Vengeful Love: Black Diamonds Page 23

  “Already? We’ve only just gotten engaged.”

  “Well, she thinks she could pull something together soon, like in a month.”

  “A month? That’s insane.”

  “Hey.” He holds my chin. “I waited long enough to find you, Scarlett Heath, I don’t want to wait any longer to make you mine. Please don’t fight me on this.”

  I can’t resist his plea and my head is really too busy to start fretting about anything else. “I’ll meet with her,” I tell him. But I’m not conceding.

  “Good. The other thing is, you need a dress for the charity gala on Thursday.”

  “Oh, crap, yes, I forgot about that.”

  “I’ve made an appointment for you with Julia and Lucas tomorrow.”

  “Gregory, I don’t need another new dress. I can’t buy something new every time we go somewhere, I’ll be bankrupt.”

  “That’s fine because I’ll be paying, with our money, and on this occasion you absolutely do need a new dress. It’s our first public appearance since the engagement and given the hype surrounding me at the moment, there’ll be a lot of eyes. I want you to feel comfortable and a beautiful new dress to match my gorgeous fiancée will help that.”

  Whilst I hate to admit it, what he’s saying does make sense. I want to look good but not for me, for him. I want him to be proud of me and that’s hard enough in a room full of stunning and insanely wealthy women. “Fine.”

  He clears his throat theatrically. “That’s it? That’s all the grief you’re going to give me?”

  “It’s a one off and don’t push it, Ryans.”

  “Fine. Jackson will pick you up from work at six and take you. I have something to take care of tomorrow.”

  “Fine.”

  “Fine.”

  “Stop trying to have the last word.”

  “I’m not trying to have the last word.”

  “You just did it again.”

  “Didn’t.” He chuckles.

  “Did,” I say, stomping my foot like a child. “Stop it.”

  “Okay, I’m done.”

  “Fine.”

  “Fine.”

  “Okay.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  I picked everything I knew he’d love on me and for the first time, Julia and Lucas didn’t say it looked “all wrong.” In fact, they said nothing. Julia held her perfectly manicured fingers to her lips with theatrically glazed eyes and Lucas fanned his face with an uber-camp hand. I took that as meaning I’d achieved my goal. Amanda confirmed as much as she sat on the plush sofa of the style-room facing me, sipping a virgin cocktail compliments of Harrods—or, I suspect in truth, compliments of Gregory’s account.

  “You look fit to be the fiancée of a bazillionaire,” she said with a proud, sort of mothering smile.

  Now, Amy helps me into the gown. She lowers the crimson silk base layer over my arms and down my body, being careful not to touch my hair which has been curled and pinned low at the back of my head, the front swept softly across my brow. As the silk reaches the floor and pools around my strappy red sandals, Amy adjusts the deep red lace layer over top and fixes the train, the lace overhanging the silk by two or three inches. She fastens the invisible zip, then adjusts the half-inch straps—lace, silk and a white-gold chain entwining across each shoulder.

  I watch her move, grateful for her help but missing Sandy. Remembering how she had helped me into the blue gown Gregory bought and had delivered to me the first time we went to an event together. Jumping beans dance in my stomach. It’s our coming out night. There’ll be cameras, eyes of jealous women, catty whispers like there always are when I’m seen with Gregory. But tonight, I don’t care. He’s mine. I glance down at the rock on my finger through clouded eyes.

  “Stop that, you’ll ruin your make up.” Amy grabs a tissue and dabs it into the corner of my eyes, despite the fact no tears have fallen.

  She turns me to face the floor-length mirror in the walk-in wardrobe, then moves behind me and hangs a necklace against my chest. Three thin rows of shining diamonds grace my skin above the structured sweetheart finish of the dress. He’ll love it.

  Amy holds up two long diamond earrings to match the necklace. “Earrings.”

  Once I’ve secured them myself, she fastens a matching bracelet around my right wrist. She sprays Coco Mademoiselle into the air and I turn my body under the spray, catching the scent. I apply one more coat of Clarins’s Poppy Red to my lips, then Amy hands me a small silk bag.

  “Knock ’em dead, peaches.”

  I take a deep breath and exhale slowly, watching my shoulders move up and down in the mirror, the dancing beans in my stomach fiercely trying to escape. “Okay, let’s do it.”

  I hear Gregory hang up a call. By the time I make it to the staircase, he’s standing in the lounge, watching me carefully descend, the gown trailing the steps behind me.

  Holy fuck! I will never get used to how striking this man is.

  He strikes that pose he does and rests one hand in the pocket of his trousers, holding his dinner jacket back, exposing his black waistcoat. His bowtie sits against a crisp white shirt. His hair is slicked back, making his strong jaw and dark features more intense. His captivating browns are wide and fixed on me. I feel like I’m the only girl in the world and he’s looking at me for the first time.

  He offers a hand to guide me down the final steps. As his skin meets mine, fireworks burst from my chest, a charge runs through my blood.

  As I reach the lounge floor and stand, hopelessly lost in him, he raises my fingers to his lips.

  “You’re going to make my dreams come true when you agree to be mine forever.”

  “I’m already yours, Gregory. Every part of me. There’s no going back from you.”

  “I love you, Scarlett Heath.”

  My lips burst into a smile before he drops his mouth to mine. It’s gentle, lingering and still.

  “You’re beautiful,” he whispers, his brow leaning against mine. “This dress.” He takes my hand and pushes me away from him, twirling me under his arm. “Stunning.”

  “I thought you might like it.”

  “You were right.” He pulls me back to him, leaning into me. “And I can’t wait to see it on my bedroom floor,” he whispers, causing me to laugh against his chest.

  “All set?” Jackson asks, making me aware of his presence in the room.

  Gregory lifts me unexpectedly, his arms wrapped around my back, and spins us twice before setting me back on the wood flooring. He winks at me, arrogant and delicious. “All set.”

  * * *

  We join queuing cars of guests opposite Hyde Park and Jackson rolls us to the red carpet for our allocated arrival slot.

  “Okay?” Gregory asks. I realise that my grip has tightened on his hand, my fingers digging into his skin.

  There’s an answer to that question but I need to think about what it is and in that thinking time, he leans into me and holds a calming hand to my cheek. “It’s just us, baby, going to dinner. You and me.”

  I nod once uncertainly. He takes my left hand and adjusts my engagement ring so it rests just-so on my finger. Then he takes my knuckles to his lips as Jackson opens the back door of the Bentley. As soon as Gregory climbs out of the car, panic descends in my chest.

  Get a grip, Scarlett. It’s just dinner.

  Gregory dips down to the car and I place my right hand in his. Cameras start to flash before I even step out of the Bentley. He firms up his grip on my hand and leads us along the red carpet under the haze of flashing bulbs.

  “Mr. Ryans!”

  “Mr. Ryans, is it true you’re engaged?”

  “Mr. Ryans, who is she?”

  She. I guess that’s me and I guess they’re surprised that I’m not some model
or actress or princess like most of Gregory’s red carpet dates.

  I’d like nothing more than to get off this carpet but Gregory turns into me. “Look at me, baby. It’s just me. You and me, angel.”

  As he stares into my eyes, he gives me that irresistible half smile and I genuinely smile back in response. Then he takes my left hand and lifts it to his cheek. My body takes over. My thumb moves across his freshly shaven skin as he rests the tip of his nose to mine, then his lips meet mine and my eyes close, taking me to our world.

  “Just us,” he whispers.

  “You just made me flash my ring, didn’t you?”

  “Too right. You’re mine and I want the world to know that I’m the luckiest man alive.”

  With the confidence he gives me, I turn back to the cameras with a smile, his hand still firmly holding mine.

  We’re greeted in the hotel lobby by another photographer who takes a formal shot, then we’re each handed a glass of champagne. The hotel lobby has been transformed into a swath of colours representing the four charities benefitting from the evening—purple for Transform, a children’s abuse charity, pink for Brainy Children, a charity researching brain tumours in children, sky blue for Early Birds, dedicated to premature baby studies, and aquamarine for Dreams, a children’s hospice that works in conjunction with the hospital Gregory visits every quarter or so.

  “Gregory, old boy.” A man in his late fifties with soft eyes, a healthy but not overdone tan and a slick head of silver hair on his tall slim body, approaches us, dragging my eyes back from the alluring colours of the room.

  Gregory takes the hand offered to him. “Thomas, are you well?” Then he leans in to kiss Thomas’s wife, Norah, on each cheek. “May I introduce you to Scarlett Heath, my fiancée.” He rests a hand on the small of my back as I shake both hands offered to me.

  “Scarlett, Thomas and Norah are heavily involved with Dreams. Norah is the Chair of the charity and does a marvelous job.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you both,” I say genuinely, not least because they are two of few seemingly sincere people I’ve met at events Gregory frequents. “You must be immensely proud. The place looks superb.”

  “Well, I wish I could say that was down to me but I have a wonderful company that I work with every year, me and the Chairs of the other charities here tonight anyway. It’s they who pull everything together, and for free. The designers have an eye for those finer details.”

  I turn my head around the room again, appreciating the light and childlike grandeur. “It must be a very rewarding job.”

  “It is rewarding, indeed, though it never feels much like a job. You should meet some of the children we get to work with. Wonders of the world. Incredibly courageous.”

  The tall, pretty pianist returns from a break and begins to play. Her lilac dress and teal cardigan look innocent and fitting in the room. Her fingers move swiftly yet effortlessly across the keys, her body rocks gently into the music as she plays. The room falls quiet but for the hypnotic sound of her music. It’s a song I recognise from an album by Yiruma. My father would listen to his music sometimes after a long day in surgery and when he became very sick, on the bad days when he struggled to leave his room, Sandy or I would put the album on loop. It always soothed him, comforted him and with that, it brought me pleasure, too.

  I don’t realise I’m transfixed until Thomas speaks close to my ear. “The piece is called “Love Me.” Her name is Violet. Wonderful isn’t she?”

  “She’s played for our annual gala for the last three years,” Norah adds. “Such a lovely young woman.”

  I turn back to them and nod, swallowing the lump in my throat, afraid to speak until the haze over my eyes dissipates. “It’s beautiful,” I eventually say, receiving something akin to empathetic pity from both Thomas and Margaret.

  “You know, I think she plays for weddings,” Margaret says, casting mischievous eyes to Gregory, who wraps an arm around my shoulder, his touch dragging the fog back to my eyes.

  “You make me incredibly happy,” I say, leaning up to plant a kiss on his cheek, overwhelmed by the emotion of the occasion.

  “Excuse us,” Thomas says, taking his wife’s hand. “We’ll see you at the table.”

  “A delight to meet you,” Norah says.

  “Gregory! Darling!” Lara’s voice hits us before we see her making her way through the crowd. Gregory’s mother is as glamorous as ever in a structured black satin gown, her ears, neck and wrists adorned in pearls.

  “Are you okay?” Gregory asks, stroking a thumb down my cheek in such a sweet gesture it does nothing to quell the lump in my throat.

  “Yes. Perfect.”

  “Oh my beautiful daughter-in-law-to-be, look at you. Absolutely dazzling.”

  “Hi, Lara, how are you?”

  “Oh better now, better now.”

  “Hi, Lawrence,” I say, accepting a kiss on each cheek as he bends over his plump belly towards me.

  As Lara begins excitedly hurling extravagant wedding plans at me, my eyes lock onto a group of three women over her shoulder, whispering, their attention obviously fixed on my left hand until one of them notices me looking. With a tut, an eye roll and one hand on hip, they turn their backs to me. Then I see her, Stella. She has a scowl like thunder as she makes her way towards us, practically dragging her very wealthy husband, Jean-Pierre, behind her.

  She all but dives on Gregory, wrapping her arms too tightly around him and putting her lips too close to his as she kisses his cheeks. I smile part politely, part in sympathy, at Jean-Pierre.

  What a woman! What a magnificent dick!

  “Stella, how nice to see you,” I lie with the biggest, fattest, most sarcastic toothy grin on my face, turning her body to me and away from my fiancé to air-kiss her cheeks, being careful not to make contact with the ginormous cowbag.

  Urgh, I really wish Amanda hadn’t decided she was too fat and not pregnant enough looking to face a camera. She’d have a monumental put-down and I’d thoroughly enjoy watching Stella’s over-Botoxed, over-made-up face drop. Well, okay, she’s kind of stunning but in a very effortful way. I’m such a bitch.

  Just as I’m thinking how much I’d like to slap her face with something heavy, wet, and very fishy smelling, Gregory pulls me into his side and nuzzles the hair at my temple. “Feisty,” he whispers on a chuckle.

  Our table is one of three closest to the stage in the room that must seat at least a thousand people. The colours from the reception shine in even brighter swags and swaths throughout the room. The walls have been draped in black curtains and the cheerful shades burst like shooting stars, lights twinkling against the darkness. As Gregory guides me to our table to the continuing sound of Violet, the pianist, playing through large speakers, I can’t help thinking back to the children’s ward of the hospital.

  It was the day after Gregory and I had first made love. Sandy and I visited my father whilst Gregory went to Paediatrics. Once we’d said goodbye to my father for the day, we went in search of Gregory, finding a man dressed in a giant lion head and a ward full of giggling children. One of the first moments I knew I was unequivocally in love with him.

  The children loved him, too. He was incredible with them. There wasn’t a nurse without a smile as he broke the mould of white-collar CEO. The room is exactly how those children were that day. Sick, some of them dying, the truest darkness of the world. Yet their smiles really were like shining stars, just like the lights glimmering around the room.

  We take our seats at a table for which Gregory has paid. We’re joined by Lara and Lawrence, Norah and Thomas, Stella and Jean-Pierre, Lawrence’s niece Emily and her fiancé Harry, and Gordon and Vivienne, a couple I remember from the fateful night of Lara’s bonfire party. A night I push quickly from the forefront of my mind.

  Once the lights are dimmed, Norah make
s her way to the stage to welcome the guests. She speaks about the purpose of the night before inviting up to the stage the chairs of Early Birds, Transformed and Brainy Children. They give frankly shocking and astoundingly moving speeches about their respective charities and give the guests details of a silent auction and various other fundraising things happening throughout the evening.

  Norah returns to the microphone with a beaming smile. “Well, I would like to tell you all a little bit about the fabulous charity, Dreams. But, tonight, we have a very special guest of honour. She is a shooting star. A burning light we should all take inspiration from. Her mum tells me this little girl demanded to stay up beyond her bedtime tonight to come here and tell us how amazing she thinks Dreams is and what the charity has done for her. This brave girl has fought two bouts of leukemia in her short five years and is currently nearing the end of her third round of treatment. The doctors say she’s doing very, very well. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage tonight, the star of the evening, Isabella Willows.”

  It’s the little girl from the hospital. Isabella, Gregory’s “girlfriend,” who’d informed me that it was okay for Gregory to have two girlfriends. Her mum helps her walk slowly up the four steps to the stage, pausing on each to take a breath. With each step, I will her frail tiny legs to win, the lump in my throat and constriction in my chest building with every anxious second.

  The piano music changes to “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid and the whole scene has my eyes full for the second time tonight. In the middle of the stage, Isabella pauses, gathering her breath. She waves to a table and a man who I guess is her father. He in turn blows her a kiss. Then she looks around the room, those big bright eyes that melted my heart the first time I saw her are shining, distracting from the dark circles beneath and her hairless head which is decorated with a white hairband with one big daisy.

  When I think I can take no more, she turns to our table and shouts above the piano. “Gregory!”

  He waves but she holds out her hands towards him. His jaw tenses and I can read his mind. The stern, ruthless CEO image will be shattered if he goes. If he doesn’t, he denies that little girl, standing there with her weak arms outstretched. He debates it for a second then rises from his seat and goes to Isabella, bending to the stage as she wraps her arms around his neck. I have no idea what he says to the little angel but she laughs, the most profound and wonderful sound.