Meridio's Daughter Part 25

Mahogany and Cinnamon stood there, their tail nubs twitching *back and forth. Casey wondered in her heart if she and Tessa would ever return here together. It would never be the same, she would never be the same, and the ache in her heart was so intense that she wanted to lie down and die.

Tears filled her eyes and she brusquely wiped them away. She refused to cry anymore, not in front of Tessa. If Tessa could be strong and heartless, she could be, too. She pulled the door closed, and Casey walked to the waiting automobile.

The moment they walked into the house, Olympia knew something went wrong between the two women. It was obvious they had been crying, and the pained expressions on their faces were like matching bookends.

"Your father is away for the rest of the week, miss. He asked that you ring him at this number should you need him," Olympia said."Thank you, Olympia. Will you excuse me please? I have a headache, and I think I'd just like to lie down for a while."

"Of course, miss. Perhaps some of the Kare's tea?"

Casey raised a pain-filled glance in Tessa's direction. "No, I think I'll just ride this one out."

Tessa stood beside her mother, silently watching as Casey walked the flight of stairs to her room. Olympia made sure she heard the door to Casey's room close shut before she spoke.

"Tessa, what have you done?"

Many years pa.s.sed since Olympia saw her daughter cry, but Tessa sobbed into her mother's arms as she did twenty years earlier. Olympia couldn't get a straight answer from Tessa as to what happened over the weekend, so she held her and petted her and let the tears flow until Tessa had no more left in her.

"Do you love her?" Olympia asked.

"With all my heart. It's circ.u.mstances...Casey can't be with who I am right now," Tessa said as honestly as she could.

"You need to leave this life. We need to leave this place, you and I and Casey. You need to take her somewhere far away where Andreas Meridio cannot find you."

*"It's not that easy. I can't just ask Casey to give up her life for me, to leave everything she knows."

"Would Casey go if you asked her?" Olympia pushed harder.

"Yes," Tessa said in defeat, running her fingers through her hair. "Yes, I believe she would."

"Does this life hold that much for you then that you would give up this chance at happiness? With a woman as wonderful as Casey?"

"You don't understand." Tessa hissed. "It's just not as easy as all that." Tessa walked into the guesthouse bedroom, effectively ending the conversation.

"Nothing is ever that hard, little one," Olympia whispered to the empty room, "if you want it badly enough."

A knock at her door brought Casey out of her thoughts.

"Yes?"

Olympia opened the door, carrying a small tray with a pot of tea. She deposited it on the table where Casey sat, and Casey noticed the koulourakia, small decorative sweet rolls.

"I brought you some hot tea with a few herbs in it to ease the headache. Probably due to stress, eh?" Olympia stroked Casey's head.Casey looked up at Olympia and saw it so plainly. They were indeed Tessa's eyes looking back at her. Casey's eyes filled with tears, and they spilled down her cheeks.

"Tessa told me who you are...I'm so sorry, Olympia."

"Nonsense. Come here, little one." Olympia sat on the sofa and patted the s.p.a.ce next to her.

Casey sat tentatively next to Olympia. When Olympia gently placed her arm around Casey, it loosened a new flood of tears, and Casey was soon sobbing into the woman's arms just as Tessa did earlier.

"My father ruined your life," Casey began.

"Ca.s.sandra...Casey, look at me." Casey looked up and Olympia lightly kissed her forehead. "I'm going to tell you the same thing I told you when you were seven years old. Remember the summer you refused to wear a s.h.i.+rt because the boys went 00.

*around without theirs on? You wanted to prove they were no better than you."

Casey smiled weakly at the memory. She remembered distinctly Olympia chasing her around to put a blouse on her.

When Olympia finally caught up with her, she sat Casey down and had a sincere talk with her about the birds and the bees and why boys and girls were different.

"And when you still complained, do you remember what I told you?" Olympia asked.

Casey's smile was tinged with sadness as she nodded. "That's just the way life is," she repeated the words from so long ago.

Olympia wrapped strong arms around Casey. "Well, that's just the way life is, Casey. If you want to experience the good, you have to be willing to accept the bad, as well. Tell me something, little one...do you love Tessa?"

Casey was surprised and a little embarra.s.sed at confessing her feelings for Tessa to the woman's mother, of all people. "I-I..."

she stammered.

Olympia chuckled at Casey. "I'm not a fool. I think I knew before the two of you did. That day when you met, it seems a hundred years ago now, doesn't it? Through all of Tessa's grief over her father, every day, she would ask about you. When your mother took you away and Tessa went off to school, her letters would always ask if I had heard from you or your mother yet. I'll never forget the day you saw her in the kitchen. You were just becoming a teenager, and she was a young woman of the world, but if you could have seen how her heart broke when she realized you didn't remember her. I think it was fated before the two of you were born that you would be together someday, in some way."

"I do love her, Olympia," Casey admitted. "I love her so much it hurts. I can't be with her...not..." Casey paused, unsure of how to explain herself or the rift between she and Tessa.

"I told you I wasn't a fool," Olympia said to the sudden silence.

"I think I know what has come between you. I think I've known what Tessa had planned all along, but I didn't want to believe it. I want to believe it even less now. I find it hard to accept, knowing how much your heart means to her, that she would choose revenge 0.

*over your love."

Casey underestimated Olympia all these years. She was wise beyond Casey's understanding. She knew her daughter and what Tessa was about better than Casey did.

"Things change, little one. Don't give up on Tessa's heart just yet."

Casey slowly opened the door to her father's office and peeked in. Tessa's voice could be heard from the other side of the door, and Casey wondered who her unfortunate victim was.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n it, Alex, see that they sign it this time. You tell those a.s.sholes that if I have to come down there, it will be a sorry day for them. Go on, get out of here." Tessa growled.

Alex walked to the door just as Casey was pus.h.i.+ng it open.

He rolled his eyes to Casey, and she smiled, laying a gentle hand on his arm as he pa.s.sed by. Her look said she was sorry.

Casey stepped into view, and the hard lines in Tessa's face softened when she looked up at Casey.

"Is your head feeling better?" Tessa asked.

"Yes, thanks."

Tessa rose and moved to the other side of the desk. Standing in front of Casey, she tried to touch her, but Casey pulled back.

The hurt in Tessa's eyes was mirrored within Casey's.

"I do love you, Niko, that hasn't changed, perhaps it never will. But if you choose to follow this path, I...I can't be with you...

I can't be your lover."

"He killed my father, Casey," Tessa said pa.s.sionately. "He deserves to be dead."

"I'm not sure I disagree with you," Casey said. Tessa raised surprised eyes in Casey's direction. "The things he's done are unforgivable, and you have every right to wish him dead, but it's not up to us to play G.o.d. We aren't the ones who should be judging whether he lives or dies...it's not our place."

"I'm making it my place." Tessa growled.

A few more moments of silence reigned before Casey gave voice to what they both knew would come next.

"I do hope that once the hahre is repaid, your life becomes 0.

*everything you wish it to be. But if you go ahead with this plan of revenge, I won't ever be able to share that life with you."

"So be it," Tessa lashed out with words to hurt in the same manner that she was hurting.

"So that's the way it's to be with us then?" Casey asked with a cold edge to her voice.

"That's the way it's to be, Ms. Meridio," Tessa returned just as callously before walking out the door and leaving Casey standing in the middle of the room looking very much like that scared, confused child from so long ago.

0.

Chapter 18.

The standoff lasted for three days, each woman carefully avoiding the other. Casey sequestered herself in her room, preparing for the first phase of the dig to begin. She e-mailed and called, but it was soon apparent that she would have to start spending time in Athens. She hated the idea for more than one reason. Athens would always remind her of Tessa, and the only apartment she had was the one that belonged to Tessa .

Casey also thought a lot about her father, wondering when the moment would come. Would Tessa put a bullet in his brain as she'd demonstrated that day they were on the boat? She said that was the only way a real gangster would kill a man, when he could see it coming. She pondered on the man that, she realized now, she barely knew. Actually, she didn't know him at all. She came to realize he was the kind of man who could kill in cold blood without a thought or a trace of guilt. If her father ever felt remorse over his crimes, he didn't show it. He killed Tessa's father right in front of her, then had the audacity to hire her later, saying it wasn't personal, it was just business. What kind of a monster does that? Tessa kept herself just as preoccupied behind Meridio's office door. She worked long hours, then shut herself up in the guesthouse, usually drinking until she fell asleep. The previous night, she got so drunk that Alex had to carry her from the Kastro back home. She felt like she was being torn in two. Her love for 0.

*Casey and her thirst for revenge were pulling her in opposite directions.

Tessa rose and walked to the safe and deposited the books and the money as she did every evening. She was leaving when Casey walked into the office, nearly colliding with Tessa.

"I'm sorry, but I needed to speak with you a moment," Casey said, wondering how the two of them could be so distant when they'd made love only a few days before.

Tessa stopped and Casey realized Tessa was waiting for her to continue.

"I...I guess I just want to know if I..." Casey paused and searched the blue eyes, looking for some signs of the lover she knew. What she saw were eyes that were as filled with pain as her own. "I guess I need to know if I should look for a different apartment in Athens or-"

"That apartment is yours to do with as you wish. I'd like to think you would still use it. I have an old friend who takes care of the place. At least I know you'd be safe there," Tessa said.

"Thank you," Casey said softly, not knowing what else to say.

"Thank you," she repeated, then turned and left the room.

"You're welcome," Tessa whispered to an empty room.

Looking down at her hands, she realized that they were clenched into fists to keep them from shaking.

"Alex!" Tessa called sharply out the door.

He showed up immediately. "What's up?"

"Come on." Tessa growled impatiently.

"Where are we going?" Alex asked, pulling on his jacket.

"To get drunk."

Casey hadn't been sleeping well, so when the pounding on her door began, she jumped up to see who it was. Pulling open the heavy wooden door, Casey found Alex nervously s.h.i.+fting from foot to foot.

"Please, miss, I need your help...it's the Kare. "

"I'll be right out," Casey said as she closed the door. She threw on a pair of jeans and a sweats.h.i.+rt and reopened the door.

Alex quickly told her, as she followed him downstairs, about 0.

*the fights Tessa had been in at more than one bar that evening.

"She's in the dining room. She has one of her guns out and she's playing Russian roulette with it."

"Dear G.o.d!" Casey rushed into the dining room to find Tessa loading another bullet into the thirty-eight's chamber.

Casey walked to the table and placed her hand over Tessa's.

Tessa looked up, and for a second, Casey didn't think Tessa was going to recognize her. Tessa blinked hard twice, then recognition dawned.

"Please, Niko...don't do this," Casey pleaded softly. It was the first time she used the nickname since their estrangement.

"It's okay," Tessa slurred, holding up a bullet. "I only used two.""Please put away your gun...it scares me."

As she looked into Casey's eyes, Tessa knew that she was the cause of the pain that both women were experiencing. She looked back down at the small hand that covered hers and the tears returned, the ones she couldn't keep from shedding lately.

"I'm sorry," she murmured. Looking up at Casey, she tried to convey the depth of her emotion through her eyes. "I'm so sorry,"

she rasped.

Casey could barely stand to watch the woman she loved fall apart in front of her. She slipped an arm around Tessa's shoulders, and Tessa leaned her head against Casey's body. With her other hand, Casey easily slipped the pistol from her grasp.