‘I’m not actually in the army.’
‘Not actually in the army?’
‘I’m not quite in the army.’
‘Not quite?’
Why was he making this so difficult for her? Or perhaps she was the one who was making it difficult for herself? She swigged from her bottle of Fix. ‘I’m not in the army. At all.’
‘Really,’ Elias said, sitting back a little and cradling his beer bottle with his hands.
‘I don’t know why I told you that. Well, I do know really. I told you that because being in the army is about as far removed from what I really do for a job as I could think of. And I didn’t want to tell you my real job because Hazel and Shelley both said that you don’t go travelling and tell anyone you meet anything real about yourself. Because I’m a woman on my own,’ Becky continued. ‘And when you’re a woman on your own, apparently every second person you meet is waiting to exploit you, or murder you or… exploit you and, well, I wasn’t even meant to tell you my real name but I figured that actually my real name is Rebecca so if you were going to exploit me then telling you that my name is Becky wouldn’t really get you into my credit cards.’
She needed a breath when she had finished. The air was still sticky and humid, despite the now dark sky, but having finally ended the elongated paragraph she would take any oxygen she could get.
‘And you have decided now that I am not going to murder you or exploit you.’ He raised his beer glass as if in a toast. ‘I feel honoured.’
Oh dear. She had insulted him. And she knew from Marco Polo that Greeks – more so than any other nationality, it was professed – didn’t take kindly to being insulted.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Becky said. ‘But it was only a little white lie and being in the army is so much more interesting than what I really do. I just thought you would be someone who sat next to me on the plane. That it wouldn’t matter if I told you something else. And then I said I was staying in Athens not Corfu and then we ended up in Athens and…’
‘Rebecca,’ Elias said, the timbre of his voice low, sultry, rippling up her backbone.
‘Yes.’ Her voice was stupidly breathy. Pathetic. Not the independent go-getter she really wanted to be on this break. Much more work was needed on that.
‘I understand,’ Elias replied.
‘You do?’
‘I do,’ he answered. ‘And it makes no difference to me. Conversation on a plane is simply conversation on a plane. You might be surprised to know that I was once seated next to a man who told me he was a builder.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘He passed me the inflight magazine because my seat pocket did not have one. This man had not one callus on his hands. In fact, his hands looked like they had been manicured.’ Elias raised his beer bottle again. ‘Now, I do not know why he lied to me. But I did not care. We had a brief conversation about the weather, the turbulence and the selection of in-flight snacks and that was it. We would never see each other again.’
‘I know but… I don’t tell lies.’ Hiding what she did with sandwich personalisation from Megan wasn’t anything like the same. ‘I just said it for my own protection… or so I thought… and because of my stupid friends.’
Elias laughed then and it was a joyous sound. Deep, rumbling through his entire body, his mouth widening with an expression that rose up through his cheekbones right up to his beautiful eyes.
‘I didn’t realise it was quite that funny.’
‘It is,’ he answered, still laughing a little. ‘Because I thought that maybe you were an artist with all the drawings of animals… but then there was the stabbing of them. I was worried that perhaps you were the murderer.’
‘Oh,’ Becky said. ‘Well… I draw animals when I’m distracted. I was trying to put together a menu plan for a pitch I’m trying to win. It’s a nursing home party and it’s important to me and… it should be important to my sister but apparently it isn’t… and I couldn’t quite work it out on the plane. Hence the animals and the poking them with my pen.’ This beer was making her share way too much information now. Maybe it didn’t mix well with that white wine she had had earlier.
‘You plan parties?’ Elias asked her. His knee nudged hers as a couple meandered around them, coming down the steps. He edged a little closer.
‘I… make sandwiches and wraps and rolls. It’s my sister’s catering company, but this pitch for the nursing home, well, she isn’t keen on taking the job, but I really want to.’ She sighed, frustration with Megan still bubbling under the surface. Why was her sister treating it like just any other job? It was much more than that. It was about doing something nice for the home that had looked after their dad. ‘I just need to think up a menu that’s going to be unbeatable by anyone else who pitches.’ She really really wanted this.
‘I get it,’ Elias replied. ‘You want to prove to your sister that you have this capability she thinks only she possesses.’
God. From the little information she had given him he had pretty much nailed that. ‘Well… yes,’ she answered and nodded. ‘Do you have any brothers or sisters?’
‘Ochi,’ he answered. ‘Sorry. No. I don’t. Only me. My mother will tell you that as I was ten pounds in weight and it felt like she was evacuating a watermelon. There was no way she was going to repeat the experience.’
Becky couldn’t help but laugh.
‘You laugh at me? Being a child on my own growing up. No one to play with because my head was too large?’
Now she laughed even more. She was imagining him with a giant head. He didn’t have a giant head. He had quite a beautiful head, if heads could be beautiful. His dark hair was shaped neatly, brushed back in that style that was popular now.
‘You are now thinking of me with a watermelon for a head, are you not?’
‘No.’ But she didn’t stop laughing. She put a hand over her mouth. ‘OK… maybe.’
‘You are cruel, Sergeant Rebecca.’
‘Oh, I imagined myself a way higher ranking than a sergeant.’
‘Is that so?’
She nodded and took a sip of her drink.
‘So, how do you like Athens?’ Elias asked her.
‘I like Athens very much,’ Becky replied, looking around her. The fairy-lights strung under the canopies casting a romantic glow over everything, the old stone with pots of bougainvillea spilling from urns and hanging baskets, the animated chatter from their fellow patrons. ‘It’s so beautiful. Not just the Acropolis which was the most magnificent thing I’ve ever seen. It’s also the little shops, the incredible view over the city and here, sitting on cushions on the steps, underneath a thick dark sky, drinking beer I’ve not tasted before in the middle of… real Greek life.’ She looked back at him. ‘Thank you for showing it to me.’ A sigh left her body then and the contentment loaded in it took her by surprise. She did feel content, as well as exhilarated. As those emotions floated over her she realised just how close Elias was to her and the fact that he appeared to be gazing into her eyes. His eyes. So in contrast to the olive skin and the dark hair, a flickering shimmer of blue meets green. Becky’s heart was racing. This was attraction. There was no denying that. She was as attracted to this virtual stranger as she had ever been attracted to anyone. Even Mr Eighteen-Months. And what a big mistake that had been. Except she shouldn’t judge every next man she met by the standards of someone else, should she? That wasn’t fair. That wasn’t giving herself or anyone else a chance. And she did want some of those feelings back again. Even if it was for one night with a stranger…