Page 20 of Marcellus: House of Drakos

First they had to drive through a massive amount of reporters and photographers that were camped in front of the tall security gate that was manned by armed guards. Savannah was confused. “What’s happened? Why are all of these reporters around here?”

Olivier looked at her. “You’re joking right?”

Savannah found that question insulting. “Why would I be joking?” But as soon as she answered his question with a question, she remembered. “Oh,” she said.

There had been countless news reports about mechanical issues with some Drakos planes over the last few months, and she’d heard about that horrific crash that killed everybody onboard.

But she never even considered the fact that the media would stake out Niko’s father’s house because of those issues.

But she now realized why wouldn’t they? Niko’s father was, after all, the owner of the company.

It stood to reason that they would want to blame him.

But to deal with that crisis, and also Niko’s situation (whatever it was since she still didn’t know), sounded insane to Savannah.

She wondered if the media was there because of Niko too.

Maybe there was breaking news about Niko while she was on her computer looking for employment. It was all so surreal to Savannah.

But once they were able to get past the media, who had to keep their distance on the public street and could not touch the Drakos private property, they drove up to the security gate. Once it opened, she quickly forgot that media. She was blown away by what she was seeing.

After the tall security gate opened, a gate manned by armed guards, it opened to the front of a mansion that took up what looked like five city lots, with a beautiful limestone front, with wraparound porches on all three levels, perfectly manicured trees on either side of the long road that led up to a huge, decorative fountain in the middle of the circular driveway.

It was beyond anything Savannah had ever seen before.

She knew Marcellus Drakos was a billionaire. But when they met in Niko’s penthouse eight years ago, it was easy for her to forget his status. But seeing how he actually lived changed all that. There was no forgetting a status that grand.

By the time the bodyguard opened the back passenger door and helped her out, and Olivier walked around and escorted her to the tall front entrance doors, she could feel herself trying to shake.

But she shook it off. She was doing him a favor, not the other way around.

She was there to answer his questions and, hopefully, to see that Niko had survived whatever he was caught up in.

She wasn’t about to let her nerves get the best of her.

Besides, a part of her was hoping Niko would be back to himself again and could defy Alberto’s decree and get her job back. And that Marcellus would have forgotten he’d ever met her.

When she walked through that front door just ahead of Olivier and saw marbled floors and what looked like a grand rotunda that she often saw in a courthouse somewhere, and a pure-gold triple staircase, her mind slipped right past Niko and focused on the beauty before her.

She’d never seen anything like it. She’d seen rich folks before, and their houses, but this was another world of rich.

“Madam? Madam?”

She didn’t realize Bernard was standing there calling her until he walked up closer to her.

“Oh I’m sorry. Yes?”

“Right this way please.”

She glanced at Olivier. He nodded. “I know. My father is a bit extra in his decorative tastes.”

“It’s not extra,” Savannah felt a need to say, as if his father needed her defense. “It’s beautiful. I was blown away by the beauty of it.”

Olivier didn’t respond, as if he agreed to disagree with her definition of beauty. But then he motioned with his hand that she should follow Bernard.

“Right,” she said, remembering the friendly-looking black man in front of her. With Olivier walking behind her, she followed the man beyond the foyer, down a long hall, and into a sitting room. Or parlor. Or whatever they called it since she was only guessing its name.

But inside that sitting room was a man seated on the middle of a sofa with his legs crossed and both arms spread out across the back of the sofa.

If any man could have looked better than the man that seated on that sofa she wouldn’t believe it.

He was gorgeous. Just everything about him fit gorgeousness.

From his thick brown hair that sat on top of his head as if he was Robert Redford in his prime, to the wide jaw and deep, cobalt-blue eyes that pierced her presence as if he knew all her secrets even from across the room.

That was Marcellus. He looked a bit older, but still every bit as gorgeous.

Her heart began to soar. Just seeing him again relaxed her.

She somehow knew, though everything was bad, with him in charge it was all going to be alright.

“Need me for anything else, Dad?” Olivier asked as he looked beyond Savannah.

“No.”

“I’ll be in the family room if you need me,” Olivier said to his father, then he gave Savannah a polite smile and eased out of the room, closing the double doors behind him and effectively closing her in.

“Come. Sit down,” Marcellus said to her.

He didn’t take his eyes off of her, which made her extremely uncomfortable, as she walked to the wing-backed chair that sat in front of the sofa.

She immediately felt underdressed. He was in a suit and tie, even in his own home, while she wore bike shorts and t-shirt and sneakers.

She had to remind herself that she was doing him a favor.

He wanted to stare: let him stare. But she wasn’t going to lose her lunch over it.

But Marcellus wasn’t staring at her for the hell of it.

He was wondering within himself if she knew something about his son’s abduction.

If she could be helpful to him. Or a problem.

He was remembering her and how she felt in his arms. “What’s your name?

” he asked her as if he hadn’t remembered her at all.

Savannah was a little disappointed, but she didn’t let it show. “My name is Savannah Richardson.”

Savannah smile. Didn’t he know it! She wore a bang like a kid would wear, he noticed, but it still couldn’t hide the fact that she was no kid anymore.

Black didn’t crack, and she was a testament to that fact, but the seriousness of her look, and the sophistication of it, solidified her years.

She would be thirty-seven now, and it showed.

Certainly younger than he was, but no spring chicken herself.

He also understood, just looking into her face, why his daughter Kalayna insisted that she was not the kind of woman to play games.

That she was a serious sister, as Kalayna put it.

He saw that too. Just like it saw it back then. “Niko fired you.”

Semantics again. She almost just wanted to say yes. But she had to quantify it. “I was fired by his company, but yes.”

“Why did he fire you?”

“First of all he didn’t fire me. His fashion director did. And second of all I was fired for no good reason.”

“You realize everybody says that.”

“Yes, I know. But in my case it’s the truth.”

Marcellus found himself unable to take his eyes off of her.

It was as if she fascinated him all over again.

There was nothing about her that stood out in his mind, but yet everything about her stood out.

The way she sat straight-back and proud.

The way she showed not a single sign of intimidation.

That rarely ever happened. Everybody were intimidated by him.

It pleased him to see that she wasn’t everybody.

That there was something so very authentic about her just as it had been eight years ago.

“So you were the perfect little secretary for my son, were you?”

“I was nowhere near perfect, no sir. I’ll never tell that lie. But did I work my butt off for him? Yes I did. Did I advise him and stick by him through thick and thin? Yes I did.”

“Did he fire you? Yes he did.”

Savannah was about to set that man straight again, making clear that Niko never fired her but his company did.

But she was beginning to realize just how right Tyla had been.

It was just semantics. If his company fired her, then he fired her, plain and simple.

Even his father saw that. She decided to move on.

“I assume you wanted me to come here because you found out something about Niko.”

“Did Olivier not tell you?”

“He said I’d get the full story when I got here. To your house.” She looked around at the crystal chandeliers. “If you can call this palace a house.”

If Marcellus wasn’t so worried about Niko, he would have smiled. She certainly had that upfront way about her he still liked. But he was worried about Niko. “My son has been kidnapped, Miss Richardson.”

“Kidnapped?” Savannah’s eyes stretched wide in disbelief and her heart dropped. “Oh my God!” Her face turned into a mask of distress right before Marcellus’s very eyes. “Are you sure?”

He nodded his head. Her face looked like he felt inside. “Yes, we’re sure.”

“But why? And by whom?”

“We don’t know the details. That’s why I summoned you here. I thought you could help.”

“Me?” She shook her head. “I can’t imagine anybody wanting to do something like that to Niko.

I mean, he had his rivalries with fellow designers and his issues with various models who wanted him for themselves, but nothing that would lead somebody to kidnap him.

Oh my Lord. This is awful. This is just awful, Mr. Drakos! ”