She’s a Class-A nurse now.”
“Oh?” A patronizing smile appeared on the old man’s face. “You’re planning on going to the clinic?”
“To help, yes.”
She caught her knees just as she was on the brink of genuflecting and stopped herself.
What was she doing? Was her body trying to curtsey? Good grief! The man wasn’t a king and he certainly didn’t run the island. Even if he behaved as if he did. And yet there was a part of her that still worried she would never be smart enough, good enough, talented enough to come home and do anything other than fulfil the fate Dimitri Nikolaides had outlined for her.
“I’m sure there’s some little corner you’ll be able to help out in. Plenty of cuts and scrapes to tend to.”
Mr. Nikolaides eyes scanned the length of her, as if assessing a race horse. Working class mule, more like. That was how he viewed her family and it was how he always would.
Cailey’s spine stiffened as she forced her static smile not to waver.
“Maternity, wasn’t it?”
“S-s-sorry?” Noooooo! Don’t stutter in front of the man.
“I heard through the grapevine that you help other women with their children. Sweet.”
Coming from his mouth, it sounded anything but. Not to mention bordering on pathetic. Women on Mythelios were expected to do nothing less. Cook. Clean. Bow. Scrape. Sometimes she wondered if the island had ever been informed that the twenty-first century had arrived—an era when women were allowed to be smart and have opinions and love whomsoever they chose!
She stared at the lines and wrinkles carved deeply into his face. Saw the cool appraisal of his unclouded eyes. What made you so mean?
Once he’d successfully bullied her off the island the man should have had all he wanted. A son to matchmake with the world’s most beautiful heiresses. A daughter at an elite medical school. No doubt he knew exactly who she’d marry, too. The daughter of his housekeeper was safely out of the picture, so as not to sully his daughter’s circle of friends or, more importantly, his son’s romantic future.
She forced a polite smile when the silence grew too awkward. “My family usually bundles in wherever help is needed. Leon’s police squad is out saving lives this minute.”
“You don’t look too busy,” Mr. Nikolaides glanced at Kyros. “And your mother? Is she doing anything or simply enjoying her retirement?”
Cailey almost gasped at his effrontery. Her mother had earned her money at the Nikolaides mansion just as she had earned her retirement. And Kyros? Why wasn’t he saying anything? Why wasn’t she saying anything?
She’d never let anyone speak to her like this in London. Not after the years of work she’d poured into becoming a nurse. And definitely not after her years of living away from the island to “protect” a billionaire’s son. As if Theo needed protection from all the European heiresses she’d seen dangling off his arm in the society magazines she might have read accidentally on purpose at the hospital gift shop. On a regular basis.
“Oh, yes. You know us, Mr. Nikolaides,” she eventually bit out. “We Tomarases love helping clear up other people’s messes.”
Mr. Nikolaides blinked. Then smiled. “Yes, we do miss your mother’s deft touch up at the house. I trust she’s well?”
“Couldn’t be happier,” Cailey snapped.
“Mama’s very well, thank you Mr. Nikolaides.” Kyros’s hand tightened round Cailey’s arm. “We’re just off now, sir. Glad to see you weren’t hurt in the quake.”
He turned his sister around and frog-marched her away from the dark-windowed four-by-four, now weaving its way through the rubble strewn along the harborside road as if it had been thrown down by a petulant god.
“What was that all about?” Kyros growled.
“Nothing.”
He wasn’t to know Dimitri had all but packed her bags himself all those years ago. Demanded she never enter the Nikolaides house again. Not as a friend to his daughter Erianthe. Not as a “helping hand” to her mother. And especially not as anything whatsoever to do with Theo, his precious son who was prone to develop “a bleeding heart for the less fortunate.”
She launched herself at her brother for a bear hug. It was the easiest way to hide the lie she was about to tell. “I’m just tired after the overnight flight. Once I get to work I’ll be fine. It’s just weird seeing the island like this.”
“I know, huh?”
She could feel his voice rumble in his chest and cinched her arms just a little bit tighter around him. Once she let go of him she’d have to go and face the other Demon of Mythelios.
Full points to Dimitri for pipping her to the post. But she wouldn’t have been surprised if he was stalking the harbor for interlopers. Huh.
He looked old. The worn-out kind of old that came from emotional strain rather than physical. Proof he was human? Somewhere in there?
Besides, he’d only put a voice to what Theo and his mates had already been thinking, and no doubt Erianthe too, who hadn’t even had the guts to say goodbye to her before winging her way off to her fancy boarding school...
Bah! Enough of putting blame at other people’s doors. She’d believed everything Dimitri Nikolaides had said about her because there had been some truth in it. She wasn’t as smart as the others. She did have to work twice as hard to understand things. Finally figuring out she was dyslexic had helped. A bit. But it hadn’t made all the medical terminology easier to read. She’d just had to face facts. She wasn’t up to Nikolaides standards and no amount of teenage flirtation would change that.
A siren sounded and shouts erupted from a fire truck as it pulled to a stop beside them.
She gave her brother a final squeeze. “Go out there and save some lives.” She went up on tiptoe and gave each of Kyros’s ruddy cheeks a kiss.
“Same to you, Cailey.” He scrubbed a hand through her already wayward hairdo, if you could call stuffing her curls into submission with an elastic band a hairdo. “Welcome back.”
She smiled up at him, praying he wouldn’t see how their run-in with Dimitri Nikolaides had shaken her to her core. “It’s good to be here.”
* * *
“Is that enough?” Theo was impatient to get back to work. Yes, the media could help. No, he didn’t have a moment to spare.
The look on the reporter’s face acknowledged the question was rhetorical.
He undid the microphone and began to walk away, ignoring the pleas of the other reporters. They’d be better off showing footage of the rescue crews hard at work while he figured out how to help patients and simultaneously order the urgently needed helicopters to get the worst cases over to Athens.
He could call his dad.
He could also saw off his own hand. Lifting up that phone would come at a cost. It always did.
“Dr. Nikolaides?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t have time for any more interviews—”
“No! I’m not with the press. I’m a doctor. My name is Lea Risi.”
He stopped and turned. The woman was wearing holiday clothes. Chinos. A flowery top. Her accent was not local, but she spoke flawless Greek. Useful, considering there was a heavy mix of tourists and locals pouring into the clinic.
For just a nanosecond he rued the appeal of this gorgeous port town that drew holidaymakers from all around the world. If only they were on a rocky outcrop with a diminished population...