"Tell who what?"
"Your family. That I'm not...real. I mean, they acted so surprised. Shocked, actually. Like, even though your grandfather told you to get married, they didn't expect you would."
His mouth twitched. "He and I are renowned for our power struggles." It didn't sound like a lie, but she sensed it wasn't the whole truth.
"I meant that they seemed to think you wouldn't get married ever. Not for any reason." She waited, but he let that speculation hang in the air. "Is that true?" she finally prompted.
"Yes." He said it flatly. "But he was adamant he wouldn't hand over the reins until I had a plan for the next generation. I found a workaround." He waved at her.
She wanted to ask why he was so dead set against marriage. Didn't everyone want to find a mate and form some kind of lifelong commitment?
But his dismissal of her as a "workaround" made her feel insignificant all over again. Like the fake she was.
"Well, they're tripping over themselves to be nice to me, acting like you must have really fallen for me. You should tell them it's not like that and they shouldn't get attached. Otherwise it will be hard when it's over."
"Is this because my sister offered to show you around the city? She paints. She loves walking around with a camera, scouting new subjects and locations. That is why you married me, isn't it? To see the city?"
Calli kept to herself that she could care less about sightseeing. As he glanced over his shoulder at her, she turned to fetch a different bra from the drawer, even though the one she wore was perfectly fine.
She let go of that conversation and was happy when they returned to the penthouse the next afternoon so they could attend their first public function as husband and wife.
A whirlwind of social engagements kept them busy for the next two weeks. They barely had a moment alone outside the bedroom, but at least she was able to advance her search for Dorian.
During the day, when she had the privacy of an empty penthouse, she stalked her paramour online, refreshing her knowledge of his family, searching his online photo albums for a six-year-old boy-all to no avail. If Brandon's relatives had taken him, they kept their privacy settings locked down tight. The connection wasn't obvious.
She made do with memorizing where Brandon grew up and where he had gone to school-Yale-along with the year he'd graduated and the names of his classmates and social circles. He bred thoroughbreds for racing, so there were a lot of references to tracks and derbies. She had just missed the Belmont Stakes and any chance of "bumping into him" there, damn it.
His family had made their fortune during prohibition, she learned, then turned their name into blue-blood, upper-crust American aristocracy. His father was a lawyer turned senator, his mother a homemaker and charity fund-raiser. They attended church, belonged to the right clubs, and knew the right people.
They were the right people. Four years ago, Brandon had kick-started his own political career with an interim council position. During the election, rumors had swirled about gambling debts and a thrown race, but they hadn't been proved. He was engaged to the daughter of a Washington insider and they lived in Manhattan. He had his sights set on the next election cycle for state representative and was currently on vacation at Martha's Vineyard.
If she could have gone there, if she could simply show up on his doorstep and confront him, Calli would have. Sadly, her previous attempts to contact him had resulted in cease-and-desist orders. A surprise face-to-face on neutral ground was her only choice.
She moved through the various cocktail parties and art exhibits, the ballrooms and living rooms, feeling as though she was playing one of those tile games that shifted one to make room for another. As she went along, she made a mental note of each name, trying to find a connection to Brandon, trying to figure out how she would rearrange these smaller abstract pieces into a bigger, clearer picture.
It wasn't easy when she also had to contend with sugar-coated glares of hostility from all the women who had thought they had a chance at the most eligible bachelor in America. If she had a dollar for every "Congratulations" that dripped poison, she would be as rich as her husband.
As for her marriage, it was the furthest thing from what she had imagined for herself. She hadn't aspired to marry, but when she had imagined such a thing, it had always been a love marriage that included romantic acts of intimate sharing, physical and emotional.
With Stavros, sex was a kind of delirium, the intensity growing rather than abating as time wore on. It was disturbing. Each morning, after giving up another piece of her soul to him during the night, she shored up her inner walls and distanced herself as much as she could.
If he noticed, he didn't let on. Perhaps it didn't bother him. He was focused on work and the new responsibilities he had taken on. He didn't talk to her about it and she didn't ask. She played her part, pretended she didn't feel the daggers or overhear the gossip about herself in the ladies' room. She went shopping when his sisters suggested she join in, and attended lunch when his mother invited her, all without prying beyond what they offered openly. Not because she wasn't curious. She longed to know more about her husband, but she also knew it was pointless. This was temporary.
She was here to find her son. If the emptiness of her marriage made her sad and bereft, well, she had lived in that state for a long time already. She could handle it.
Then finally, a breakthrough.
"I'm sorry," she said as she processed what the man next to her had just said. "Did you say your old rowing team would be there?"
"From my Yale days, yes. The regatta is our annual get-together. Heavy fines if you don't show for the kick-off party." He touched the side of his nose and winked. "We all have to sail with a hangover. Otherwise it's not a level playing field."
Hilarious. She wondered how many people drowned each year.
"What a lovely tradition," she said with the social grace she had learned while hosting for Takis and had honed as Stavros's wife. "Who are your teammates? Have I met any of them?" Her heart began to thud and roll, like paddles hitting the water and pushing through the weight of waves.
Stavros couldn't take his eyes off the light in Calli's face-and his captivation had nothing to do with how attractive she was. Rather, it did, but it had its roots in the opposite side of admiration. Jealousy.
"What were you talking to Hemsworth about?" He skimmed off his tuxedo jacket and draped it over the chair near the window.
"Why don't you hang that?" She moved to do it.
"I pay the housekeeper to do it. She checks to see if it needs mending or cleaning. Leave it and answer the question."
Calli let go of the jacket and stiffened at his tone. "Wally Hemsworth?"
"Yes. You lit up like a Christmas tree. He was soaking it up. That was his wife with him, you know."
"Are you accusing me of flirting with a married man? In front of his wife?"
Her wide-eyed shock seemed genuine, but he only raised a brow. That was exactly what it had looked like she was doing. He still didn't know why she had married him and it was beginning to eat at him.
Her jaw moved in a small flinch. She slid her lashes down in what might have been an attempt to disguise hurt. She was the queen of disdain when she spoke, though.
"Last I checked, I was already married to the richest man in the city. What could Wally Hemsworth possibly have to offer beyond that? More sex? I don't think that's possible, is it?" She dropped her jewelry into a dish on the vanity.
"Is that a complaint? Am I making too many demands? You respond. If you ever turned me down, I might be able to control myself." He used a facetious drawl, but there was a hard core of truth in there. She flowered every single time he touched her and it was too enthralling to resist.
But that was all they had. Sex. He hadn't expected to find that infuriating, but it grated like sand in an oyster, always there, growing with layer upon layer of attempts to be ignored. She navigated a social event with ease, but gave up little about herself. When people asked him about her, he had few answers.
It left him feeling something he hadn't experienced even when he'd been in Greece, living on pennies. Insecure. He wasn't sure of her. It kept his gut in a state of tension and his libido at ten, constantly needing to reinforce their physical connection to ensure she was his.
His frustration sharpened his tone. "Then what were you talking about?"
"Nothing," she insisted, pulling the tie that had scooped her hair over her shoulder. "We talked about his time at Yale and the regatta next week. You said we were going to that, right?"