Thessaloniki, Greece…
“Damien? Damien, where are you?” Aimee Myers paused and listened, keeping her eyes alert for signs of a little boy who’d decided it was great fun to hide from her. More often than not, he only succeeded in hiding his head, believing if he couldn’t see her, the reverse was also true. “Damien?”
She scanned the edge of the beach, framed by a thick barrier of palm trees and flowering bushes. He hadn’t gone into the water as she’d been sitting with her feet in the waves and he would have had to pass her. A glance up the beach, towards the cabanas, set back beyond the high tide mark, caused her to smile. Peeking out from the back of the middle tent-like structure were a pair of little legs encased in red swimming trunks. “Damien? Oh, Damien?”
She made her way across the wet sand, readying her camera so she could capture his look of surprise when he realized she’d found him. When she was only a few feet away from him, she put the camera lens to her eye. “Damien.”
He spun around, losing his balance and falling in the soft sand. A click of her camera, and the look of surprise on his face was captured for eternity. “Aimee!”
His little boy giggles brought a huge smile to her face. She let the camera hang from the strap around her neck, catching the little body as he scrambled to his feet and lunged for her. She swung him up and into the air and he screamed in delight.
“Higher!”
Aimee chuckled. “My arms are only so long, little guy. What do you say we head back up to the house and see if cook has any more of those cookies?”
Damien wrapped his arms around her neck and placed an exuberant kiss on her cheek. “Cookies.”
Aimee hugged him and then set him down. “Let’s go pick up your shovels and the bucket and I’ll gather up our towels.” They’d taken an excursion down to the private beach owned by the Moustakas family as a way of helping Damien deal with the fact that his mother and patéras were leaving again.
Leo and Gemma were married four days earlier. Aimee had made the trip across the globe, accompanied by Gemma’s brother Tyler, to celebrate her best friend’s marriage to the man she loved. Tyler had rushed back the day after the wedding, needing to return to the States and finish the classes he was enrolled in. He would be graduating soon and then moving to Greece to work for Leo and the Moustakas company.
Aimee would also be sticking around Greece for the next several months. She’d grown tired of the direction her life was heading and, at Gemma’s suggestion, was going to spend the next few months re-evaluating her future. She needed a career where she could feel fulfilled, not just someone to get the next cup of coffee, or worse—a pretty face.
Aimee considered herself a competent and self-sufficient woman, but the politicians she’d worked with over the last several years just saw her as window dressing that gained them access to her superiors. The entire Washington D.C. lobbying scene was like that and she was done being a part of it.
No, she wanted a taste of what Gemma had found. Excitement. Novelty. A chance to do something she’d never done before. Maybe even find myself a romantic encounter of my own—but on my terms. She would never allow a man to dictate to her like Leo had originally done to Gemma. That is not going to happen to me!
And yet, Gemma seemed so happy. Even with their honeymoon plans being altered so abruptly, she was over-the-moon with happiness and joy. Something Aimee had no personal experience with, at least, not where men were concerned.
Leo and Gemma had been planning to spend a week on the Moustakas private island, the échase parádeisos, and Aimee had volunteered to watch Damien in their absence. Their plans had altered after a guest at their wedding had shown Leo a picture, supposedly of himself, taken on a remote island in the South Pacific several weeks earlier.
Leo’s twin brother, Alexi, had gone missing when his yacht had encountered a storm and sunk. A search for survivors had yielded nothing and Alexi had been declared dead. With the picture, the Moustakas family now had evidence that Alexi had not drowned, but was very much alive.
“Momma?” Damien asked as Aimee settled him into the child safety seat secured in the back of the town car that Leo had provided for her use while she was in Greece. He’d also offered her the use of his sports car collection, but just thinking about driving a vehicle that cost well over a million dollars had cause Aimee’s stomach to clench. She wasn’t that good of a driver, choosing to use the Metro and other modes of public transportation available to her in the United States capital. When Aimee had declined, Gemma had, with a knowing smirk on her face, suggested to her new husband that her best friend would be more comfortable being chauffeured around. Leo had immediately agreed.
Always wanting to be self-sufficient, Aimee would have been content with an old beat up rental car, but Gemma had dangled a carrot in front of her that Aimee just couldn’t refuse; A man at her disposal, whose only duties were to see to Aimee’s comfort and safety.
“She and daddy went to find Uncle Alexi,” Aimee told him, slipping into the vehicle and nodding at Grigo, Leo’s man of affairs and for the time being, her personal chauffeur. “We’re ready to go home.”
Grigo nodded and then looked over his shoulder. “Did you have a nice time at the beach, Damien?”
Damien nodded and Aimee answered for him. “We attempted to build a sand castle.”
“I hope it was a big castle?”
Damien shook his head and stuck his bottom lip out. “Fall down.”
Grigo shared a look with Aimee in the rear-view mirror as he started the vehicle moving. “That is too bad. You’ll have to try again another day.”
Aimee looked at Damien and hid her smirk. He had his little arms crossed over his chest, and the look on his face clearly indicated a storm was brewing if the subject wasn’t changed immediately. “Maybe after our snack we can finish reading about Aladdin and the lamp?”
Damien yawned and nodded. “Cookies.”
“We’ll get some cookies first and then read a story.” And maybe you’ll take a long nap so I can at least check my email and go through all the pictures I’ve taken in the last few days.
An hour later, Aimee got her wish. Damien slept peacefully in the middle of the large bed in her room, and she’d already checked her emails–an exercise that had proven to be filled with frustration, providing no new direction for her life.
She hooked her camera up to her laptop and started downloading the pictures. When her cell phone rang, she answered it absently. “Hello?”
“Aimee! Oh, I’m glad I caught you. Is everything going okay?” Gemma asked.
“Gem, you’ve not even been gone twenty-four hours. Of course, everything is fine. Damien’s taking a nap. We spent the morning at the beach and he’s tuckered out.”
Gemma sighed. “I was hoping to talk to him, but maybe this is better. I hate that I had to leave him again, so soon after the wedding and rushed honeymoon….”
“Don’t worry about it,” Aimee assured her. “You know Damien’s fine here.”
“Yes, but I didn’t suggest you stick around for a few months so that you could become Damien’s babysitter.”
Aimee chuckled. “Don’t worry about it.” Aimee and Gemma had been best friends for years and roommates back in the States. Aimee had been there for every step of Damien’s life thus far, often watching him while Gemma worked late or took care of errands.
“But I want you to enjoy Greece and have some fun.”
“Damien and I are having fun, so it’s all good. What are you and Leo up to?”
Gemma sighed, allowing the change of topic. “He’s trying to find a pilot who will take us out to the islands.”
“I thought you guys took Leo’s private jet?” Aimee asked.
“We did, but it needs a certain amount of runway to land and the islands just don’t afford that. At least, that’s what I’m being told. We need a much smaller plane.” She didn’t wait for Aimee to answer, but just continued, “Anyway, the smaller planes don’t usually have a very large travel radius, so it looks like we’re going to have to make several more flight stops.
“Leo suggested just buying a plane, but some of the islands aren’t very friendly to foreigners and he doesn’t want to make any enemies before he has a chance to ask them about Alexi. Many of the islands are still trying to recover from the earthquake and tsunami. He’s trying to find someone local to help speed things up.”
Aimee frowned. “I’m sorry things aren’t going as smoothly as you had both planned. I know Leo is desperate to find his brother. He couldn’t talk about anything else but that at dinner last night.”
“His mom and dad are just as anxious. Aimee, I can’t believe that Alexi is alive.”
Aimee couldn’t believe it either. “I hope you guys find him. How long is Leo thinking you guys will be gone?”
“Well, he was hoping to be on Ranongga Island in about forty-eight hours, but now…I don’t know. He’s talking like it could take us a few weeks to find him if he didn’t stay on the same island.”
“Well, wouldn’t he be easy to find? I mean, he looks just like Leo… Surely someone will recognize him!”
Gemma chuckled. “You mean, we should just go around the island asking if anyone has seen a man looking like my husband? That might take a lot longer than a few weeks. There are quite a few islands in that area and language could be a barrier as well.”
“Isn’t there a common language everyone speaks?” Aimee asked.
“Kind of. Most of the islanders speak some form of Pidgin English, but the native language on Ranongga is Ghanongga.”
“Ghanon…what? I’ve never heard of it.”
“That’s not surprising. The only place it’s spoken is Ranongga Island and there’s only about twenty-five hundred people living there. Leo asked around for any translators, but all of them seem to be helping out with the relief effort. He couldn’t find anyone available here in Australia. He’s going to ask again when we get closer to our destination. From what Leo was able to learn, there are lots of different languages spoken on the various islands. Leo speaks five languages, but not Pidgin English. Someone told him he might be able to understand some of the islanders, but there would be difficulties.”
“Sign language,” Aimee suggested. “You know, communicate with your hands and by drawing pictures. You’re an artist…”
“No, I’m an art restoration expert. There’s a big difference.”
“Well, I’m sure you can draw stick people and the like.” Aimee smiled. “Anyway, Leo seems resourceful. You’ll both do fine.”
“Once we get there. Hey, Leo’s telling me we need to go. Kiss and hug Damien for me?”
“You know I will. Be safe and we’ll see you soon.” Aimee ended the call and then glanced at the bed to make sure Damien was still sleeping. He was. She continued downloading pictures from her camera. Now that Gemma’s wedding was over, she’d been hoping to have some time to research a new direction for her life. That hadn’t happened yet, and it didn’t seem likely that it would be happening anytime in the next few weeks either.
She didn’t begrudge Gemma and Leo wanting to rush off to find his twin, nor did she really mind becoming Damien’s surrogate mother for a few weeks. She was just starting to feel antsy about what was next. Sighing, she scrolled through the images she’d just downloaded, smiling as she found several that she really liked.
She tried to be objective about the technique, lighting and focus, but in the end, she was more interested in the emotion the pictures evoked. She wanted to feel something when she looked at a picture she’d taken. She’d always liked photography, but until recently, it had only been a hobby for her.
As she scrolled through some of the candid shots she had taken during the wedding and reception, she bit her lip. She was already planning to find a local photography shop and create a memory book for Gemma. She paused when she found one of Leo with Gemma holding Damien. Father and son were eye to eye and Damien had his hand on his father’s cheek, while Leo’s hand caressed Gemma’s jaw. She felt a small twinge of jealousy as she thought of how nicely Gemma’s life had come together. Gemma had a husband who adored her and a son any parent would be proud of. Gemma had people who needed what she had to offer.
I want that. I want to be needed for what I can offer, not because of how I look. I’m tired of men seeing me as a stepping-stone to the man calling the shots. I want to call the shots!
A small tap on her door had her looking up. Kassi poked her head into the room. Kassi was the first and only cousin to Leo and Alexi, and had come to live with them after her father had died the year before. Her mother had died years earlier, leaving the twenty-year old alone in the world. Her uncle had opened up his home to her and she’d been living with them ever since.
“Hey!” Kassi’s eyes took in the sleeping child and she lowered her voice. “I thought maybe you guys might want to join me for a swim?”
Aimee smiled and waved her into the room. “Maybe when he wakes up. We spent the morning at the beach and he’s tuckered out.”
Kassi took a seat on the couch next to Aimee, glancing at her laptop screen. “Oh, that picture is awesome!”
“Not really. It’s just something I took while I was walking around the day of the wedding,” Aimee told her.
Kassi shook her head. “You’re really good. People pay lots of money for photographers who don’t take pictures half that good. Have you considered doing it professionally?”
Aimee raised an eyebrow. “Not really. Photography is just a hobby…”
Kassi smiled and then stood up, heading for the doorway. “Maybe it shouldn’t be.”
Aimee sat there for long minutes after Kassi left her room.
Could I really turn photography into a career? I’d need all new equipment, and a way to let people know about my services, and…
Aimee closed her laptop. “You need a job, not a hobby. Photography isn’t your future.” Seeing Damien start to stir, she pushed thoughts of the future aside, turning her mind to how she was going to amuse a one and a half-year old for the remainder of the day. Swimming with Kassi would take up several hours, leaving several more to go before Damien would be ready to retire for the night. Aimee would have plenty of time to ponder Kassi’s words.
I could take pictures. I would be my own boss, call the shots, be in charge of my own destiny. I would never again be at the mercy of men with too much power and money, who believe that money entitles them to act however they wanted. I would be completely in control of my future. That’s what I want. That’s what I deserve!