Page 34 of Faking Ever After

Dimitrios pressed his fingers against his lips and guilt crossed his face. “Was it a surprise? My, my. Percy will have my head.” He cleared his throat. “I am to drive you.”

My first thought was that I would be taken to the nearest port or airport with a one-way ticket home, but I dismissed it, considering Dimitrios was holding this picnic basket like it contained gold.

“And you’re driving me…where?” I cocked my head.

Dimitrios dragged his pinched fingers over his lips, zipping them and giving me a tight-lipped smile.

Percy was up to something, and I couldn’t tell if it was good or bad.

Still, I found a laugh to share and told Dimitrios I would be ready in a few minutes. Dimitrios left me and I hurried to wash my face and brush my teeth. Then I changed into nicer clothes and joined him downstairs, where Nektaria was busy carrying out breakfast.

Within ten minutes, we were in the car and driving along the narrow and cracked roads away from the beaches and into the mountains. Dimitrios played music, which first struck me as a combination of sounds that had no business existing near each other. Still, as Dimitrios tapped the wheel to the rhythm of the folk songs, I understood that there was something like harmony in there, just simply not the sort my ears were used to.

We drove along the curvy roads and Dimitrios occasionally pointed to places we passed. Demeter’s Temple, or the Temple of Dionysus, and a monastery so high up in the mountains that it seemed impossible it had been built there at all. The marble quarry looked like it was shaped by the hands of gods, a chiseled side of the mountain with blocks upon blocks of marble. “To us, marble is like any other rock,” Dimitrios explained. “You will see.”

And he wasn’t lying.

We went high up, though the peak of the island was not our destination, and through villages that buzzed with more life than I had imagined existed on a barren rock in the middle of the sea.And when we neared our destination, I stared out the window with unrestrained wonder. Marble. It was all made of marble.

The town hung from the side of the mountain, deeply inland and greener than any other place I’d seen on Naxos so far. As Dimitrios drove nearer, I discovered I could still be more surprised. Even the paved streets and protective walls on the edge of the town were made of marble.

Dimitrios parked the car under an old sentinel that provided plenty of shade. A few paces before us was a little platform with a viewpoint of a green canyon beyond the protective railing. And by the railing, on a marble bench, sat Percy Davenport.

He was beautiful. It was no wonder I couldn’t get him out of my mind. Every time I looked at him, the realization slammed me anew. It was unfair that anyone should be that pretty. The smooth skin that was starting to tan, those defined lips and high cheekbones, that sharp jawline, and his piercing blue eyes. There were streaks of sunkissed highlights in his hair.

Percy wore a cream linen shirt and brown linen pants paired perfectly with brown leather sandals, the straps wrapping around his ankle like he was some ancient philosopher. Or warrior. He certainly had the body fit to be a Spartan hero.

Only when my door opened, I realized Dimitrios had left the car and carried the picnic basket. Percy looked at the car and I slipped outside. A gust of gentle wind moved the locks of my hair around. I ran my fingers through it to free my eyes.

Percy hopped onto his feet and tucked his hands into his pockets. “Hello,” he said with a smile that was so warm and welcoming that I almost believed we weren’t pretending. We’d had an awkward disagreement just twelve hours ago; I wasn’t sure what to expect from this meeting.

His sweet dimples threatened to leave me without oxygen until I forced myself to inhale. “Good morning.”

“And the basket,” Dimitrios said, handing it over to Percy.

“Thank you,” Percy said patiently, and Dimitrios saluted with two fingers, then returned to the car. He waved at us as he pulled back onto the road.

“There goes our ride,” I said.

Percy laughed softly. “Good.” He set the basket on the marble bench. There was silence for a short while as the wind lifted from the canyon before us and billowed Percy’s partially unbuttoned shirt.

I wondered if he knew what he looked like. Did he do it intentionally? He was like a lonely dreamer, a poet who was consumed by his own thoughts, who was in love with his own melancholic heart. He was ridiculously handsome, but he treated it in such a casual, unimportant way that it seemed effortless. He looked like he didn’t care either way about his appearance and simply stumbled out of the bed, robed in perfection.

“Do you like the view?” he asked.

I stepped toward the railing. The land sloped steeply from there down to the bottom of the mountain.

“This is one of the rare places where there’s a bit of a forest on the island,” Percy said. “The Ottomans burned it down in several invasion attempts and the forests never recovered.”

I placed my hands on the railing. It was cool to my touch, lacquered black and polished clean. Although I gazed out at the bright blue sky and deep green canyon, my attention returned to Percy. “Maybe I overreacted last night,” I said.

Percy chuckled softly and shook his head. He turned to me swiftly, one hand sliding out of his linen pocket. “This is for you.” In his hand, a small, black box with a white bow and ribbon rested.

I sighed. “Percy, really, you don’t need to…”

“It’s not a payment, Finn. It’s a gift,” he said in a warm and patient voice. “Take it.”

I hesitated, gazing into the burning glaciers of his irises, and then took the little box.

---