The Ex

“I think that you"ll find that everything"s in order, Mr. Kouriakis,” William Butler said cheerfully, extending his almost womanlike hand over his cluttered work desk to shake on the deal that would give me the land I"d been after for, for months now. “Mr. Kouriakis?”

I had registered his gesture but my brain seemed to be slow to receive the message.

“Thank you.” I took his hand. Releasing it, I rose to my feet. “I"ve got another appointment, Will. Take care.”

He followed suit, his hands straightening the front of his shirt. “Yes, yes, of course. You"re a busy man. How are you finding The Norton? Everything to your liking?” His eyes shimmered expectantly.

“Take care,” I repeated shortly, and swiftly exited his office, slamming the door shut behind me. He was an agent, not my newfound buddy. What the h.e.l.l did he care if the hotel I was staying in was ritzy or not?

“Back to the hotel, Mr. Kouriakis?”

It took me a few seconds to register that I was outside the building and the ever-dutiful Roger was talking to me. Perhaps I was experiencing premature Alzheimer"s. It was quite possible. At thirty-three, I was hardly the boy Yaya had chased around Kástro to deliver one of her less-than-delightful thrashings.

“Come again?”

Roger looked at me strangely, holding the backseat door open. “Hotel, sir?”

I almost shrugged as I slid in. “Sure. That would be fine.”

Fine, my a.s.s.

*~*

“Christos, you"d better not let your pride get in the way of your future,” Yaya hissed over the phone. “That"s not what the Kouriakis men are taught.”

I found myself staring at my reflection in the panoramic mirror hanging above the writing table, registering for the first time the peppered specks of five o"clock shadow on my jaw. “Yaya, s"agapo – but I need you to mind your own business,” I said, as calmly as I possibly could. What I really felt like doing was flinging the hotel"s obligatory gla.s.s bowl of mints against one wall.

“Mind my own business?” she repeated, and I could almost see the curl of her lips as she said it. “You"re lucky I"m back home, Christos, because you know I would"ve given you the taste of my hand.”

Despite myself, a wry smile spread across my face. “I"m glad you mentioned that. I hope you didn"t think I was oblivious about your little layover in England, Yaya, because that would have been careless of you.”

“Is it a crime for me to travel now?”

“Some might say it"s a crime for you to connive with my ex-wife to get an ex-employee of mine sent to jail,” I replied curtly. The long, empty silence told me that she was flabbergasted. I let out a sigh. “Yaya, by now you should know that there is little I don"t know.”

“Oh?” There was a challenge in her voice. “I pity you, then. It must be very taxing to know everything about everything.”

“I"ll call you later.”

Before she could argue, I hung up, setting my phone on the table and kicking back on the sofa. Rubbing my eyes furiously, I felt the sudden urge to have a smoke. I hadn"t had one since college and the relentless need to suddenly pick up a cigarette and put it to my lips astonished me.

d.a.m.n you, Frankie Vega.
Once her name crossed my mind, it took an eternity to erase it. Even simply thinking of returning to Kástro transported me to the image of her splayed on the beach, legs parted for me, begging for me to make her come. My eyes automatically shut as the memory became more vivid. I could almost taste the balm of her juices on my mouth.

Before I could remind myself that she was forbidden, the stiffness in my pants converted into my brains. There was no point in denying that I was still heatedly attracted to Frankie, no point in trying to pretend that I could ever stop being attracted to Frankie.

“Skata,” I muttered aloud, opening my eyes again. Cursing was something I rarely did outside the bedroom. Momentarily disoriented, I gazed around the room, undoing my tie. It felt like a constrictor around my neck. “What are you, fifteen?” I muttered, glaring down at the prominent bulge in my pants.

I swore again, slowly getting to my feet.

What am I still doing in this G.o.dforsaken town, anyway? I thought self-deprecatingly, unb.u.t.toning my shirt.

Perhaps because you"re still stuck on that half-breed ex-wife of yours, Kouriakis.

The thought ambushed me and I froze on my way to the bathroom.

Of course, I was still in love with Frankie. That wasn"t something I could turn of like a tap whenever I felt like. If there was something the Kouriakis men knew and did well, it was to love pa.s.sionately and unconditionally.

Yet sometimes, that wasn"t enough.

It hadn"t been enough with Frankie.

Stop it, Kouriakis. You won"t like where this train of thought will end.

Once I started, I couldn"t stop. Self-flagellation, or merely rubbing salt into the wound, was what I knew best. It felt rejuvenating to pick at the scabs I hadn"t even known existed – or the scabs I"d thought were fully healed.

Yes, because you are a failure at even a simple thing like the act of love; the act of being loved. If you could not keep the woman you love by your side, how can you expect to keep anything?

It was pointless trying to stop myself once I got going. I never bothered. Instead, I let the bullets of thoughts shoot right through me. I allowed them to pierce my sanity, but I would never allow them to impair me. Pain was for the weak.

Naked, I stood under the icy pellets of water, hoping that my hard-on would be relieved.

Perhaps if you had been man enough to not allow yourself to get sick, you would have kept her. Perhaps you would still be together.

Do you think she would have loved you through the chemotherapy? Through the hair loss? Through the spells of nausea? Of course not. Because you were half a man. You were a sick patient. No woman would have wanted you then, and no woman will want you now. Certainly not Frankie. Especially not Frankie.

I might have growled before I drove my fist into the gla.s.s door of the shower, but I couldn"t be sure. One minute, the door was intact, and the next, shards of gla.s.s were at my feet and my hand was bleeding profusely. Pain didn"t register. At the back of my mind, I instantly knew that it was a bad cut, but physical pain was a thousand times better than emotional. At least it didn"t wear away at my sanity.

The blood, however, was not about to stop. Dark and plentiful, it trickled between my fingers and down my palm and splattered onto the white tiles of the floor. Tentatively, I stepped over the gla.s.s and out onto the downy bathroom mat. It was a shame that all the towels were the customary white. I pulled one off the rail and single-handedly wrapped it around my waist. After running my hand under warm water, I swathed it in another towel and returned to the bedroom.

A cigarette sounded like heaven right then – or, even better, a Cuban. I could probably call room service for one. A cigar would hit the spot, for sure, and maybe I"d be able to calm down...
Before I could pick up the phone, a knock at my door dragged me away from it.

Probably for the best.

I wasn"t going to throw away over ten years of nicotine abstinence over Frankie Vega.

The knocking grew incessant, until it felt like whoever it was, was a.s.saulting my head. It definitely sounded like security. The gla.s.s shattering must have been loud.

“All right, all right,” I grunted in annoyance, crossing the room and pulling open the door. “I"ll pay for –”

Frankie"s lips were against mine and the rest of my sentence died in my mouth.

My instant response to her was shocking, if not, embarra.s.sing. Like a teenage boy who"d never experienced any female interaction, my erection returned in full force, almost unbearable as it rubbed against the material of the towel and the front of Frankie"s dress.

She felt so d.a.m.n right against me, pressing herself as intimately against me as she possibly could. I gripped the sides of her face, groaning as her lips broke apart to allow my tongue in. The taste of her was the fuel to the flames. Picking her up, I elbowed the door shut and ferried her to my bed, gently setting her down as if she were a priceless artefact. She was. Despite everything, she was priceless to me, and that was the real reason I"d returned to the town we"d made our home.

“Wait,” she breathed, her hands pushing at my chest. “I have to say something.” Her eyes zoned in on my towel-covered right hand. “What the h.e.l.l happened?”

All notions of being cool toward her and freezing her out flew out the proverbial window. She was here, in my bed. At this point, I was far to weak and aroused to not succ.u.mb to her advances.

“Don"t worry about it,” I growled, kissing her neck.

She pushed me away and grabbed my wrist, abruptly unravelling my makeshift bandage. “Don"t worry about it?” Her eyes narrowed at the sight of the crimson staining the white. “Did you get into a fight?”

I sighed. She wasn"t going to let this go. That was Frankie. Get a guy hot for her, then talk about fistfights.

“No, Frankie. I did not get into a fight.”

“Then what happened? h.e.l.l, Kon, did you at least clean the wound?”

Her hand was around my wrist and I urgently wanted it to be around something else.

“I"m a grown man. An infected cut is the least of my problems.” I gently pulled my hand away.

She got to her feet. “Don"t be f.u.c.king stupid.” Turning on her heel, she headed into the bathroom.

I watched her go, before resignedly leaning back onto the bed. She returned seconds later, the first-aid kit in hand.

“No. Frankie, no.” I sat back up, fixing her with what I hoped was a terrifying look. “No.”

“Don"t be such a baby,” she muttered, sitting beside me and opening the box. “Just relax. I saw the gla.s.s. You must"ve been pretty p.i.s.sed off.”

“I still am,” I said through clenched teeth, reluctantly holding my hand out. “To what do I owe the pleasure of being subjected to this new Mother Teresa persona?”

Her hazel-brown eyes met mine. They never failed to make me sit back and notice them as if it were the first time. “I care about you, Kon. I"ve always cared about you.”

em>Bull.
I chose to remain silent, wincing slightly when she swabbed the wound with antiseptic. Tongue slightly stuck out in concentration, she wrapped my hand in gauze and raised my hand to kiss it.

“All better now.”

That simple act made me want to pretend for just one second that she was still mine, that she did care. That I was more than a good, nostalgic fúck to her.

“Can we talk now? Please?” Frankie released me, her eyes pleading.

The mask I wore automatically came on. “Actually, I should dress up and finish my business here.”

The spark of fire that I was quickly coming to recognise as the new Frankie flashed through her face. “Actually, you will shut up and listen to me,” she exploded, rising.

I stared up at her, a smile quirking at my lips. “I will?”

“Yes, because I owe you that.” She bit her bottom lip, both vulnerable and determined at the same time. “Why didn"t you tell me, Konstantin? Why did you shut me out like that?”

I arched a brow, genuinely confused. “I don"t follow.”

She sat back down and placed a hand on my thigh. “The cancer, Kon. Why did you –”

“Who told you?” The question sounded more like an attack. Frankie retracted her hand like she"d been scalded, finally as afraid as I"d wanted her to be moments before.

“Does it matter?” she asked softly. “What matters is that you didn"t tell me. I was your wife.”

I stared at her. She remained still, simply staring me out, her eyes gla.s.sy with unshed tears. “It was a little hard to describe how I had a tumour when I was being accused of infidelity, Francesca.”

She reached for me again, freezing when I recoiled. “I was so stupid,” she said. “So b.l.o.o.d.y stupid. But you should have told me. You should have let me know. I would have stayed.”

“With the notion that I was a cheater? What"s worse than a cheater, Frankie?” I barked, my voice cracking at the end. “A sick cheater!”

“Stop it!” she exclaimed, balling her hands into fists. “I read the letter; the one you never gave to me.”

Yaya. This has Yaya written all over it.

Yaya wasn"t supposed to know, except that Yaya was Yaya and she was rarely kept in the dark about anything and everything. The reason for her sudden, renewed interest in Frankie had baffled me but now it was crystal clear. My grandmother clearly thought of herself as an angel of light, providing answers to the lost and fixing what she saw as broken.

“How could you think I"d be disappointed that you got sick, as if it was your fault?” Frankie was saying, her voice barely a whisper. “Is that how lowly you thought of me? That I was a gold-digger who couldn"t stick an ill husband? That I would"ve wanted to cash in all my chips and leave before the road got rough?”

“I"ll stop you right there. I"ve never thought of you as a gold-digger.”

She snorted. “Oh, but you won"t disagree with the part about my wanting to get out of Dodge?”

I wanted to wrap her in my arms then and there but there was a barrier between us. “I would never have asked you to stand by me when I wasn"t so sure I was going to survive.”

It took me a few seconds to realise that she had slapped me.

“I love you, Konstantin Christos Kouriakis,” she said fervently, her eyes blazing. “I love you even when you behave like this, like an a.s.shole. I love you even when you make me feel like c.r.a.p. And I would love you even if you were a...a Cyclops with chicken pox and no genitals!” She waited a beat. “G.o.d, I just love you so much. Please. Say something.”

I felt my lips twitch. “No genitals?”

“Yes.” Frankie"s face was sombre. “No genitals.”

I wanted so badly to believe her, to hold on to her I love you but the wounds she"d given me were fresh and painful and stupidly, I"d kept going to her for more.

Keep your heart out of this, Kouriakis.

“Come here.” I reached out and drew her to me, inhaling the scent of her perfume.

She kissed me once, her arms snaking around my waist, before drawing back and asking, “Can we just...talk?”

“That"s definitely overdue,” I replied, mentally telling my brain downstairs to understand. But... “Although, talking can wait.” It never really got the memo.

She shivered, understanding me. Her hands went to my towel, fumbling to get it loose. “My hands are being stupid,” she whispered, and my heart jumped, my ego rising to jump with it.

“Let me,” I murmured, helping her out before rolling her over onto her back. “I"m going to remind you that this particular Cyclops has all of his parts, agapi mou.”

Frankie giggled, her eyes brightening. Instantly, I wanted that sound to be my alarm clock for the rest of my life. But first, we needed to do some talking.