by Corri Lee
“Pushing the divorce made her panic. She’d still be alive if we hadn’t—”
“Hadn’t what?” Blaze’s low growl made my chest tighten. “Hadn’t tried to cut my strings to liberate me from her puppet show? She had to die, Emmeline. It was the only way to end the charade. Or would you rather I’d been only yours behind closed doors forever?”
“I...” Shit. The terrible thing was that he was right. If she was so determined to give him that money instead of her family, her death was the only way to do it. It didn’t matter whether it came naturally or by her own hand. Without him as her next of kin, her family would have fought it, refusing to allow the ex to take the fortune regardless of whether he was named in the will. He had to have stayed ‘with’ her to earn his share. The length of time it could have gone on was finite. “You hate her, don’t you?”
“I hate what she did,” he clarified. “But I get it. There were better ways to get around it, though. This letter came seven years too late.”
“Make peace.” Stroking the inside of his forearm, I aimed to calm him, like he was a snarling animal. “You have an incredible gift for forgiveness.”
“You think?”
“If you can forgive Henry—”
His arm slid back out of my reach. “Why would you say that? I’ve never had a reason to need to forgive him.”
“Blaze.” I chose to believe he wasn’t insulting my intelligence by acting like nothing had happened and that he really didn’t know about my talk with Henry the day before. I didn’t have the energy for an argument with him. “I know what he did to your dad.”
“Oh. Oh, cupcake...”
Thinking better of him had been the right choice. Wriggling closer, Blaze ran his fingers down my cheek, neck, and over my collarbone before his hand dropped down into my lap. The touch was reverent but at the same time sympathetic. Like I was the one who needed pity.
“I never wanted you to find out.”
“I’m fine.” That wasn’t a lie. Not completely. As far as the whole Regis-Henry-past life thing went, I was okay with it. Sad for them all, but not overly traumatised. “I just find it fascinating how you and Connie were so accepting.”
Bringing up the subject reignited my intrigue. I twisted around onto my knees and rested my hands on Blaze’s thighs, getting as close as I could without making my interest morbid. “How did you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Forgive him. How are you that strong?”
Visibly perplexed, Blaze studied me carefully before pulling me into his lap. The air crackled with anticipation, making the hairs on my arms stand on end. I’d not long been complaining that I didn’t know Blaze well enough to marry him. I could tell I was about to find out maybe the deepest, most profound thing about him now.
“I was only four years old, Emmeline,” he started. “Having a child’s mind does marvellous things to your perception.”
“Explain.”
“Well... At that age, you’re so selfish. Money has no value, warmth is something you take for granted. You’re not weighed down with harsh realities. You just want your basic needs satisfied.
“So I’m this little kid with a father who’s never home and a mother who’s always door-watching. One day, she tells me Dad won’t ever be home again and she starts crying all the time. No matter how much I hug her and tell her he’ll be back, she never stops crying. But this guy—Henry—turns up and she laughs with him. I fucking hated him for that.”
He painted such a sad picture. It wasn’t too hard to imagine an emerald eyed boy sat in one of Connie’s battered arm chairs, scowling in the direction of the muffled conversations in the next room. It wasn’t crazy to imagine how much that hurt.
“So what the hell happened?”
“I grew up.” Blaze nodded to himself like he was reliving it all in his mind. “The jealousy didn’t last long but I was still selfish—he gave me pocket money I didn’t turn down. As he started building his own business, he brought me gifts and taught me stuff, like how to play poker and kick a football straight. He had me as a pageboy at his and Ivy’s wedding, and when he was old enough, he promised to give me everything my dad had claimed he’d get me.”
“I had no idea. About the wedding.” And I could have kicked myself for not playing closer attention to my parents’ wedding photographs.
“Yeah... I expected things to get weird after they married. I think part of me thought he’d hook up with my ma and be my new dad.” Blaze’s feet started to swing mindlessly, his inner child replaying it all. “But it didn’t, not even when Tallulah was born. He always made time for me, noticed my gift for numbers and sent me to good schools. See, I wasn’t old enough to get out of being around him. So I had no choice but to find out he was a good guy.”
“Gotcha.” It wasn’t a matter of how he had been able to forgive Henry. It was completely circumstantial. The real question was how Connie could do it; how she could stand to have him in her home and around her young child. It would have been different if she’d kicked him to the kerb. “So if you’d been older...”
“I’ve have probably tried to kick his head in.” Blaze grinned, looking surprisingly cheerful. “Not that I’ve have succeeded. He’s always been built like a brick shithouse. But I wouldn’t have given him the time of day, that’s for sure. Having an immature mind was the saving grace that led to the life I have now. If I’d hated him so badly, I wouldn’t be with you. I’m very grateful.”
“Me, too.” As cruel as it could be, destiny had created our paths to lead each other. Did the ends justify the means? I was happy to make believe that they had.
Our past tribulations had given us the strength to get through those that had happened more recently. The rewards of that persistence and tenacity were finding the other halves of ourselves and financial security that would see us into old age. Which reminded me...
Our accumulative fortune was likely to grow. We had our wages, Natasha’s inheritance and our allowances from Henry to boot. To think I’d ever worried about Blaze’s financial situation. I had no freaking idea what we’d do with that kind of money. Did Blaze have ideas of his own?
“So, uh...” I draw lazy circles on his legs through the fabric of the lounge pants he’d changed into. “Now you have your pay out, what are you going to do with all that money?”
“Honestly?” He looked me over from head to toe; then dragged his gaze back up to my face. He looked peaceful when he smiled and reached up to brush my hair back. Peaceful and content. “Nothing.”
“Are you kidding me?” After he’d so insisted that he had to have it. After letting it break us apart. After allowing me to make agonising decisions that would let him get it but also keep him with me... “Tell me you’re kidding me.”
Blaze leaned back to look into my eyes. “I have everything I need. Weren’t you the one who told me I shouldn’t need that money to be happy if I had you? You asked Chase why you weren’t enough, but you are.” I blushed, remembering my Madison Square Garden freak out at Halloween. “For now.”
“Um...” Oh, crap. That sounded ominous. It took a moment of my head spinning to release Blaze was laughing at me. I shoved his shoulder. “You’re teasing me.”
“Mostly. Come do wedding stuff with me after Caroline leaves tomorrow.” I nodded, pretending he hadn’t completely derailed me with his joke. Who knew; maybe playing an active part in the planning would get me in the mood for the wedding. It wasn’t going to just go away, I knew that. It made more sense to try and enjoy it. The cost of being able to say those vows had been massive for everyone. I almost had an obligation to be more into it.
Plus it was worth agreeing to just to see Blaze look so happy.
He excused himself to get a drink before we bedded down for the night, leaving me to stare after him with a wistful kind of yearning. When us being an item had been so all-together damning, I wanted to feel bad about loving him but I couldn’t. It was the one aspect of my life the guilt couldn’
t seep into. I had no doubt that no matter how many lives were lost for us or how much we pissed off our friends and family, I’d never regret that I’d fallen in love with him.
My eyes were drawn to Natasha’s letter where it had fallen on the bed, specifically to the last two words she’d left to Blaze. Avenge me. That she’d always planned to tell him the truth must had been the thing that stopped Blaze from hating her instead of her actions. It honestly seemed like she might have been a sweet girl and that her life had been wasted—not just because she’d died young, but because she’d led a linear, dispassionate life dedicated to meeting an ultimate goal of revenge.
That had to be shallow and unsatisfying. If she’d only had a compassionate mother and didn’t feel the need to be Blaze’s white knight, she might have experienced more. She might have travelled, rebelled and fallen for a man who actually loved her the way Blaze loved me; enough to give up everything.
Avenge me. What were Mona and Patrice doing now? Had they found out how much they’d traded the house for yet, or were they toasting to their riches in a wine bar somewhere? Maybe they were scouring the jobs pages or scratting through their financial paperwork trying to figure out how long they had before they became homeless. All because they’d treated their own flesh and blood like a cash cow.
I’d wanted to kill her in my dreams before we’d even met. That had to make me like them. As much as I wanted to believe that Natasha was no longer a part of our lives, she’d served justice to her mother and sister from beyond the grave. It was only too likely that mine was coming, too.
If Blaze had been able to swallow enough hatred to ruin Mona and Patrice’s lives for Natasha, was I next on his list? Was the real start of what had always felt like a dream about to become my worst nightmare? How far would he go to vindicate her death?
Not knowing exactly what I’d be paying for would have driven me to madness if I wasn’t already as batty as they came.
“I think silk and lace.”
“Satin, Mother.”
“Buttons.”
“Zips.”
“Halter neck?”
“Bodice. Jeez.”
I could feel Ivy’s eyes burning into the back of my head while I cycled again through the rail of sample bridal gowns Blaze’s seamstress friend, Caroline, had brought to the hotel. They were all incredibly beautiful and there was a good variety, but they all lacked personality and a wow factor that made me want to jump head first into one and lace up the corset strings. If I had to pick a dress to make a statement people would admire, I wanted it to be that I was no normal bride. None of these did the job.
Not that my mind was even on the task. My thoughts were in the other room where Blaze and Chris were being measured up like me. Caroline’s husband was a tailor and, unsurprisingly, the master behind all of Blaze’s yummy suits. He’d tagged along with his wife with the usher’s suits that had already been ordered, and to double check the in-seams of the groom and best man.
Daniel and Jonathan had looked dapper in their blood-red brocade waistcoats and tail coats with ivory cravattes. I had a good mind to complain about how good they looked. I was yet to see Blaze in his get up but I knew the colours were reversed, while the best man almost matched the ushers with the only difference of a black cravatte.
I’d been stunned to tears to find out Chris had been offered and accepted the best man position. It settled a gut feeling I’d had for a long time that he didn’t actually like Blaze that much. He’d let him sleep on his mother’s couch while I was in New York but I couldn’t discount that he’d put up a polite front to get through it. He had a damn good poker face and it would send my world askew if my best friends and partner were at odds.
Stupidly, I’d started to let paranoia get the better of me. Knowing it was irrational didn’t stop me wondering if Chris had teamed up with Blaze to plot my downfall, using all the times I’d knocked him back in favour of a prettier lay as ammunition and justification. The times of him and Esme flipping a coin to decide which of them won a place in my bed for the night when the pickings were slim for me were long gone. I couldn’t be sure that the disappointment was, too.
“Emmy? What do you think?”
Shrugging off the distraction, I took a step back from the rail and scanned the length of it miserably. “I don’t know. They’re all lovely but... none seem very me.”
Caroline rolled her eyes over the rim of her tea cup and stood in a fluid movement that made me uncomfortably aware of my poor posture. The remaining aches in my neck and back made it difficult to stand properly upright for any number of minutes. The lack of sleep from the night before exacerbated that, and added insult to literal injury by making me look pale and heavy eyed. I was painfully conscious of the fact I looked like shit while she and her assistant looked like urbane goddesses of fashion.
“Nobody expects you to pick one to go, Miss Tudor. But if there’s one you like mostly, I can use it as a base and make alterations to it. Though if you had an idea of what you wanted, that would help.”
Her air of condescension made me rattier. Most other woman had considerably longer to imagine their dream dress, while I was expected to pull orders out of my arse for her. Because she’d caught me on a bad day, I really wanted to prove that I could come up with something on the spot, if only to wipe that contemptuous look off her face.
Her assistant granted me an extra few seconds of thinking time by helping me up onto a small, round platform and starting to intrusively measure my inner leg.
“Would it help to see Blaze’s favourites?”
“Come again?” Why was I even surprised? Of course he’d been dress shopping for me. He probably had one set aside in reserve in case I flaked out on my side of the deal to pick one myself. “Yes, all right. Fine. Jesus...” I was so frustrated I could have wept and I didn’t even fully understand why. Less than twenty-four hours ago, I’d wanted him to take over. This just felt like it crossed a line.
Caroline extended the rail to separate three dresses from the rest. All of them I’d overlooked until they were a focal point, all with their own individual beautiful details that would have looked even better combined.
The first was a fishtail gown with an ugly scooped neckline and too many silk roses sewn on. The next was a meringue with a gorgeously ruched sweetheart cut bodice but nothing from the bust up to cover the chest. The final was floaty, but had long sleeves in lace—a lot like the dress I’d worn for the wake. But the lace was only in artful sections around the throat and wrists, and mounted on a sheer transparent fabric that made the wearer look mostly nude.
All were white. Completely white. That was wrong on so many levels and I was in the mood to throw my weight around.
I pointed out the parts of each dress I was keen on, spared some time to emphasise which bits were particularly ugly; then fussed about the colour.
“Oh, yes!” Ivy clasped her hands together like a delighted Hollywood pin-up, going so far as to bat her lashes. “Ivory would be perfect with your colouring. And sparkle—lots of sparkle!”
Ew. “No sparkle. I’m wearing pearls. I don’t want to look like a kid’s jewellery box threw up over me.”
“Pearls? How lovely.” God bless my mother and her ability to turn any snipe into a romantic notion. That trait of hers could be enviable at times—her faith in true love was so great it was grotesque—but it could also be insufferable.
“Ivory, fishtail skirt, sweetheart cut bodice with a corseted back, lace embellishments on the cuffs and throat—anything else?” I could see Caroline’s hackles rising and couldn’t resist pissing her off further.
“Actually, yes. The colour scheme is ivory and red. I can’t be the only one not adhering to that.”
“Red. On ivory?” I stared her down until she relented. “As you wish, Miss Tudor. I’m not the one who has to wear it.”
Fuck you. Angry tears were burning my eyes, dangerously close to breaking free. I didn’t want to be the over-sensitive little
woman in front of my fiancé’s friend, so held my breath to keep them at bay.
Why was I so emotional?
“Maybe you’d like to try them on before you make any firm decisions.” The assistant dutifully passed Caroline a clipboard bearing my sheet of measurements. Caroline skimmed over it and straightened herself out in a way that got my back up, even before she said, “Pardon me, maybe not. We’re going to need to order in extra fabric.”
“Excuse me?”
Her answering smile was tight and disingenuous. “I’m afraid only the bodice dress will fit you today, simply because the corseting gives some extra leeway around the midsection. I brought these dresses according to your measurements in August. I didn’t anticipate an extra six inches around your bust and a further four on your hips and waist.”
I could have thrown up. I was happy to accept that I’d gained a little weight while I was overseas but putting the numbers of difference on it made my stomach flip. Once anorexic, my own dysmorphic perceptions made me see myself as far bigger than I really was. It was too soon after I’d finally begun to grow comfortable with how my body looked to be told that I was as big as I felt.
“That’s quite an impressive increase for the time frame. And you’re still so trim.” That compliment came a little too late. The damage was done. “What’s your secret? Or is it too secret, if you get my drift? Should I leave a little growing room around the stomach?”
Holy fuck, was she—”Are you asking me if I’m pregnant?!” Bloody hell, were the numbers not enough of a bitching point?
“Well, six inches on the baps, love.” She turned her back on me so I couldn’t see her holding back her laughter. Unfortunately, I saw her shoulders shaking slightly and caught a glimpse of the skin on the back of her neck starting to blotch red with exertion. “It’s the natural assumption.”