Page 157 of The Skeikh's Games

“You shouldn’t have put me in that trunk.”

“I made sure you could get out. Do you think rental cars come with crowbars?”

She stared at him in surprise then laughed out loud. “You absolute shit.”

“I would never have hurt you, Athena. I just wanted to get out of the country before you raised the alarm. I never expected your brother to do it for you.”

Athena shook her head. “I don’t know why, but you still get to me.”

“Same here,” he told her just before the guard hustled him back to his cell.

He was going to miss that woman.

Christmas was a bit late that year. Between the legal issues and the upheaval in the family and business, holiday spirit got put on hold. Not long after Simon made his confession and turned Kosta in, he was asked to resign as CEO of Katsaros Corp.

“The thing is,” the Chairman of the Board said as he spoke to Simon on the phone, “We can’t be seen to have a felon in charge of the company.”

“I’ve been working on a formal resignation,” Simon assured him. “It will be in your hands by the end of the week.”

“You’ll retain your seat on the Board, of course. That’s a given.”

“We’ll see.” Simon wasn’t at all sure he wanted to deal with corporate issues. Athena, on the other hand… She’d be good as a board member and even, eventually, CEO. She had that kind of brain.

As for himself, Simon had begun to think longingly of Eirene’s plan to travel the world. It would be a good thing to travel with a purpose, to see what was what, instead of the aimless movement he’d been guilty of for much of his life. Maybe it was time to connect with life. Since he already knew that his confession and the information he’d given the authorities would keep him from doing prison time — though he was going to be paying some stiff fines — he could make some plans for the future.

When he told Eirene that he was resigning, he expected her to be disappointed, and tried to cushion the news by saying, “I thought you and I might spend some time traveling. I’m hoping you’ll show me the world through your eyes. I need to see it clearly.”

Oddly, she smiled at him. “That would be lovely. But we’re going to have to do some planning.”

“Why not just go?” he asked. He caught hold of her and danced her around the room. “Let’s be footloose! Let’s travel the Silk Road, trek in the Himalayas, do photo safaris in Africa!”

Eirene squeaked with laughter. “I want all those things too, but we have to be realistic.”

“Why?”

“Because parents need to be responsible.”

It took him a moment to understand what she was saying to him. “Parents? We’re going to be parents?”

She nodded. He squeezed her tight and she squeaked again.

“How? When? I—”

“Darling I think you know the how part,” she told him as she disengaged from his grip. “The when is in about six-and-a-half months.”

Simon was overwhelmed by emotions that he could barely put names to. There was joy, of course, but a terrible fear that he wasn’t worthy and that he wouldn’t do a good job of being a father. There was a sense of having a job to do, a job so important that it made being a CEO look like nothing. It was possibly the most important job in the world… next to Eirene’s, of course.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“That you’re happy?”

“I couldn’t be happier. Oh my darling Eirene, I couldn’t be happier if someone handed me the world tied up with a ribbon. It feels like that’s what you’ve just done. I hope I’m worthy.”

“You are.”

“One trip I want to make before the baby comes,” he told her. “I want to go to Cape Soúnion, to the temple there.”

“Poseidon’s temple?”

---