Authors: Marguerite Labbe
“Hey, Mr. K.” Knox’s excited voice came up through the hole in his office floor that still contained a fireman’s pole and cut through Galen’s circling thoughts. “You have got to come see these dudes.”
N
ICK
C
HARISTEAS
ducked into his office and dumped the stack of files on his desk. He was in hell. Absolute, literal hell that involved endless wait times on the phone and reams of papers that kept getting higher every day. Financial security was not worth this bullshit.
He flung himself in his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose to ward off the incipient headache. If he could just clear his mind of insurance forms for ten minutes, he’d be golden for the rest of the day. He took out his darts and swiveled his chair around to the small dartboard he’d stuck onto the bookcase.
The first dart landed next to the outer rim and Nick winced. He did not want to explain to management how another book got punctured. He took careful aim and the second hit dead center. By the time he ran out of darts, the tension in his shoulders had started to ease and the knots in his stomach had unraveled. Nick rose to grab the darts for another quick round when his eyes fell on the poster of Santorini he had tacked to the wall.
Six more months. Then he would have three blessed weeks on a charter boat in the Greek Islands, diving, getting back in touch with his roots, and hopefully this time, bringing back the prominence to his family’s name. That’s why he worked this job. It gave him the pay, the insurance, and the vacation time for these twice-yearly jaunts around the world. He came in sick, saved up every scrap of leave just for these little escapes. If he was the one to find the Dexios Collection, it would be his ticket back home. Finding the Collection would fix everything.
Nick’s phone rang and he peered at the display with a grimace for the name there, Jessica Blandford, no doubt calling to bitch again about staffing. Nothing made her happy. Nick ignored the ringing and turned back toward the dartboard. He threw the dart harder than he intended and it sank all the way up to its shaft into the workplace safety sign he had hanging next to the bookcase. “Crap.”
A brisk knock at the door made him jump and cast a quick glance at the offending dart. Before he could answer, the door opened and his assistant Sean walked in with several message slips in his hand and two paper cups of coffee.
“You have a meeting in ten minutes, and you might want to call Jessica back before it starts.”
“I do?” Nick sat up at his desk and pulled up his calendar. “I thought I was free to catch up on paperwork for the rest of the afternoon.”
“You were, but this came up regarding you-know-who, and they want it addressed immediately.”
Nick scowled and shuffled through the files on his desk. “Got it, thanks. Any other messages I should know about beforehand?”
“No, I think they can wait. The barista you’ve been ogling wrote his number down for you.” Sean handed him one of the coffees with a number emblazoned on the side without batting an eyelash.
Nick took it with a slight flush and a cough. “Thanks, sorry about that.”
“Not a problem.” Sean handed him the slips of paper. “Jessica called twice, Hodson’s Funeral Home sent a fax about the insurance papers for McCleary, that teller in the Market Street branch, oh, and somebody named Galen called. I didn’t quite catch his last name, sorry.”
“Galen Kanellis?” Nick dropped the message slips on his desk unread as thoughts of work and considerations of a hot barista disappeared right out of his head, all because of the power of one name. He had made such a fool out of himself over Galen.
“Yeah, that’s it. He didn’t wait on the line long enough for me to get the spelling of his last name. He didn’t leave a number either.”
Nick’s heart twisted, and he squashed the burgeoning hope inside of him before it could take root. He’d been down that road with Galen, and he’d crashed hard right into the wall of reality. “Okay, thanks.” Nick waved him off and stared unseeing at his desk as he remembered the last time they’d been together.
Wow. Galen Kanellis. Nick had written him off as a lost cause. It seemed like the only things they had in common were an interest in art and some fabulous sex. He had been such a sucker for those dark eyes that had held secrets Nick had never been able to get him to reveal, secrets and pain. Galen had been running from something and running hard.
“Hey, Sean. If he calls back give him my cell number.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them and reconsider. Oh, what the hell, what did it matter? It wasn’t like Galen would call twice. Of course, Nick could do it first.
Nick snorted and picked up the fax from the funeral home. No, if Galen really wanted to hook back up with him he had to show Nick. He wouldn’t accept dribbles anymore. Not after he’d already lost his heart once and had it handed back to him. Not after Galen had walked away without looking back.
He should have been used to it by now. His mom left. And she’d contacted him and his brothers later on too. Nick still didn’t understand what her motivation had been, because it hadn’t lasted a whole year before she was gone again.
He rubbed his temple when the headache threatened to return. At least Galen had given him the courtesy of honesty. He hadn’t lied and pretended to love him, then walked away after he’d gotten what he wanted. Better to lock the door on his past. Nick didn’t have the time or energy to waste on people who didn’t stick around. He wasn’t that little kid anymore to set himself up with false hope. His mom and Galen made their choices, and they had to live with them. Not him.
Nick glanced at his watch. He had enough time to call the funeral home back to give them what they needed so the family could scratch one worry off their list. That was something he could do, that and dream of Santorini with its sunsets, caldera, beaches, and wonderful food. He could almost taste the roasted leg of lamb and the pita bread slathered with taramasalata.
It was a long shot, but maybe the Dexios Collection had made its way back home somehow. All of his other leads had dried up. It wouldn’t hurt to start at the beginning, and at least he’d be doing his diving in a picturesque location this time.
Galen would look scorching hot laid out on the charter boat’s deck.
Nick growled to himself and picked up the phone. He was not going to think about him anymore.
“
W
AIT
,
a little more to the left. On the third one, the angle’s off,” Galen said as he studied the arrangement of the statues again.
Knox blew out his breath and straightened as he gestured to the other workmen. “You know, Mr. K, the first twenty times I looked at his ass I was all for this. Now, I’m too tired to admire it.”
“We’re almost done. This is the only one that’s still bugging me.” Galen watched with his arms crossed, worrying his lip as they adjusted the angle again. Knox knew what he was doing, but telling himself that didn’t make the adjustment any less nerve-racking. Nothing could happen to these statues.
Four unfinished statues, all seeming to be caught in a miderotic moment, one man who waited for his other half to complete the embrace. The bronze gleamed with a life of its own over taut muscles that looked as if they were just waiting to move again. In his head, Galen had already given the statues names: The Kiss, Fellatio, Copulation, and Afterglow.
Galen stood back after the statue was shifted and looked over the arrangement again. “I think we’ve got it this time. That’s perfect.”
Knox began picking up his equipment with a look of relief on his face, and Galen walked the room from the beginning of the exhibit to the end. He’d set up cones to take the place of the pieces that hadn’t arrived yet. Suzane would kill him when she discovered he’d gone ahead and set up the statues as the center point. She hadn’t finished her research, and the dating on the statues would take some time, but he had to see what it would look like in the room.
And he was in love.
“What do you think?” he asked Knox as the young man coiled the straps that had steadied the statues when they’d been moved.
“Oh, you already know my opinion. I just wish they’d been finished. It seems a shame to go to all the trouble to make four halves of a statue instead of four whole ones.”
“What about you, Ella?” Galen called to the only other occupant in the room, a young woman in the process of painting an Asian-themed Daughters of Sappho mural along three of the walls. Galen had been captivated by her initial designs that mixed traditional Asian style with a vibrant modern palette. To see her sketches penciled out on the walls brought a satisfied smile to his lips. He couldn’t wait to see them completed with a roomful of people admiring her hard work. This exhibit would lead to good opportunities, and not just for the museum. He just knew it.
Ella Zhu came toward them, wiping her paint-spattered hands on a rag hanging from her belt loop. She stripped off the bright cotton kerchief that protected her long links of dark braids and stuffed it in her pocket. The unusual combination of a broad nose in a round face with dusky skin and long, narrow eyes gave her an exotic look. “I think I’d like it more if they were naked women instead.” She examined the statues, walking around them with a thoughtful expression. “They’ll be popular, though. I agree with Knox, they look a little odd as they are. What was going through the sculptor’s head when he came up with these?”
“I believe they were made this way on purpose, to make people think.” Galen looked over the progression of statues, all of the same man, and most of them in naked, erotic poses that left much to the imagination.
He paused before each statue, drawn to the solitary figure and unable to explain why he evoked such an emotional response from him, aching loneliness and yearning. At times it reminded him of what he’d gone through after Bryan had died. Other times it made him remember all the good things about being in a relationship, made him long for another one.
He couldn’t seem to stop tending to the statues and fussing over them. He had to have them in his museum even if it turned out they weren’t as old as he suspected or if they were created as somebody’s idea of a joke. They were beautiful and just what this room needed. He could now picture the whole exhibit finished and ready for patrons with the smaller items ensconced behind their glassed enclosures, the statues on the low platforms, with Ella’s brilliant murals finished.
Galen stepped up to the second statue. In it the naked man stood with his legs wider apart than in the first. The lines of his muscles spoke of tension, and the corded throat with his head thrown back, the parted lips, and half-lidded eyes conveyed pleasure. His hands were outstretched low in front of him and his cock jutted out from a nest of curls. Every time Galen laid his eyes on him in that stance it brought a visceral punch of desire to his gut.
Galen imagined the man’s companion on his knees, leaning forward to take the offering. Maybe he could talk Knox into doing some of his charcoal renderings to complete the set on paper. If Galen had any of his inherited fortune left, he would give a good chunk of it to see them complete. He turned toward the third statue and heard the sound of Suzane’s heels on the hardwood floors as she entered the room.
“I hate to admit it, but they look good,” she said, her tone grudging. “I think they will really bring the display together. Now if we could just get the people at the British Museum to part with the Warren Cup for a year, I’d be the happiest woman alive.”
“Does this mean we’re not going to have an argument about them staying?” Galen crouched in front of the third statue. The man leaned on his hands and knees, back arched, buttocks clenched in midthrust. “Because I’m keeping them. Did you have any luck on the research?”
“I found some maddening, vague hints to an obscure myth about a pair of lovers who pissed off a goddess. One of them, Dexios, got turned into a statue. You know those crazy gods in mythology, always having to take matters to an extra level. Someone could’ve used the story as a basis for your hottie. If that’s the case, the timing could be right. Just do me a favor and don’t go announcing this until we know for sure.”
Suzane laid her hand on his shoulder and waited until he looked up at her. “These statues belong to somebody, and they might want them back. We should look into what legal standing we have. And if they turn out to be a big, fat joke, I don’t want to see your reputation screwed with because you let your passion overrule your judgment.”
Galen turned back and traced the intent furrow across the man’s brow. Something about Suzane’s words struck a chord deep inside him. Dexios. Why did the name sound familiar? Maybe he had heard it from Nick. He had two loves: geek stuff and wreck diving to salvage lost art. He seemed to recall Nick mentioning statues a couple of times, though Galen was pretty sure that wasn’t why it was familiar.
Nick. Thinking of him awoke the ache again. Galen would love to see Nick’s excitement over this discovery, to hear his thoughts about where they might have originated. Hell, it would be just good to talk to him, period.
“And sometimes you lose too much when you let go of passion.” He rose and shook his head. “Sorry, I don’t know where that came from.”
“Are you okay? You’ve been pretty distracted the last few days.” Suzane’s voice came from far away as Galen’s fingers dropped down to the man’s full lips and jaw. “I know this place is your life, but when was the last time you went out? Had a hot date?”
Galen shrugged and stuck his hands in his pockets. “Dating is overrated. I haven’t been able to get into it.” Meaningless sex, on the other hand… he’d gotten pretty used to those kinds of hookups. Until Nick. The man had brought feelings into the matter, and Galen had been unable to reciprocate at the time. Now that he’d regained his equilibrium again it seemed he would be paying for his sins by having Nick haunt his thoughts on a constant basis.
Suzane squeezed his arm. “It’s been almost two years since Bryan’s accident. I’m sorry I made the comment about dating. I know you can’t put a time limit on mourning, but you can start living again. Find new things to enjoy outside of your work, a hobby maybe. Hell, get a cat.”