‘The press. Surely you wouldn’t want them to miss this moment.’ The bitterness on her tongue was harsh, but just.
‘No press. Not today.’
‘Giving me the day off?’
‘I think you’ve deserved it,’ he said, trying to keep his voice light. ‘What would you like to do now?’
‘I get a say in the matter, do I?’
He was beginning to get more than a little frustrated, so he drew her around to face him.
‘Célia.’
‘I know. I’m sorry, it’s just all a bit too much.’
‘Which is why I wanted today to be fun.’
She huffed out a laugh. ‘Fun?’
‘Yes, you do remember fun, don’t you?’ Although looking at her reaction, perhaps she didn’t. ‘How long have you been working on Chariton?’
She inhaled, the action tempting his gaze to her breasts, but he resisted. Barely.
‘Three years, give or take. Ella and I were talking about it long before, when we were still at university.’
‘When was the last time you had a holiday? Or just took a break?’
That she avoided both his gaze and his question told him enough. He sneaked an arm around her waist and guided her back up the street.
‘Where are we going?’
‘First we are going to Monastiraki, which has a flea market perfect for our purposes of simply enjoying the morning. Then we have lunch.’
Loukis had decided not to tell Célia about the lunch meeting he had arranged for her. He’d not missed the way that, if given too much time to think, Célia would over prepare, over question and over doubt. When she met the first prospective client he had arranged, as agreed upon as part of the fake fiancée deal, Loukis wanted her to be as natural as possible.
She dragged her heels for a while, but soon relaxed, guided by his arm around her shoulder, Loukis telling himself the touch was necessary for them both. Aversion therapy, he had said the night before. The problem was that Loukis was not in the least averse to touching her.
The smell of strong coffee and sweet treats filled the air, his mouth watering at expectation of the honey and pistachio of a baklava. As if Célia was having the same thoughts, her footsteps slowed, and he smiled.
‘Coffee? Baklava?’
She nodded, smiling, and they took a seat at one of the free tables out in the street. Dappled light picked out shadows on the white tablecloth as it filtered through the leaves above. The warmth of early summer comforting. He loved Athens at this time of year. A little too early for the massive influx of tourists that would usually drive him and Annabelle from their estate out to the island. It had been the first property he’d ever bought. Somewhere that his mother hadn’t tainted, his father’s devastation hadn’t touched, and where he initially and then, later, Annabelle had both found a peace...no. More than that. They had—for a while—found happiness. Suddenly, without warning, the looming custody battle set his heartbeat racing as he vainly tried to struggle with the fear, shocking and terrible, that he might lose Annabelle.
The waiter came with menus, but Loukis waved them away, simply ordering baklava, an espresso for himself and frappe metrio for Célia. He thought she would like the sweet iced coffee. As the waiter disappeared back into the restaurant, his attention was drawn by a father and son on the nearby table. The son was angrily wiping at his eye with one hand, as if trying to disguise his tears, and holding what looked like a small black electronic plane in the other.
He heard the father’s reassurances, and almost felt the man’s helpless anger as he tried to explain to the boy that there must be something wrong with it. That they just had to wait until they could go back to the shop. Though judging from the look on the father’s face, he either didn’t hold out much hope for a solution or feared the money it would cost. Loukis empathised with the man, clearly struggling with his child’s hurt and pain. Since Annabelle had come into his life, he’d felt that constantly.
Célia turned to look behind her, her gaze seeming to snag on the same tableaux as his had done.
‘What’s wrong?’
Loukis shook his head, shrugging. ‘Something wrong with the machine apparently.’
He watched as she cocked her head to one side as if trying to get a closer look at the machine, rather than the boy and his father, which struck him as a little odd. She shifted her chair a little, so she could better see, which drew the attention of the upset little boy and his father.
‘Can you ask him what’s wrong with it?’ she said to Loukis.
Frowning, he relayed the question and the father’s answer, all three of them looking rather bemused by Célia’s interest.