his shirt.

‘On no you don’t. Put them back on. You don’t get to buy yourself time to think while you hide behind polishing your glasses. Speak to me. Why didn’t you tell me? You know how important honesty is to me. I made that very clear when I came running to you after the incident with Already-married Andreas. And you know how much I’ve invested in my Andreas search, how much it mattered to me.’

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