Adonis in Athens (Romancing Europe #1)

Curious and just a little bit excited, he strode out to the front office as casually as he could. As he rounded the corner he saw her immediately. Her back was turned and she was reading one of their English advertisements that had been blown up and hung on the wall, but he would recognize those long legs and shapely shoulders anywhere. Her hair was shorter now—three years ago it had hung halfway down her back and he’d wrapped his fist in it while he’d been buried deep inside of her.

Shit! he thought with irritation, changing the direction his thoughts were going. Why was he thinking about sex with her? It wasn’t like he lacked in female companionship. They weren’t Paige, though, and he’d never had a connection with a woman like he’d had with the sweet American blonde, but that felt like a long time ago. She’d undoubtedly moved on and there was only one reason she could be here. The thought made him sad, but there was no help for it now. So he cleared his throat and spoke her name as calmly as he could.

“Paige? Is that you?”

She turned and nearly took his breath away. Damn, she was still gorgeous, with that luscious lower lip that protruded just a little and her strikingly expressive hazel eyes. When she smiled, it felt like a punch in the gut; it was that magnetic.

“Hi.” Her voice quavered slightly, betraying her nervousness, but she put on a brave front. “I hope you don’t mind I stopped by without calling.”

“Of course not!” He walked out from behind the counter and didn’t hesitate to hug her tightly, kissing her once on each cheek, as was the Greek custom.

Paige’s breath caught when he wrapped his arms around her and she was helpless to stop herself from hugging him back, breathing in his delicious aftershave and allowing herself just a few seconds to remember the feel of those hard muscles and smooth, tanned skin.

“It’s good to see you,” he said softly, meeting her eyes. “Come on back to my office and you can tell me what you’re doing in Greece.” He ignored his gaping employees, knowing he would be grilled within an inch of his life once she left.

“Sure.” She followed him down a hallway that led to offices and he opened a door at the end, allowing her to walk in ahead of him. She paused at the view, her mouth falling open slightly. “Oh my gosh, this is gorgeous.” Two walls of the corner office had floor-to-ceiling windows and waves bounced and crashed onto the sea wall alongside a pier that was practically steps away.

“It makes it hard to work some days,” he admitted, grinning at her obvious pleasure.

“I don’t know if I’d ever get anything done if I worked in an office like this!”

He laughed. “I grew up coming in here, but it truly doesn’t get old.” Instead of sitting behind his desk, he took the chair next to hers and tried not to stare. He still thought she was the most exquisite woman on earth. Maybe not beautiful by celebrity standards, but everything he’d ever wanted in a woman physically. Blond, with big hazel eyes, a mouth made for kissing and a little brush of freckles across her nose that gave her a girlish look.

“You’re probably wondering why I’m here.”

“I can guess,” he said slowly.

“Yeah, so, I almost got engaged and realized I needed to find out one way or another if we’d, you know, really gotten married.”

He arched one dark, thick eyebrow, unsure why the idea of her getting engaged made him sad. “You almost got engaged?”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “It was such a clusterfuck! You wouldn’t believe…” Her voice trailed off. “Sorry, you don’t need to hear about my life.”

He chuckled. “Considering we’re married, it might not be a bad idea.”

She met his gaze in surprise. “You’re not mad?”

“Mad? Why would I be mad? I’m just surprised you didn’t check before now. I figured that would have been the first thing you did after I left. Since I didn’t hear from you, I assumed we’d been drunk and confused and it didn’t happen. Not legally anyway.”

She flushed. “I was embarrassed and kind of afraid and then…” She swallowed. “Then my period was late and I was distracted. I did a pregnancy test every single day for two weeks until I finally could be sure that I wasn’t.”

He wasn’t sure why, but he needed to know. “Would you have called me if you’d been pregnant?”

She looked shocked. “Of course! I wouldn’t have made any decisions like that without talking to you…” Now it was her turn to hesitate. “Would you have stepped up and been a father?”

His green eyes grew warm and serious. “No question. Even if I’d had to move to the U.S. until you finished school or whatever. We did that together, Paige—we were drunk but not the entire time we were together. I distinctly remember a lot of sober sex…”

She turned bright red but nodded. “Oh, I remember almost everything about those three days…just not the actual wedding part.” She sighed and opened her bag. “I, well, I thought it might be time to take care of this but I wanted to see you in person. It felt…wrong to send these in the mail.” She held out the divorce papers.

Apollo took them slowly, willing the disappointment in his gut to go away. “I see.” He didn’t even look at them and instead focused on her face. “You want to end it.”

She frowned. “Well, I mean…we don’t really know each other and live thousands of miles apart. I have a family, a life and a career in Las Vegas. You obviously have a good job here working for your dad and—”

“I don’t work for my dad anymore—I’m the CEO now.”

She smiled, and not only did it reach her eyes, it seemed to permeate her entire face. “That’s wonderful—how exciting for you! But it just drives home my point: this isn’t something we could even give a trial run to see if we still like each other. I have to leave in four days and—”

“You came all the way to Greece for four days?” He couldn’t wrap his head around the idea of spending that many hours on an airplane for only four days at the destination.