Brittany stuffed her trowel into the front of her backpack. ‘You’re warm, friendly and lovable. That’s what guys like about you.’
‘That and the fact it takes one glance to know you’d look great naked,’ Spy said affably.
Lily turned her back on him. ‘Warm, friendly and lovable are great qualities for a puppy, but not so great for a woman. They say a person can change, don’t they? Well, I’m going to change.’ She scrambled to her feet. ‘I am not falling in love again. I’m going to take your advice and have rebound sex.’
‘Good plan.’ Spy glanced at his watch. ‘You get your clothes off, I’ll get us a room.’
‘Not funny.’ Lily glared at him. ‘I am going to pick someone I don’t know, don’t feel anything for and couldn’t fall in love with in a million years.’
Brittany looked doubtful. ‘Now I’m second-guessing myself. Coming from you it sounds like a recipe for disaster.’
‘It’s going to be perfect. All I have to do is find a man who doesn’t tick a single box on my list and have sex with him. It can’t possibly go wrong. I’m going to call it Operation Ice Maiden.’
* * *
Nik Zervakis stood with his back to the office, staring at the glittering blue of the sea while his assistant updated him. ‘Did he call?’
‘Yes, exactly as you predicted. How do you always know these things? I would have lost my nerve days ago with those sums of money involved. You don’t even break out in a sweat.’
Nik could have told him the deal wasn’t about money, it was about power. ‘Did you call the lawyers?’
‘They’re meeting with the team from Lexos first thing tomorrow. So it’s done. Congratulations, boss. The US media have turned the phones red-hot asking for interviews.’
‘It’s not over until the deal is signed. When that happens I’ll put out a statement, but no interviews.’ Nik felt some of the tension leave his shoulders. ‘Did you make a reservation at The Athena?’
‘Yes, but you have the official opening of the new museum wing first.’
Nik swore softly and swung round. ‘I’d forgotten. Do you have a briefing document on that?’
His PA paled. ‘No, boss. All I know is that the wing has been specially designed to display Minoan antiquities in one place. You were invited to the final meeting of the project team but you were in San Francisco.’
‘Am I supposed to give a speech?’
‘They’re hoping you will agree to say a few words.’
‘I can manage a few words, but they’ll be unrelated to Minoan antiquities.’ Nik loosened his tie. ‘Run me through the schedule.’
‘Vassilis will have the car here at six-fifteen, which should allow you time to go back to the villa and change. You’re picking up Christina on the way and your table is booked for nine p.m.’
‘Why not pick her up after I’ve changed?’
‘That would have taken time you don’t have.’
Nik couldn’t argue with that. The demands of his schedule had seen off three assistants in the last six months. ‘There was something else?’
The man shifted uncomfortably. ‘Your father called. Several times. He said you weren’t picking up your phone and asked me to relay a message.’
Nik flicked open the button at the neck of his shirt. ‘Which was?’
‘He wants to remind you that his wedding is next weekend. He thinks you’ve forgotten.’
Nik stilled. He hadn’t forgotten. ‘Anything else?’
‘He is looking forward to having you at the celebrations. He wanted me to remind you that of all the riches in this world, family is the most valuable.’
Nik, whose sentiments on that topic were a matter of public record, made no comment.
He wondered why anyone would see a fourth wedding as a cause for celebration. To him, it shrieked of someone who hadn’t learned his lesson the first three times. ‘I will call him from the car.’
‘There was one more thing—’ The man backed towards the door like someone who knew he was going to need to make a rapid exit. ‘He said to make sure you knew that if you don’t come, you’ll break his heart.’
It was a statement typical of his father. Emotional. Unguarded.
Reflecting that it was that very degree of sentimentality that had made his father the victim of three costly divorces, Niklaus strolled to his desk. ‘Consider the message delivered.’
As the door closed he turned back to the window, staring over the midday sparkle of the sea.
Exasperation mingled with frustration and beneath that surface response lay darker, murkier emotions he had no wish to examine. He wasn’t given to introspection and he believed that the past was only useful when it informed the future, so finding himself staring down into a swirling mass of long-ignored memories was an unwelcome experience.
Despite the air conditioning, sweat beaded on his forehead and he strode across his office and pulled a bottle of iced water from the fridge.
Why should it bother him that his father was marrying again?
He was no longer an idealistic nine-year-old, shattered by a mother’s betrayal and driven by a deep longing for order and security.
He’d learned to make his own security. Emotionally he was an impenetrable fortress. He would never allow a relationship to explode the world from under his feet. He didn’t believe in love and he saw marriage as expensive and pointless.
Unfortunately his father, an otherwise intelligent man, didn’t share his views. He’d managed to build a successful business from nothing but the fruits of the land around him, but for some reason he had failed to apply that same intellect to his love life.
Nik reflected that if he approached business the way his father approached relationships, he would be broke.
As far as he could see his father performed no risk analysis, gave no consideration to the financial implications of each of his romantic whims and approached each relationship with the romantic optimism entirely inappropriate for a man on his fourth marriage.
Nik’s attempts to encourage at least some degree of circumspection had been dismissed as cynical.
To make the situation all the more galling, the last time they’d met for dinner his father had actually lectured him on his lifestyle as if Nik’s lack of divorces suggested a deep character flaw.
Nik closed his eyes briefly and wondered how everything in his business life could run so smoothly while his family was as messy as a dropped pan of spaghetti. The truth was he’d rather endure the twelve labours of Hercules than attend another of his father’s weddings.
This time
