What is a nice girl like you doing with an awful boy like that?

The apartment was like a stage set. She thought the furniture looked like Louis XVI but she wasn’t sure it was authentic.

LOVE MATCH BY ANNA SEQUOIA 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 93

“Don’t be intimidated,” Alexandros said as he unlocked the door. “They keep this place so my grandmother can rest when she’s in the city shopping.” The shades were down and the room was dark but as Alexandros turned on one lamp and then another the apartment took on a watery glow from the pale-blue silk-covered walls sparked by elaborate gilt moldings.

At that moment, at least, she didn’t feel intimidated. The apartment was like a stage set. She thought the furniture looked like Louis XVI but she wasn’t sure it was authentic.

Alexandros’s grandfather came in looking old and tired but with the ease of a man who has gotten almost everything in life he ever wanted. He was shorter than his grandson, burly without being fat. He introduced himself to Margaret as though she would not know who he was. She suddenly …