The Year of Her Second Husband

By Jeffrey Geri

"What do you want for yourself, Julia?" her first husband Michael asks her before their marriage.

"I want to love and be loved. I want a happy home. I don't want money to be a problem. I want to feel safe.." is her reply.

Not too big a dream for a beautiful young South African girl.

But things don't quite turn out that way for Julia.

This is the story of the triumphs and pitfalls she encounters on her lifes journey, first with Michael and then with her second husband, Greek billionaire George Stavros.

Until finally, living in luxury on the verdant, Greek island in the Aegean virtually owned by her second husband, the dream that she thought had come true turns into a nightmare.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 13, 2000
• ISBN: 9781462811335

Jeffrey Geri

Jeffrey Geri practiced as an advocate at the Johannesburg Bar before his immigration to Israel. There, he was a real-estate agent, a financial planner, a travel agent, and an advertising agent. In the years prior to his death, he dedicated himself to writing fiction.

Book preview

THE YEAR

OF HER SECOND

HUSBAND

Jeffrey Geri

Copyright © 2000 by Jeffrey Geri.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-7-XLIBRIS

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 26

CHAPTER 27

EPILOGUE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I thank my wife, Wendy, for her encouragement, enthusiasm and patience while reading and rereading the book, and for helping me write about a woman. Women don’t think like that, she would enlighten me.

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO THE LEAFY NORTHERN SUBURBS OF

JOHANNESBURG, AS BEAUTIFUL NOW AS THEY EVER WERE,

AND TO THE INTOXICATING GREEK ISLANDS,

PARTICULARLY THE GREEN AND SENSUOUS ISLAND OF SKIATHOS.

CHAPTER 1

It all started the morning she became aware of the German girls. Julia Stavros sat on the terrace of her luxury apartment at the Stavros Splendide Hotel stretching her toes and sipping her first cup of coffee of the day, strong with a drop of milk and no sugar. Her bare feet rested on a low green marble topped table. She looked down at the thin strip of beach and looking glass sea below her, deserted save for two slim blonde girls, whom Julia recognised as being guests at the hotel, German girls she remembered, and new arrivals. In thonged bikini bottoms and no tops, they tossed a large pink and white plastic ball back and forth to each other, their breasts bobbing and their laughter rising over the sprawling, still dozing resort owned by George Stavros, Julia’s second husband.

Verdant gardens, a heart-shaped swimming pool, tennis courts, beach bungalows and separate duplex apartments were scattered round a central five-storey, white mosaic-covered hotel, built up the slope of a pine covered hill. Julia’s terrace jutted out of the second floor above the beach like the prow of a ship. The soft yellow sand, bordered by low green scrub, stretched for about half a kilometre between two rocky outcrops that formed a natural and sheltered bay. There were many bays like it on Stavros Island, named after Julia’s husband, who owned almost everything on it.

This bay was distinguished by a tall phallic-shaped rock, smooth on the beach side and rough and craggy on the other, that rose out of the sea about fifty metres from the beach like a beacon. Stavros’ Phallus she’d always thought would have been the appropriate name for it, but the map of amenities prepared by the hotel for its guests referred to it prosaically as Stavros’ Rock.

Built around it, out of wood which over the years had become grey and chipped, was a skirt-like circular swimming platform.

On the other side of the scrub stood Stavros’ royal blue executive jet, waiting to fly important guests to or from the hotel or whisk Stavros off to a business meeting or an assignation of some other kind in Athens, Paris, London or Rome.

Bordering the landing strip were shimmering olive trees, clumps of pine and dark clusters of cypresses.

Julia loved the early mornings on the island—the quiet, the cool breeze, the soft light and the aquamarine of the Aegean stretching out to the distant looming dark mountains and faint pink outlines of the mainland.

In an hour, striped mauve and yellow beach chairs and orange sunshades would be laid out by Andreas in a neat row from one end of the beach to the other, while Kostas at the hotel water- sports centre at the far end hauled out his speedboats, windsurfing boards, jet skis and other equipment. Two beach-side tavernas, the Cyclades and the Sporades, both of which belonged to the Stavros Splendide, would soon ready themselves for their first guests, those staying at the hotel and the holiday-makers who would arrive in overloaded caiques from the bustling main town and harbour about a half an hour’s boat ride away. In the meantime, apart from the laughter of the two German girls, all was still. The scent of pine and wild sage wafted up to the terrace.

Kostas, in his late twenties, with dimples, a shy smile and the features, torso and limbs of a classic Greek athlete, ran the water sports centre, and Andreas, fortyish, scrawny and withered, with a cat-like gait—he never walked, he prowled—was Stavros’ partner in the deck chair business. Stavros called them his partners. In fact neither of them really were, but they shared in the profits of their respective enterprises, because Stavros believed that people worked harder with a stake in what they were doing.

The two girls untied their thonged bikini bottoms and ran hand in hand into the sea, where they playfully splashed each other and swam out to beyond their depth, the outlines of their still pale bodies clearly visible through the limpid water. They weren’t supposed to be completely nude on this beach, but they must have assumed it was too early for them to be seen.

Julia wondered whether she had ever been as young and carefree. At their age she’d already been married for years. She recalled with sadness her own strict upbringing, her unkind father and complaining, dissatisfied mother.

The German girls strode out of the sea—they had beautiful firm, pink-tipped breasts—put on their thongs, dried themselves, and lay face down on their towels. They had beautiful buttocks too, rounded and gleaming white in the early sunlight. Julia noticed with slight irritation that they were using hotel bath towels which should not have been taken out of the rooms.

Julia opened the neck of her negligee and pulled the hem up to the top of her thighs. Her smooth brown legs were firm and shapely. A ballet dancer’s legs, although she hadn’t danced since she was a young girl.

Wondering when Stavros would return from his cruise, she heard the phone ring and went inside to answer it … Stavros calling from the yacht. He sounded tired. His voice, like his face, rough and authoritative.

Good morning, my love, he said.

It is a lovely morning, Stavros.

Julia, I am phoning to remind you we have guests for dinner on the yacht tonight.

I remembered, Stavros.

Tell Aristotle to make sure that Kostas cleans the speedboat. He will be taking the guests out to the yacht with it tonight and it should be clean and shiny. And maybe Aristotle should also tell Kostas to have a haircut.

I’ll tell him.

She didn’t think Kostas needed a haircut—she liked his hair long—but the speedboat did need a good scrub.

When will you be back?

Later this morning.

How was the cruise?

Very good, Julia. Very good.

Bye, Stavros.

Bye, my love.

Aristotle, the General Manager of the hotel, wouldn’t yet be in his office. He came in late because he claimed that his work never ended until late at night when it was time for him to go to bed. A fifty-year-old bachelor, with a round friendly face, sad eyes and thick curly black hair, he lived in one of the duplex apartments near the pool. Julia often wondered whether he was gay.

Back on the terrace, she saw that the German girls were now lying on their backs, the plastic ball between them, their heads resting on the towels they were not supposed to have taken from their rooms.

Time to make herself another cup of coffee and to order her breakfast. Julia went to the kitchen, used only to make coffee and store Stavros’ ouzo, milk, wine, ice and cool drinks, and on the way stopped to examine herself in the mirror hanging in the hall. She opened her negligee further and was pleased by what she saw. At thirty-six, her neck, chest and shoulders were still creamy and smooth, her breasts—Stavros’ little doves as he called them— high, and firm.

She had to stretch to get a full view. The mirror should have been a little lower. But then tall, sixty-five-year-old Stavros would have had to stoop in order to see himself.

She also saw an oval, fair-skinned face, framed by shiny auburn hair hanging loose down to her shoulders. She thought her green, almond-shaped, often rather anxious eyes were too deep set (although some said they were her best feature) and her nose a touch too long. She smiled, just testing. Her smile, though cautious, lit up her face.

For a moment she thought of Howard, and then dismissed him from her mind. It was too gentle a morning.

She made the coffee and phoned through to the dining room, ordering orange juice, a soft-boiled egg, buttered toast and marmalade. She had taught the kitchen staff how to make a soft-boiled egg and to toast a slice of bread exactly as she liked it, which they sometimes did and sometimes didn’t. She had almost lost hope of finding real marmalade—with the rinds—when the harbour supermarket, also owned by Stavros and run by his cousin, ordered a stock especially for her from the united Kingdom.

Reminding herself to deliver Stavros’ message, she called Aristotle’s office.

The General Manager’s office, Marlena, his secretary, answered.

A baby-faced young Greek girl, she’d been recruited by Aristotle from Athens, where she had worked for the Grande Bretagne. Enticed to the island by the prospect of meeting eligible young male guests from the UK, Germany and Scandinavia, faced with the competition from the beach she hadn’t had much luck so far. Julia felt sorry for her. Terrified of Stavros’ sister Maria—who wasn’t?— Marlena’s muddy skin paled whenever Stavros’ sister came near her.

Good morning, Marlena, Julia said. This is Mrs Stavros speaking. Is Aristotle there?

No. He hasn’t come in yet, Mrs Stavros.

Well, when he comes in please tell him to remind Kostas to clean the speedboat and to have a haircut.

To have a haircut?

Yes. Stavros said Kostas should have a haircut. We have important guests for dinner tonight and Kostas will be taking them out to the yacht.

I’ll tell Aristotle, Mrs Stavros.

Julia returned to the terrace. The German girls had gone, leaving the beach deserted except for Andreas, who stood at the edge of the sea, his greasy brown hair down to his shoulders, the top of his buttocks sticking out of his minute bathing trunks, urinating into the water.

A knock on the door announced the arrival of Dimitri with her breakfast. How long had he been knocking? From the terrace you could hardly hear. She let him in and he followed her outside. She touched the egg and it was cold. She removed the napkin covering the toast. The toast looked as if it had been taken out of the freezer.

Please, Dimitri, she said. Take it back and bring me another egg and fresh toast. You can leave the orange juice.

Perhaps a little younger than Kostas, Dimitri was equally handsome, slighter, with wide doe-like eyes which he now rolled in exasperation. He wasn’t to blame. The breakfast had been cold before leaving the kitchen.

I’m sorry, Mrs Stavros.

I know it’s not your fault, Dimitri.

She noticed a brown stain on the sleeve of his white jacket.

And by the way, your jacket is dirty, Dimitri, she said. I think you should change it.

It only happened this morning, Mrs Stavros. It’s coffee.

Did you ring the bell ?" she asked kindly.

The bell doesn’t work, Mrs Stavros.

Well, when you’re downstairs, be a dear and tell maintenance to come up and look at it.

She knew that the staff disliked it when she drew their attention to lapses in their dress, in the quality of their service, and in their conduct towards guests. But she had no choice. Although Maria thought otherwise and did not want her to interfere, Julia felt that as Stavros’ wife it was her duty.

While sipping her orange juice, she paged through the blueprint of the new brochure that the Athens-based advertising agency was producing for the hotel.

Let me do something useful, she’d suggested to Stavros when hearing he planned to print a new brochure. I can check the English and make sure there are no mistakes.

The old brochure had been riddled with errors.

Fine, Julia. Make yourself useful.

From then on the proofs had been sent to her and the English was now perfect. But in her opinion the brochure could have been far better. There were too many photographs of Aristotle. He popped up in almost every picture, flexing his muscles at the pool, standing with his hands in his pockets in the lobby, and looking like a real amateur on the tennis court, clearly holding a racket for the first time in his life. She also thought it a pity they couldn’t have some photos of bare-breasted girls in the brochure, a feature of the resort.

The beach had started to fill up and the two German girls had returned, sitting just below her on deck chairs with their backs to the sea, their eyes closed against the sun, German magazines and bottles of spring water on the sand beside them.

Again Dimitri knocked—the breakfast better but Dimitri’s new jacket, although clean, had been taken out of the laundry unironed, badly creased and still damp.

Having finished her breakfast, she put the tray outside the apartment door, phoned down to the kitchen to ask them to send someone upstairs to collect it, and took another cup of coffee outside.

The terrace was like a botanical garden, with plants transported by Stavros from all over the world—illegal in all likelihood, but Stavros did it nevertheless. Stavros liked to care for them himself. He named each plant: Queen Beatrix from Holland, Simone Signoret from France, Princess Di from England and even a thorny Winnie Mandela from South Africa.

Can I fix you a drink, my sweet Beatrix?

Here, let me make you comfortable, my darling Simone.

Today is the day for your trim, my beautiful Di.

He would coo to them while quenching their thirst, patting down the earth in their earthenware pots, many of which had been filched from famous archaeological sites, and gently pruning them of dry or redundant leaves and shoots.

The plants flourished.

She ran her bath. It was tricky. At times there was hot water, often so hot it came out in gusts of steam, and at other times none at all. Today it came out in a luke-warm trickle. The vagaries of the plumbing didn’t bother Stavros. He preferred a cold shower.

That night Stavros was entertaining business associates, and she would be expected to play her role as mogul wife and gracious hostess. The guests would be flown in from Athens for dinner on the yacht—a short half an hour’s flight—and afterwards flown back. Stavros hadn’t yet told her who they were.

The food, together with barman and waiters, would be provided by the best restaurant on the island, in which Stavros was also a partner. There was nothing for her to do. Even the floral arrangements were being attended to. She was sorry, she would have liked to have been involved. She could have done the flowers. Every young South African girl had been taught by her mother how to arrange a beautiful bowl of flowers.

She remembered her servants, Agatha, Emma and Joshua, happily chattering and sometimes singing and harmonising the way the Africans did, while sitting on the lawn in Johannesburg polishing the silver for a dinner party. By the time they set the table, the cutlery, candlesticks, butter bowls and place card holders would be glittering.

Agatha had been a superb cook. She and Julia were an excellent team, planning every event down to the last detail, deciding on the menu, the ingredients and the logistics. They agreed where Joshua should stand, and determined which uniform he should wear and whether he needed help or could manage on his own. Agatha would prepare the dinner, sometimes langoustine, crayfish or lobster, and at others cornish hen, chicken done in various ways, roast beef or rack of lamb. Her creme brule and cherries jubilee were legendary. over the years Agatha had taught her many of the recipes, and Julia would have liked to have cooked some of them for Stavros. When she’d suggested it after arriving on the island, he’d said, Why should you have to cook, my love? "

But I want to, Stavros, she replied.

No, Julia, he said. You never cooked in South Africa (not entirely true; on Agatha’s nights off Julia had often made dinner for herself and her first husband Michael ), and I don’t want you to have to cook here.

She’d dropped it.

Julia was sure that at the dinner that night the fare would be lavish and not restricted to what was available on the island. Stavros often arranged for his favourite seafood to be flown in from Athens and, if necessary, dispatched his own plane to fetch it. She wondered what they would be having, and hoped there would be langoustine, prepared the way she liked it, piping hot in garlic and butter.

The previous winter, at a restaurant in Knightsbridge, Julia had ordered langoustine. The price was outrageous. When Stavros saw the size of the portion he’d called the manager.

Please, Stavros. Don’t make a fuss, Julia said.

When the manager arrived at their table, Stavros snapped, This is bait, not langoustine. Double the helping at the same price or I will buy this restaurant and fire you on the spot.

The manager hastened to comply. When Stavros wanted something he got it.

Adding bath oil and bubble bath to her bathwater, she took off her negligee and stepped in. Her pretty breasts floated above the foam and she soaped herself lightly between her thighs. The bathroom was magnificent, covered in smoky green Italian marble with gold-plated fittings and a sunken circular marble tub almost large enough to swim in. She wished Stavros was in it with her. She wiggled her toes and imagined them creeping through the luke-warm water towards his groin.

Through the bathroom window she heard the sounds of the resort outside, the whirring of jet-ski engines and the chugging of taxi boats. She could even hear the clink of ice on glass. Someone was making an early start that morning. Her bath now cold, she added some more luke-warm water.

She stepped out of the bath, wrapped herself in a towel and took another cup of coffee outside.

Jet skis streaked around the bay. Boats and boards dotted the horizon with their brightly coloured fin-like sails. A caique had just arrived, and its passengers walked up and down the beach in search of vacant chairs and shade. Young people crowded around

Stavros’ Phallus. A long-haired boy, supported by his friends tried to scale its smooth surface.

A care-free scene that repeated itself day after day throughout the summer. She told herself she should be doing more to enjoy it.

She was a woman who needed friends and, apart from Rose who owned the hotel boutique, she hadn’t any on the island. Her loneliness made her dwell on the past. She had to do something to snap out of it. Find some friends.

Rose wasn’t a real friend. Busy all day in the boutique and dancing every night in the disco with one of the unattached male guests, she rarely had time for Julia. A tall blond divorcee from Leeds, Rose had come to the newly-opened hotel to think about her future, seen the boutique premises, as yet unoccupied, and immediately rented them. She’d had no experience in running a business. Her shop was so crowded with merchandise you could barely move. She stocked swimwear for men, women and children, straw hats, peaks, anti-sun lotions, sun-tan creams and cosmetics. Her shelves were packed with gifts and souvenirs—ceramic plates, prints of the Greek Islands, wallets, purses and tee-shirts. Postcard display stands crowded the entrance. Her fastest selling items, she confided to Julia, were the condoms she kept stacked in the drawer of her desk.

Rose had guts. Julia had to hand it to her.

Where could she find someone on the island with whom she could establish a real friendship? Possibly in one of the villas Stavros had built on the shore and sold to European and English families who, year after year, came out for the summer. She really had to try harder.

Maybe she could take up painting or photography.

She missed Charlie.

In the summer Stavros would bring over his five vice-presidents from the head office in London, and they’d keep in touch with his vast empire from the island. They and their families and secretaries were accommodated in the apartments and the beach bungalows.

Charlie, one of the vice-presidents—a Greek who’d grown up in Canada—had become Julia’s friend. Seeing her on her own at the pool looking a little lost, he’d come over to her and invited her to join him and his family. Tall, with an open smile and tanned good looks, he’d reminded her of her brother Nick.

An MBA from Harvard, with a pretty American wife and two small daughters, Charlie always sought her out, finding the time to exchange a bit of gossip and keeping her up to date with the latest company news. She’d often join the young executive and his family at the pool, and when Stavros was away they’d all eat together in the hotel dining room.

I need more people like Charlie, Stavros told Julia at the beginning of the friendship. At that stage he still had a high regard for him.

Charlie disliked and feared Stavros’ sister and secretary Maria— The battle-axe, he called her.

She resents me, he told Julia, because I’ve become so close to Stavros. And I think she would like to do me harm.

Maria was also in charge of personnel. It was Charlie who told Julia that the telephone operators had instructions from her to listen in and report to her on all the staff’s external telephone calls, incoming and outgoing.

How do you know? she asked, shocked.

I can’t disclose how I know, Charlie replied. "but believe me, it’s true. She probably monitors your calls too. I’d be careful if I were you.

Does Stavros know?

I wonder. In any case it would be something that he wouldn’t concern himself with. He doesn’t like to be bothered with what he refers to as ‘small details, ‘and he doesn’t like to interfere with Maria. If Maria thinks it’s a good idea, Stavros wouldn’t contradict her.

She’d thought of raising the matter with Stavros—it was disgusting—but, unsure as to how he would react, she decided to leave it and just be careful when using the phone. Apart from Nickand Howard she had no one to phone anyway. She would have to be particularly careful when talking to Howard.

One day Charlie disappeared, and after a search had been found dead further up the coast, with a deep gash in his head. The police assumed he had dived into the sea somewhere and hit his head on a rock. His wife and children were inconsolable.

Julia tried to help by looking after the two little girls. Within a few days the bereaved family returned to America.

When Julia told Stavros how sad she was, he’d said, "I discovered he was stealing from me, Julia. Selling company secrets to my competitors. Maria found out. I would have had to dismiss him. Even call in the police. So it’s too bad that he’s