The Greek's Nine-Month Redemption

“Oh, yes. Of course we have.”

“You’re sick. How could you do that to your own—”

“He is not my own anything. I am not your blood, agape. And a good thing to or what happened between us would be off-limits. Both in the past and in the future.”

She gritted her teeth, trying not to blush. She was definitely playing at being slightly more blasé and experienced than she was. But he hadn’t called her on it yet. So she was going to carry on. “I would rather run my new Jimmy Choos through the shredder, thanks.”

“Is that what the kids are calling it these days? I admit, that doesn’t sound very sexy.”

“It wasn’t meant to be.”

“Right. Tell me, Elle, how is my mother?” he asked.

Elle arched a brow. “How long has it been since you’ve spoken to Mariam?”

He shrugged. “Months? She doesn’t approve of my betrayal any more than you or your father do.”

“And yet you don’t feel any guilt over it?”

“I have my reasons,” he said, his tone so cold and hard it could cut glass.

“I’m sure you do, but none of them are compelling enough for me or my family. I don’t care what your reasons are. And your mother is well,” she said. “I just talked to her last night.”

It had been difficult to talk to her stepmother when memories of what had passed between her and Apollo had lingered so persistently. She had felt...guilty and completely transparent. Thankfully, Mariam had her own topics to discuss and hadn’t seemed to notice Elle’s general silence.

“Well,” she said, clearing her throat, “as charming as this little detour has been, let’s get down to business.”

He reached up, touching the knot on his tie. “Oh, you meant actual business.”

“You’re a pig.”

“I’m wounded. Now, I’ve been going over projections for the quarter. You have to either increase profits soon or you need to start cutting expenses. I can guarantee one, but I can’t guarantee the other.” He stood, placing his hands on the desk. Her desk.

She tried to cling to her anger. Anger that would hopefully be much more powerful than the attraction that was still surging through her. What was her problem? She was supposed to be cured. She was supposed to have inoculated herself to all future Apollo encounters. Cure yourself from a snakebite with snake venom, and all that. But she didn’t feel cured. She did not feel at all inoculated. In fact, she felt a little bit dizzy.

“Of course you can’t,” she said, the words coming out harsh. “No one can guarantee a profit increase. But trust me, if we keep on going in this new direction—”

“This isn’t about trust. It’s about the bottom line. I have a great deal more experience in business than you do, Elle.”

Those words rankled. In part because they were true. In part because they dug beneath the suit of armor she had worked so hard to put into place today. It hit the wound beneath it that twinged every day. That she was her father’s second choice through and through. When she failed at this, she would prove that she never should have been here in the first place. That if her father had had his way he would have put someone else in her position. That if Apollo weren’t too important for it, if Apollo hadn’t turned against them, it would likely have been him.

You decided failure be damned, remember?

Yes. She had. But it was difficult to feel committed to that now.

“But I care about this company.”

“As do I. It’s a part of my bottom line, and there is nothing I care about more than my bottom line.”

“Well, Matte is only part of your bottom line because you set out to acquire it when you saw that it was floundering. You knew what you were getting.”

“And without my influence this company would probably already be six feet under. Like the rest of the holdings I bought from your father.”

“You fired the final shot into them.”

“A mercy killing,” he said, his tone hard. “Don’t oppose me, Elle. I am not doing this for my own amusement. If I succeed, you will succeed along with me. I am not the enemy that you set me up to be.”

She didn’t know what to say to that. Except, it was a disagreement they were not going to settle. Not without blood anyway. “Yes, but you said you were standing there ready to pull the plug, so let’s be honest. You aren’t a savior, either.”

“I never claimed to be.”

“Well, don’t stand there and pretend that you aren’t the villain.”

“Oh, did you think that’s what I was doing? You’re wrong there. I know full well that I’m the villain here, agape. If I had a mustache I would twirl it. Alas. You will have to settle for the assurance that I know full well where I stand in this little play. However, we do not have to oppose each other. I know that my presence is sinister. However, there is nothing you can do to fight it. But understand I will save Matte if it’s at all possible.”

“You’re here to announce cuts today, aren’t you?”

“Surprisingly, no. But I did come to discuss something with you.”

“What?” she asked, feeling suspicious.

“I would like for you to come to my European headquarters. To get a little bit of an idea for how things run, to attend to some meetings there, and to attend a certain number of charity events.”

“What?”

“What I would like to do is help revitalize the image of Matte. I would like to bring you into the public eye. Have you as the public face, so to speak. With a little bit of help you could provide a facelift all on your own. And then, maybe we would be able to avoid cuts.”

She hadn’t expected this. She was, in fact, struck dumb by the fact that he was extending a hand out. That he was offering her a chance to not only save the company, but to do it in such a public way.

She had been prepared to be the one left standing in the ashes. A phoenix who was not poised to rise. She had been prepared to go down in flames, with her hands on Apollo’s naked body.

And now...now he was changing things. Again.

“You just expect me to pick up and go to Europe with you?”

“Yes. And I don’t exactly expect you to have a major issue with being asked to spend some time in Greece with me.”

“Your headquarters are in Greece still? Are you the last remaining corporation in the country?”

“I am successful. Worldwide. It would be a poor thanks to my homeland to remove the jobs and revenue I provide simply because there’s been some unrest.”

“Please, don’t tell me you have a heart. Only a moment ago you were telling me that your decisions were based on the bottom line.”

“I don’t have a heart. I simply have a strong liking for dolmas and ouzo.”

“That I can believe.”

He smiled, and for a moment, she felt like she was looking back at the boy he had been. The boy she had known all those years ago. The one who had captivated her from the first moment she had laid eyes on him.