Billionaire Bad Boys of Romance Boxed Set (10 Book Bundle) (112 page)

“Do you have anything to say about that, Mairi?”

I shrugged, keeping my sunglasses on because it was easier to lie that way. “I got into a fight with another girl in school. A really violent fight. So they expelled me.”

“That’s it?” Aunt Norah sounded doubtful.

“Yup.” I slowly resumed eating, just to convince them I was totally okay with what happened.

“Just tell it to me straight,” Aunt Vilma pleaded. “It’s not because you’re pregnant, is it?”

I spit out another spoonful again.

Aunt Norah added uneasily, “Or on drugs?”

My spoon dropped to my plate. “Aunt Norah! Aunt Vilma!” Were they seriously asking me those questions?

“Well, you can’t blame us! We didn’t raise you to be a hooligan,” Aunt Norah answered defensively.

Silence.

And then Aunt Vilma coughed, and when she did I had to cough, too.

Aunt Norah’s gaze narrowed.

I’m not going to laugh. This is not the time for laughter. Oh my God, Aunt Vilma is so unfair! Why are her shoulders shaking?

Aunt Norah burst out, “Oh, for God’s sake! My old-fashioned English is not the main point here.”

Aunt Vilma lost it and I started to giggle. “
Hooligan,
Aunt Vi. Did you hear her say it?”

Aunt Vilma chortled, “I so did!”

It was a reprieve, a temporary one, and we all knew and allowed it. Maybe later tonight, when it was time for us to settle down with our own copies of our group bedtime story, we would talk about it again.

But for now, we were going to enjoy some harmless, adorable bit of normalcy.

Aunt Vilma and Aunt Norah were still trading insults and I stayed in my seat, enjoying my dinner as I listened to them one-up each other with the wittiest barbs. How, I wondered sadly, could those narrow-minded idiots ever think that these two wonderful women were whores and gold diggers?

They had made me believe in true love in the form of Greek billionaires.

Was that so wrong?

“Are you okay, Mairi?”

I started, realizing that both my aunts had ill-concealed looks of worry in their gazes. The sight of it made my stomach queasy because I didn’t like seeing them like that. I wanted them to be happy – to
stay
happy because that was what they had succeeded in making me feel all these years, even if I had lost my parents too early.

Forcing a smile, I lied, “I was just wondering what book we’d be reading tonight.”

“Lynne Graham’s new one of course,” Aunt Vilma replied promptly.

“Oh, please. Not another one. Can we please switch to Sharon Kendrick for tonight?”

“Betty Neels would be good,” I piped in, just for the fun of it. I personally loved the author’s books, but my aunts found her work too “sweet”.

“There isn’t even a Greek billionaire in any of her books,” Aunt Vilma countered with a sniff. “She only writes about doctors and she’s not even part of Harlequin’s Medical Romance.”

“Plus, those men are too nice for my liking,” Aunt Norah grumbled. “They never act like jerks!”

Closing my eyes with a genuine smile this time, I let my mind drift once more while listening with half an ear to my aunts passionately enumerating the many reasons why they just weren’t the kind of women to fall in love with handsome, wealthy, and intelligent Dutch surgeons.

One day,
I thought hazily. One day I was going to prove everyone wrong about my aunts. One day, I’d show the whole world that it was perfectly fine to dream about falling in love with a Greek billionaire because it could and would come true if you wanted it badly enough.

And I wanted it. Badly.

Lesson 1

To catch a Greek billionaire, you must first find a way to get in his line of sight.

She said: Find a way to stand beside him (model, actress, lottery winner)…or behind him (nanny, secretary, or just bump into him).

He said: You are making it too complicated, matakia mou. It is this simple - do you want to be on top or under me?

8 Years Later

Mairi’s heart started beating like crazy as the ornate gates of the Grecian Academy for Young Ladies finally opened.
This
was what she had been waiting for all her life – her very first
possible
encounter with Greek billionaires.

She opened her mouth to talk about how
excited
she was about today, felt her friends’ knowing gazes on her, and instead decided to shut up. She was
not
going to take the bait. She was a mature twenty-something woman with good self-control. She would totally show them she could act like an adult if she wanted to.

Mandy and Velvet crowded around her. They were her closest friends, the only ones whom Mairi knew right from the start that she could trust with her secret. Of course, being trustworthy did
not
mean they were above teasing her about it. They were not.

“Come on,” Mandy teased. She was a slim dark-haired woman with a practical streak that bordered on obsessive, a trait that served her well when teaching Economics. But as a friend to a dreamer like Mairi?
Not fun
were the first words that came to mind.

“Look at all those sports cars and limousines driving our way,” Velvet whispered enticingly. Tall and auburn-haired, she looked more like an exotic model than the Chemistry teacher with the rather acerbic wit that she was. “One of them could be
the
man you’ve been dreaming of meeting all your life. Isn’t this something worth celebrating?”

Don’t take the bait, don’t take---

“Come on, Mair. You know you want to say it. What if the first man who steps out of the car is tall, dark, and handsome with the most spectacular Greek accent---”

Her eyes glazed over as Mairi started to fantasize about how her first encounter with her future Greek billionaire husband would play out. A happy-crazy grin flitted over her lips as she exclaimed excitedly without thinking, “
Yay me!
”

Mandy and Velvet burst into laughter.

Oh, drat. She had taken the bait. Again!

Clutching her sides, Mandy gasped, “You are way too cute!”

Velvet waved imaginary pom-poms in the air. “Yay for Mairi finally getting to meet her first Greek billionaire!”

“Ha-ha. I know you guys are just making fun of me,” Mairi grumbled even though she couldn’t help sighing dreamily. She was
that
happy. And excited. And nervous. Today was
the
day she had been waiting for most of her life. The thought of meeting
him
was more than enough to have her silently gasping for breath.

Mandy snapped her fingers in front of Mairi’s face. “Your head’s in the clouds again!”

She answered almost proudly, “Yes.”

Velvet groaned. “You are the
silliest
gold digger I’ve ever met!”

Mairi didn’t bother answering, being used to Velvet’s rather twisted sense of humor. The worse her insults were, the more deeply she cared about that person.

“How do I look?” Mairi nervously smoothed out non-existent creases on the ankle length skirt of her daisy yellow dress. It was loose and high-waisted, just the way she
needed
it to hide her dreadfully generous curves.

“Sexy enough to eat.” Velvet snickered.

The answer had her gasping. “Velvet!”

“Oh, hush! Greek guys are very passionate. You should know that by now. So if you’re serious about nabbing yourself a Greek billionaire, you should be ready to let go of more than a few of your sexual inhibitions.”

Mairi couldn’t help but snort. “Like I’m going to take an advice from another virgin.”

“At least I already had my first kiss,” Mandy retorted.

She opened and closed her mouth. Mandy had a point, darn it.

“Sssh,” Velvet suddenly said under her breath. “Mairi’s bitchy supervisor is heading this way.”

Following Velvet’s gaze, Mairi realized with a sinking heart that Charity Fallon, the English rose who headed the school’s language department, was indeed walking towards her.
What had she done this time,
Mairi wondered uneasily. In the almost seven weeks that she had been teaching in GAYL, there wasn’t ever a day that the older woman hadn’t found something to sweetly berate her for.

Rose Thorn, the school’s headmistress, suddenly rushed past them, calling out, “Places, everyone!”

Mairi caught sight of Charity freezing at Rose’s words. Since she was one of the department heads, Charity was supposed to be in the frontlines and yet here she was, almost at the very back.

Rose clapped her hands twice. “Music!” On cue, the live orchestra inside the school started playing Beethoven in the background.

Charity recovered and hurriedly squeezed herself in between Mairi and Velvet.

Velvet leaned back far enough for Charity not to see her and rolled her eyes at Mairi as she mouthed,
‘I hate this little shit’.

Mairi choked. She was
not
going to laugh. Oh Greek gods, wherever you are, please do not let her laugh.

Around her, the silence had deepened while blank and professional expressions settled on the other teachers’ faces. Rose had divided the faculty into two groups, with the academic staff lined on one side while the extracurricular and administrative staff was at the opposite side. Each of them occupied every step of the majestic staircase leading to the school’s entrance.

To an outsider, they probably looked like stage cast members doing their best to set up a la-di-dah party scene. Unfortunately, the reason was a lot more mundane than that.

Today was Parent Teacher Consultation Day, and in GAYL it meant having to prove to parents that the school’s six-digit tuition charges were not for nothing.

“Are you nervous?” Charity whispered to Mairi.

She had to think really hard how to answer that one. The right answer should be
no
, but Charity sounded like she would rather hear Mairi say ‘yes’.

Don’t say yes.
Velvet shook her head with a warning glare. She was always after Mairi to be more assertive.

But Mairi still heard herself saying, “A little?” She just couldn’t make herself start a fight – even if it was warranted.

“Awww.” Charity sounded terribly sad, but there was a gleam of unholy glee in her eyes.

Behind Charity, Velvet made a circular motion next to her ear.
Psycho,
her friend mouthed.

Mairi choked.

“Oh! Are you okay?”

“I’m, umm---”

Charity shut her down sweetly. “I hope you’re not coming down with anything, Mairi.”

Darn it. Charity’s oxymoron ways were just too confusing. She said weakly, “I’m not?” At Charity’s scowl, Mairi said hastily, “I mean, I might be?”

“Aww.” This time, Charity smiled.

The sight of it just made her head hurt worse. Charity’s smile had always been like this, half-friendly and half-nasty. Mairi had tried several times to replicate it without any success, tempting her to write to the Guinness Book of Records to report the phenomenon. And if Guinness didn’t want it, well, there was always Ripley’s.

“I know this is your first PTC so I totally understand if you’re nervous.”

Oh, how sweet. Charity seemed honestly concerned about her this time. Mairi began, “I’m actually---”

Again, the other woman cut her off with a pretty smile. “That’s why I thought you should stick to taking care of the girls in Class E and I’ll take care of those in Class A. I’m just concerned you won’t be able to cope with it. Class A parents can be so demanding.”

Velvet was exhaling loudly.
Sucker,
she mouthed when Mairi looked at her.

Mairi sighed. Drat it, Velvet was right. She had played the sucker.
Again.

There she was, thinking Charity had finally discovered her nice streak. But instead all Charity cared about was making herself look good in the parents’ eyes. Class A girls had the highest marks in English while most of the students in Class E, which Mairi had taken over when another teacher quit mid-semester, had some of the lowest grades in their year.

Charity gave Mairi another one of her unique smiles, but this time she wasn’t as dazzled. “You understand, don’t you?”

Mairi squared her shoulders. “Well, I---”

“As you should know, most Greek parents prefer their children to be taught English by the British. And especially when they come with degrees from schools like Cambridge, where I took my masters---” With every word that came out of Charity’s mouth, her British accent became more and more obvious. It was really weird, the way the other teacher only sounded like Queen Elizabeth when she mentioned she was from
Cambridge
or that she needed
to-mah-toes
in her omelet.

Mandy was frowning hard at the ground. Mairi knew that look. It meant her friend was
this
close to laughing her head off. Behind Charity, Velvet was already doubled over, having long perfected the art of noiseless laughter.

Charity patted her sleekly styled hair, which curled becomingly against the expansive cleavage her strapless dress exposed. “Don’t take it personally, though. It’s just that they prefer their daughters to learn from those who really speak English.”

Mairi could only blink. What the heck did that even mean? That American English was some kind of
fake
version of English?

“So…” Charity looked at her expectantly. “We’re all agreed then?”

Before Mairi could answer, Rose twisted around to frown at all of them as she hissed from the bottom of the stairs, “They’re coming!” She made the students’ parents sound like a huge wave of zombies out to get them.

And so they came, indeed walking as slowly as a blushing bride who was about to go down the aisle. Since her Aunt Vilma was Hollywood’s favorite divorce lawyer, Mairi had been exposed early to the rich and famous. But even after all these years, she still couldn’t get over the air of privilege and entitlement these people had. They walked, talked, and acted like the rest of humanity was lucky to breathe the same air they did.

Rose greeted the first batch of parents and guardians with courteous charm, her soft but well-modulated voice setting the tone for the rest of the day.

Don’t look at them in the eye for too long.

Don’t call them by their first names – even if they invite you to.

Don’t let them know their daughter is not the most beautiful, smartest, and kindest person on earth.

Jaw aching with the effort to remain smiling, Mairi greeted every parent and guardian that came her way, relying on Rose’s script to make sure she didn’t inadvertently become anyone’s worst enemy. After all, the Greeks were notoriously good at holding grudges.

But as morning turned to noon her hopes started to fade. And when the lady attendants started to close the school’s doors, the last of Mairi’s hopes crumbled to dust.

She had followed all the rules, darn it. She had gone over every “bedtime story” Aunt Norah and Aunt Vilma had told her when she was a kid and she applied what she could. Against all odds, Mairi had managed to make her way to Greece, obtain employment in one of the finest international schools in the country, and with it Mairi had conquered Step 1.

She had successfully placed herself in a Greek billionaire’s line of sight.

So where was he?

*
* * *

By the time lunch break came around, Mairi was more than ready to have some time off and get away from all the noise. Who would have thought PTC would be this horrible? Nothing – not even after listening to the older teachers’ countless horror stories about it – had prepared her for the sheer torture of having to tactfully explain red marks to Greece’s crème de la crème.

“I don’t understand how she flunked her English test,” a parent had protested earlier. “I see my baby reading all the time!”

That’s great. I see that too, but text messages don’t count!
That was what she wanted to say but couldn’t. Instead, Mairi had summoned one of the canned responses from Rose’s script, murmuring her agreement and telling the mother she believed that her daughter’s turn to shine might come next term.

The memory of the episode made Mairi shake her head tiredly and she hurried to one of the balconies on the third floor, needing a breath of fresh air to help relieve her stress. Throwing its doors open, she slipped out and closed her eyes with a sigh, soaking in the rays of the Greek sun and savoring the way the weather’s now familiar warmth relaxed her.