Page 91 of Love on the Rocks
NIKOS
“You’re killing us with all the dust!” shouted Panos over the noise of the electric sander. He coughed dramatically and pointed to his black Motorhead T-shirt, now covered in a layer of white powder. He rifled through his toolbox and passed me a hammer and nails. “Here, why don’t you bang these into the roof?”
He was right—I really needed to hit something, hard. What I wanted to do was pound on Callie’s door until she let me in, thenkiss her breathless. But I couldn’t do that. I was respecting her need for space, even though it went against every instinct I had.
Callie and I had fallen into a rhythm that felt as natural as breathing, and being without her these past two days felt like being deprived of my lungs. There was an ache deep in my chest that just wouldn’t go away.
My mind was a riot of conflicting emotions, memories, and regrets. The only thing I knew with absolute clarity was what I had finally admitted to my mother and myself: I loved her.
And now I was afraid I was going to lose her.
As I banged away at the nails—almost blackening my thumb after one nasty swipe of the hammer—I imagined that each nail was one of the stupid mistakes I’d made that had come between us. Blow after punishing blow, I listed them: the tricks, the lies of omission, the secrets, my damn stubborn pride.
“Take a break, Niko,” said Panos, stilling my arm with his. I was panting, my head drenched with sweat, and my muscles trembling with exhaustion. He took the hammer and turned me in the direction of the port. “Go have a drink.”
Reluctantly, I made my way to the taverna. No sooner had I sat down outside with a cold beer, than I spotted a sleek yacht speeding into the harbor. A boat like that could only be bearing something awful.
And I was right. The first passenger hopped off the boat, landing with a loud thud in his Doc Martens, his artfully ripped jeans practically glued to his body, and his piercings glinting in the sun. He peered at the taverna over the rim of his dark sunglasses.
Greystone.
What the hell? I tensed; did Callie know they were here?
Four more men disembarked. The first wore a sour expression and looked like he’d raided a Ralph Lauren store. He was followed by two Greeks in navy-blue business suits, and aguy in loose jeans and a white T-shirt rolled up over tattooed biceps. A tall blonde woman, who I recognized as one of the heirs to the Poseidon Shipping company, was the last to leave the boat.
She caught me staring and made her way over to my table, addressing me in Greek. “Good afternoon, we’re looking for Eleftherias Square. Do you know where it is?”
I stared down at Callie’s address on the slip of paper. “Yes, I can take you.”
“How kind of you. Thank you.” She went back to the others and I stood, drained the rest of my drink, and slowly walked over to them. There was not even a flicker of recognition on Greystone’s face when he saw me.Good.
I didn’t miss how they looked at my sweat-stained T-shirt, my old paint-splattered jeans, and the plaster still clinging to my hair. Like the day Callie arrived, I didn’t let on that I spoke English. I had promised my mother no mischief, but could I help it if the opportunity presented itself to me?
* * *
As the early afternoon sun blazed down on us, I led them through the labyrinth of alleyways from the port, taking a roundabout way over the hills through the most rundown portions of town that had been devastated in the earthquake.
“This isn’t exactly quaint, is it?” the Ralph Lauren model grumbled. He had a deep, even voice and a very posh British accent. “Is the port the only entry to the island?”
“That’s part of the beauty of it, Seth,” said Greystone. “Nowadays, people like to think they’ve discovered some secret hideaway. Believe me, this has a real, authentic charm. People will be queuing around the dock for an Instagram photo-op like this.”
I took them past the old donkey outpost, basically a field of dried yellow grass that now served as a dumping ground for old, rusted barrels, warped wooden crates, and piles of broken stones.
“You call this an Instagram photo-op?” Ralph Lauren sighed.
“I don’t remember it being this far out. Are you sure you gave him the correct address?” Greystone asked the Greek woman.
“I’m sure.” She came up next to me, again addressing me in Greek. “How much farther?”
“Just over that rise,” I assured her and went back to eavesdropping. As we came over the hill to Kamini, they mentioned Callie for the first time.
“And you’re sure about Calista? I still have my doubts about her,” Ralph Lauren said, and I bristled. “She’s young. Unknown. What the hell has she been doing the last few weeks? Sunbathing on our dime?”
It took everything I had not to grab him by his collar and chuck him over the edge of the cliff. Did he not realize how hard she’d been working, how much of herself she’d put into the project?
“Callie was the right person to send. She’s done a great job of pacifying the locals,” Greystone explained. Hah, just as I suspected—they’d sent a woman to do their dirty work. “Her food is good, just needs some finessing. And if you don’t like what she presents today, we’ve got Roman here.”
The other man, who’d been completely silent so far, stopped in his tracks. In a slightly French-accented voice he said, “Wait, you didn’t tell her?”
