Lib Novel Page 7
She flushed. “I can’t afford to stay any longer. The flight wiped me out and I hate having credit card debt. The hotel is $200 a night and between the car from the airport, food and a little sightseeing, I’ll be paying this trip off for months.”
“But you came in person instead of just calling and mailing me the papers.” He cocked his head. “Why, Paige?”
She gave a tiny shrug. “The truth? I think about those three days a lot. I’ve never had a spark with a guy like I had with you and I’ve romanticized it in my head for three long years… I figured it was time to see you and get it out of my system.” She swallowed. “And I was telling the truth before—we’re married. Maybe we were young and foolish, and it was a stupid, drunken thing to do, but we’re married; legally, willingly married. We consummated that marriage and spent three days laughing and sharing and loving—I don’t believe you have to be in love to love someone—and that kind of loving relationship deserved a formal, respectful goodbye.”
Her words touched him, and ironically, he agreed with everything she’d said. Although they certainly couldn’t have been truly in love when they’d drunkenly stumbled into that chapel, they’d shared something special based on chemistry, instinct and at least a little bit of compatibility. Love, even if it was seeded in chemistry, had to have played a part in their subconscious minds because why else would they have done what they did?
“I’ve thought about you a lot too,” he admitted, putting the papers on his desk and staring out at the water again. “I wondered how you were, what you were doing…and if you’d moved on.” His eyes met hers with an unspoken question and she looked down.
“Kind of.” She couldn’t help but be honest. “It was hard not to think about you, wonder if we really were married, and it was always in the back of my mind.”
“But you never went to verify one way or the other.”
“I was afraid,” she admitted softly. “All I had left other than the memories was the possibility that we were still linked by marriage.”
“If you’d gone to find out for sure, and it turned out it wasn’t legal, or we hadn’t done it at all, you would have had to let go of the fantasy.”
She nodded, shocked that he’d instinctively understood what she hadn’t been able to verbalize.
“Why didn’t you want to let it go?” he asked curiously.
She smiled, meeting his gaze without hesitation. “I live a pretty simple existence. Those three days were the most exciting, wonderful days of my entire adult life and, well, the rest doesn’t matter.”
“Tell me,” he pressed. “You came all this way and one signature—” he motioned to the papers on the desk, “—is the end of all of it. You might as well say what you want to say.”
“The way you made me feel, the sex, the fun we had—I’ve never experienced anything like it since and it’s probably holding me back.”
“From what?”
“Relationships, love…everything. I had to get some closure, remind myself that it was just a silly, albeit wonderful, college fling. Now we’re older and live halfway across the world from each other. It’s time to let go.”
He couldn’t explain why he hated the idea of her letting go of her fantasy of him; he loved that she thought about and romanticized their incredibly brief but intensely passionate time together because he’d done it too. He’d never forgotten her; her laughter and zest for life, the way she’d come undone when he’d made love to her—God, he was an idiot. His friends would laugh him out of the country if they knew the way he felt when he thought about her.
“Apollo?” She was staring at him in confusion.
“I never moved past the memories either,” he said finally, standing up and walking over to the picture windows that normally brought him so much joy. “My father started grooming me to take over the company not long after I got back to Greece and last year he had a stroke. I still had so much to learn that I didn’t have time for anything else, so I kept the memories of our time in Vegas close. They kept me sane when I was so busy I couldn’t breathe, and made me smile when I had dark days. You have no idea how happy I am to see you.”
“Really?” She was fighting a plethora of emotions that ran the gamut from excitement to nervousness and confusion. It was supposed to be simple; he would go with her to the embassy, sign the papers and she would walk out of his life, burying those memories forever. Instead, he was making her stomach do funny things and her heart beat in an irregular pattern.
“Do you want to get out of here?” he asked impulsively. “I can’t think sitting here in my office and I’m sure the guys are falling all over themselves to figure out who you are.”
She smiled shyly. “I’m nothing special—they probably didn’t even notice me.”
He frowned slightly, walking over to her and reaching out to lift her chin with the fingers of his right hand. “You’re beautiful, Paige. Why would you say that?”
“I’m not beautiful!” she laughed. “I’m cute with a very girl-next-door look. No one thinks I’m beautiful!”
“I do.” He looked into her eyes and saw both pleasure and disbelief, and he wished he could prove to her just how gorgeous she was. If only he had more than four days to do it.
“You’re sweet,” she whispered in a husky voice, unable to deny that the chemistry was still there, practically sizzling between them.
“Let’s go for a drive,” he whispered back. “If you keep looking at me like that, I’m not going to be responsible for my actions.”
She quickly got to her feet and turned away, nodding. “Yes, okay, let’s do that.”
He grabbed his keys and opened the door, letting her walk out in front of him again. They’d just gotten to the outer office when his sister Melina breezed in. “Kalimera!” she called out. Good morning!
“I’m taking the rest of the morning off,” he told her briskly, knowing a Greek version of the Spanish Inquisition would start if he didn’t make a hasty exit. “Tell Mama I won’t be at dinner—my friend from college is here and I’m going to take her for a drive.”