Alex
My phone buzzed again while I sat at the table, reminding me that I had an unread text message from Chloe. Marie glanced at it but didn’t say anything as she continued pouring herself a cup of black tea. Her soured expression was enough for me to know that she wasn’t fooled by my cavalier attitude, she was well aware of who I was texting and she wasn’t thrilled about it.
“Mike is coming home tomorrow,” she said after she sat down. “His mother is just devastated by this whole affair, she really has nowhere to go now.”
Mike’s father was dead, he would inherit everything in the will. I was a little surprised that he was coming back to Greece so soon, his mother was still in hospice, they were just waiting for her to go next, I couldn’t believe that he would just leave his mother like that. My sister was there to care for my mother, she would never be left alone like that.
The other thing that lingered in the back of my mind was that this was it – we would be making the divorce official so that they could get married now. Over a decade in the making, and yet I wasn’t sure that I was prepared for it.
“Why isn’t he staying longer? Doesn’t he want to be there when she passes?” I asked casually.
“Oh, you know how he is, he doesn’t like being apart for so long.”
“You could always go to Chelmsford to stay with him.”
She set the teacup down loudly and narrowed her blue eyes at me. “You know I don’t do well with death.”
I shrugged. “I didn’t say you should go to the funeral, I just suggested that you could travel with him instead of making him go back and forth.”
“Is there a reason you suggested that?” she pressed. “Something to do with one of your slags?”
I pushed my chair back and grabbed my plate as I got up, bringing it to the sink. “Don’t call them names like that, it isn’t fair to them.”
“They’re still slags whether you call them that or not and I don’t want them in my home.”
I turned around and braced my hands on the counter as I leaned back, glowering at that back of her head. “This is my house and I can have whoever I want over. I don’t tell you not to bring Mike around.”
She scoffed and glanced at me over her shoulder. “That’s different.”
“How so?”
“Mike is part of our family—”
“Mike is no more a part of our family than the women I see are.”
“That’s not fair!” she yelled, getting out of the chair in one swift motion. “Mike and I are engaged now—” she waggled the obscenely large ring in my face, “—and he is going to be welcome in this house as long as I am.”
I stared at the ring even as she lowered her hand. Once upon a time I had given her my mother’s small gold and sapphire ring, it wasn’t nearly as beautiful as the one she wore now but I thought it would be enough. I think it had been, but definitely not anymore.
“I never said Mike wasn’t welcome here,” I said, attempting to placate her. “Both of you are, but I’m going to have you dictate who I can and cannot bring over.”
“Watch me.” She turned and grabbed her cup, taking it over to the couch with her. “No whores, no prostitutes, not in my house, not around my son.”
I felt my face twisting into a scowl that I was helpless to stop. God help anyone who might “corrupt” her precious little boy. Peter would never be a man as long as she had a say in the matter. Not that being around my companions would suddenly turn him into an adult, but he really wasn’t going to branch out on his own with her hovering over him constantly.
Marie flicked on the TV to some talk show while I stood in the kitchen watching her. She wasn’t even supposed to be staying in the main house, the guest room in the bungalow had been redone just for her, and yet here she was, back in my house, drinking my tea, watching my TV, and slowing moving her stuff into the guest room downstairs. I felt like I was getting pushed out of my own home. That just gives me more reason to leave, I thought, perking a little. The more she’s here, the more I can excuse myself to go see Chloe.
Coming home was a formality more than anything; I came back for holidays, or when I was being summoned, or just to ground myself back in reality. Normally I just bounced between hotels and in some cases had stayed in the houses that I was flipping. The real estate office was a satellite job and I just provided my opinion and leadership to the agents, I didn’t do any of the heavy lifting. Now that Peter had taken on almost all the work with my construction firm, I had a lot more time on my hands to do whatever I pleased.
Part of me was almost ready to give Marie the house and the island and just leave for good. It would make everyone much happier if I did.
I sighed and turned my back on her to do the dishes. I didn’t feel like I was at home right now, I felt uncomfortably formal, but if I let my mind wander away from the Athens shoreline, all I could think about was Chloe and taking her to Spain. Barcelona. I would get her something nice, something flashier than the bracelet, I had already booked a hotel suite for us, now I just needed to book dinner reservations and maybe set us up for a show.
She hadn’t texted me yet today, which I could admit was a little disappointing, but she had a life of her own. Slowly I would insert myself into her life more and more, take up more of her time, and negotiate longer trips. Five days in Barcelona was nothing. I wanted two weeks, maybe three, at a time, and I needed it to just be her and I. Nothing else.
“Zander?”
I jumped at the sound of Marie’s voice directly behind me. Spinning on my heel, I tried not to look like a deer in headlights while she scrutinized me.
“I asked you a question,” she said dryly.
Gamó. “I didn’t hear you, I’m sorry.”
“I asked you if you were coming to dinner with Pete and I tonight,” she repeated. “He’s bringing Lena with him, I figured you might want to meet her.”
The Kokkinos girl. He’d dated her off and on but it was never serious, I wasn’t about to rush to dinner to meet her. “No, I have some calls to make. Enjoy dinner though, let him know I want to see him before I leave.”
She shoved her glass into my hand and whipped around. “Tell him yourself.”
Marie sauntered off, slamming the door as she went and not looking back.
She could be so mercurial; sometimes getting angry that I spent too much time with my son and others crying because I’d gone an entire day without being in the same room as him. Peter and I didn’t often see eye to eye though, and the older he got, the harder it was to accept that he was his own person. He didn’t understand Greek culture, he didn’t like speaking the language, I was convinced that when he was away from home he just pretended to be fully British instead.
I wasn’t sure if it was my fighting with Marie that pushed Peter away, or if it was my fighting with him, but our relationship had eroded to almost nothing before he was finished high school. I could still hear him calling me worthless. I could still feel the sting of Marie’s ring digging into my cheek when I hit him after that. I tried to make it up to him, to apologize with my actions even more than my words for ever stooping that low and becoming the person I was always scared of. It never worked, he never wanted to move forward.
I guess I couldn’t blame him, I didn’t exactly want to move on after altercations with my father, but he was my only son and now I had to see his life from afar. Part of me had always wanted another baby, but judging by my relationship with the first, that probably wasn’t the best idea.
At least he had Marie, he had one of his parents in his life and that was something that made me feel a little better.
I brushed my hair back and took a long, deep breath as I glanced around the dinning room. Draft, I decided, I should draft. That get my mind off things for a little while.
Pulling my keys out, I made my way to my work room and shut the door again behind me, quietly flicking the lock before picking up my soundproof headphones.
Several large fretwork clocks lined the walls, two from my grandfather, one from my father, and three of my own. The one I was working on now was modelled after a gothic church with real functioning bells in the towers.
The sound of the saw was drowned out by my headphones but the vibrations carried up my arms and soothed me as I followed the pattern on the wood, carefully cutting out each intricate detail. Time slipped away from me in there, locked away with my tools and projects and everything complicated that waited across the island for me to deal with. The light from the skylight eventually faded into darkness and I found myself putting the last of the details on the towers. The clocks all chimed at once, ringing out in different tones to warn me that midnight was approaching and I had spent too long standing in one spot.
With a groan, I stretched, arching my back and reaching upward. I couldn’t put it off anymore, I had to check to see if she had texted me.
10:37 PM Chloe
Hi! I’m with Jaz right now so I don’t know if I can call you before you go to bed, but I made this for you last night and I hope you like it! ;)
My stomach fluttered, I tapped the thumbnail and watched as Chloe stepped away from the camera to show off her lingerie. Quickly, I closed the video and shoved my phone into my pocket. I practically slammed the door in my rush to get out of the workshop and get up to my bedroom. To my relief, Marie didn’t appear to be home and I sprinted up the stairs.
How could I not have felt my phone go off? Not that we would have gotten to talk on the phone or over video, but still.
My bedroom door shut behind me and again I hit the lock, more out of reflex than necessity. The blinds were all still rolled up, showing off the entire southern side of the island bathed in moonlight and framed against the sprawling sea. I could imagine Chloe here, backup against the window with me kneeling in front of her, worshipping her body and feeling her writhing against my tongue.
Barcelona could not come soon enough, I needed to touch her again, I needed her to touch me again. Fuck, just thinking about her mouth was enough to get me hard. Not that I needed any help, the sneak peek of that video had me grating against the zipper of my jeans.
I threw my shirt across the room and yanked at the button on my pants, trying to get out of them as quickly as possible. I was still in my boxers when I flopped back on the bed, giving in and finally just opening the video again.
Chloe adjusted what I assumed was her phone and stepped back with a swing of her hips and a little twirl. She wore a tight white tank top paired with a neon pink thong and no bra. My gaze instantly went to her hard nipples and the way her hands kept brushing over her breasts while she slowly danced for the camera. A song played in the background that I couldn’t quite make out but she was clearly familiar with as she matched the rhythm perfectly.
I grabbed my cock, lazily stroking it while I watched her pull her shirt up, teasing me with a view of the underside of her breasts. I let out an audible moan when she finally stripped it off and cupped her tits, brushing her thumbs over her nipples while she told me that she wished it was me there with her. I wish it was me too, glykia mou. So badly.
I shivered as I watched her strip the panties away next, delicately tossing them aside with a giggle and turning around to give me a nice view of her ass. My cock ached to feel her hands, her mouth, any little thing she could do to me, I wanted. Even if I could just kiss her again, right now, it would be enough for tonight.
As Chloe sat down on the edge of the bed, her fingers pushing into her sex and drawing a faint moan from her, I lolled my head back on the pillow and closed my eyes.
“Oh god,” she moaned. “Just like that Daddy, just like that…”
Her voice was barely a whisper and I ended up pressing the speaker to my ear as I stroked my cock faster, imaging that it was her, here, in my bed. The sound of her vibrator made me groan and realize that I was panting in desperation while her cries of excitement were just getting louder.
My skin was on fire, my heart racing while I fucked my hand in time to her gasps and the sound of her toy plunging deeper into her cunt than I had ever been. It made me grit my teeth and swear through my clenched jaw, angrily bucking my hips against my palm just as she screamed out her finish.
Her cry sent me over the edge and I moaned, my back arching, my body going rigid as I came and it dripped down over my knuckles.
There was usually a snap, like a pressure that had finally been released, but I just felt more frustrated as I laid there in my false after glow. I’d never jerked off and felt so unsatisfied in my life. It’s her, I thought with mild irritation, this is her fault.
I would make sure she understood the difference between a man and a toy, I wanted her to never choose to fuck a plastic cock over the real thing ever again.