Page 111 of Dagger in the Sea

“No, we do. It’s a long, complicated story.”

“It usually is,” he said, his gaze returning to the sea.

“I wasn’t rebelling against her. My being with Grigori wasn’t about her.”

“It wasn’t any kind of rebellion?”

“A rebellion over rigid expectations and a rigid way of thinking, but at the core of it was my love for him. I left university in Switzerland to live with him in Athens. We lived in his small apartment in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the city. I didn’t have access to any of my money at the time, so I found a job in a bar, which I hated, but we needed the money. He usually performed in that bar, in that neighborhood. We were together and that’s what mattered to me. I wasn’t thinking about tomorrow or the next day.”

“You did all that? Turned your back on—”

“I did. Being with Grigori was never romantic nights in fancy hotels, sex on high thread count sheets, fancy gifts or trendy cocktails and gourmet dinners. We were on his dirty sofa in his shitty apartment, on the beach on insufferably hot nights drinking cheap beer, at underground clubs. It was fun at first, liberating.”

“What happened?”

My mouth was dry, I licked my lips to prepare the way for the words that had to come. “He was always out. Either with his mates composing music, practicing, working to make money, or running political meetings. I thought us living together would bring us closer, make things easier, but it didn’t. I had to fit in to his schedule, his world, and I tried. That week, he’d been preparing for a performance and he was never home. I got upset, we fought. I insisted that we spend one night together, and he finally agreed.

“I took him to a nice neighborhood, to one of my favorite bars for a drink. Just one drink. He didn’t like it, he didn’t complain but it was written all over his face. He endured it, just wanted it over with. I felt like an idiot, but I kept trying to tell myself it was fine. It was just one night.

“We left the bar and were walking to where he’d parked his motorcycle, when I saw a friend of mine and I went over to say hello. It was so good to see a friendly face. But Grigori continued walking. He’d started his bike, waiting for me. Suddenly a group of men surrounded him, yelling and cursing. They were members of the new ultra right-wing party. Neo-nazis in black hoodies. They’d followed us there. I found out later that they’d been watching him for weeks and had been tracking us all night.”

“What happened?”

“They argued and attacked Grigori with knives. All of them. He bled to death right there on the sidewalk in front of all these fancy bars and restaurants. A river of blood. His blood, everywhere. Terrible shouting and screaming, cars, motorcycles. I tried to go to him, but I couldn’t even see him in the crowd. People were on a rampage, setting fires in the street, breaking shop windows, looting. Someone threw a molotov cocktail, and it exploded next to me.”

“Is that how you got that scar?”

“Yes.”The scar I hadn’t wanted him to touch.“His blood stained those fancy streets, bringing a rebellion to an unsuspecting part of the city. Demonstrations and protests broke out all over Athens, the entire country,” I continued. “It was an awful time. They turned him into a political martyr. But Grigori wasn’t affiliated with any political party. He simply told the truth about what people went through in their daily lives. He held a cracked mirror up to the waste and the exploitation.”

“And in the end, he was the one exploited.”

“In the worst way, and it’s my fault. If I hadn’t picked a fight with him, made him go out, taken him there, he might still be alive. If I hadn’t—”

“Adriana, stop.”

“I played a part in Grigori’s death. I made him more notorious than he already was, made him a target. Him going to that neighborhood, where he wasn’t protected by his own—and they turned that beautiful neighborhood into a war zone, and it’s all because of me.”

“Adri, you didn’t make those extremist hoodlums murder him and go on a rampage.”

“They viciously slaughtered him right there in public, on the street, like an animal.”

“Because they’re animals.”

“And I’m a fool, a selfish, self-centered fool.”

“No, you’re not. Stop.” He tugged on my hand, willing me to listen to him. “What happened after?”

“The funeral was a horror, more like a political rally. His family was in pieces, I was booed. The press was rabid for me. The day after the funeral, my parents sent me back to Geneva. That was two years ago. I finished uni, worked in London in between and after for a bit, and I came home this past Christmas, and stayed on. For the media I’m the country’s tragic little rich girl who wears a black tiara.”

“Black?”

“The ‘Bad Luck Princess,’ they call me—‘bad fate’ is the literal translation. They put me in a comic book like that. Black raccoon eyes, black crown, black heart spray-painted on a long red dress. One magazine did a full list of every man I’d ever dated in the past comparing them to Grigori. It was awful. I stopped going out and agreed to this arrangement with Alessio.”

“So you gave up?”

My back stiffened. Yes, I’d given up. “I made a choice.”

His jaw set. “You’re too young for that, Lovely.”

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