Masters for Hire

by Ginger Voight

  After tonight, I was in Devlin’s hands. Not as his client, but as the woman he had chosen. The woman he loved.

  I thought then that was just about as close to perfection as I could ever get.

  Little did I know, Devlin was about to make due on his promise.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  After checkout the next day, we crossed the street to another chic hotel catering to a hipper clientele. The suite was delightful, with sophisticated décor and its own private balcony, where we could watch the dancing fountains of the neighboring hotel. Again he had filled the room with roses, though this time they were white, each in their own cobalt vases. Had he remembered my favorite cobalt wine glasses? Or was it just another happy accident? Either way, they were perfect. I touched the silky petal with my hand. “What does white mean?” I asked him as he took me into his arms.

  “A new start,” he answered. “If you’re up for it.”

  I nodded with a smile and reached for a kiss. I wanted to initiate our romantic new room immediately, but he shook his head. “We’ll get to that,” he said with a grin as he kissed me deep and squeezed my ass. “Now drink your champagne. I’ll pick you up at six.”

  I gaped as he abruptly let me go. “Where are you going?” I asked as he walked towards the door.

  “It’s a surprise,” he grinned. “The first of many,” he promised with a bow before he closed the door behind him.

  The first surprise was a delivery, a huge white box sent over from none other than Darcy herself, with a note that read, “Our first formal design. You should be the one to wear it.”

  I gasped as I pulled the dress from the box, as pristine white as the tissue that protected it. The one-shoulder satin dress was knee-length, and featured an asymmetrical chiffon overlay peppered with shimmering rhinestones. This gathered at the shoulder with a simple, circular rhinestone brooch, with the excess material falling towards the back of the dress like a sparkling cape. It made me feel like a fashionable superhero when I put it on. My strappy, sparkly shoes I wore to Lucy’s wedding added yet another layer of bling.

  I was ready to take over Sin City with gusto.

  The second surprise was a stylist, who arrived to do my hair and makeup for my special night. She had just put on the finishing touches when my final surprise arrived: a personal driver for a rented limo. He walked me downstairs to the car, where Devlin waited in the back, wearing a stylish black tux with a white shirt with no tie, unbuttoned just enough to tempt me with that spectacular chest. His dark hair was casually mussed, sort of devil may care, inviting my fingers to crawl through those thick tresses.

  He was so sexy he took my breath away. Like always. “Wow. You really know how to show a lady a good time.”

  He chuckled. “I’ve learned a few things.” He handed me my glass. “You look beautiful, by the way.”

  “You always say that,” I pointed out.

  “I always mean it,” he replied. The look in his eyes made my stomach flutter. I couldn’t wait for our night to begin.

  “So where are we going?” I asked, though it didn’t matter. According to our original plan, I should have been flying back to Los Angeles right about then, our time together having reached its end. Whether it was dinner, a show, or a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon, as long as I was with him, I was happy.

  “So full of questions,” he teased as he pulled me close. “Don’t you trust me by now, Coralie?”

  I answered his question with another kiss, and this time I deepened it. He groaned as he pulled away.

  “You’re making it difficult to be good,” he growled.

  “Because I so like it when you’re bad,” I grinned and kissed him again. With another growl, he crushed his mouth on mine, ravaging my lips in a desperate, urgent kiss. We arrived at our next venue before anything could get out of hand, so we straightened ourselves as best we could before we climbed out of the car. He curled an arm around my shoulders and led me into yet another hotel, leading me upstairs to one of the showrooms. We were met by the hotel staff. “Mr. Masters,” the host greeted. “Miss Cabot,” he said as he shook my hand. “We’re so pleased to have you join us this evening. Please. Follow me.”

  Devlin took my hand as we followed behind towards one of the darkened showrooms. The theater was completely empty, so I was even more puzzled as the host led us down to the table down in front, center stage. “Anything I can get you? More champagne, perhaps?”

  “Please,” Devlin said.

  “Very good. We’ll bring a bottle and some glasses. Make yourselves comfortable. Your show should begin shortly.”

  I looked around before eyeing Devlin suspiciously. “We’re here for a show? There’s nobody else around.”

  He laughed. “A friend of mine performs magic here. He’s working through a new routine and he needed a test audience.” He took my hand in his. “I’ve shared you enough already this week. I wanted us to be alone.”

  I warmed all the way to my toes. “Sounds perfect.”

  He leaned over for another kiss, and the lights went down on the stage. The Beatles’ “Something” filled the room, as spotlight trained on beautiful dancers in flame-red body suits curled together like a living rose, which ‘bloomed’ as they started to dance.

  As light filled the stage, billowing silks dropped from the ceiling, and the dancers hooked onto them before soaring up into the sky. Glitter confetti fell from above like sparkling rain as they spiraled and spun high above the stage without a net. It was thrilling to watch. I gasped with every aerial trick, and Devlin grabbed my hand in his and sent me a smile.

  The magician finally took the stage, appearing in the stage as one of the dancers dropped almost as though she had fallen, but the handsome magician captured her instead. He spun her around before he laid her onto a platform, where he “levitated” her, using large metal rings to demonstrate that she wasn’t being held up by any kind of harness.

  When she came back down, she angled down to land on her feet, and the other dancers raced around her, covering her with silk, around and around until she disappeared into a tight cocoon in the flurry of activity. She struggled inside as the magician surrounded her, and when he stood in front and held out his hands, the other dancers pulled their ends of the silks until the line of her body got thinner and thinner… then disappeared entirely right as two bursts of flame popped on either side of the stage.

  “Champagne?” a female voice asked us from behind.

  It was the dancer.

  I clapped heartily for the trick, absolutely enchanted.

  The magician hopped down from the stage to join us. “You must be Coralie,” he greeted with a bow, before holding out his hand so he could pull me to my feet.

  I nodded, though I was a little nervous. I had no idea what to expect.

  “You like champagne?” he asked as his assistant brought him the full glass, where a large strawberry bobbed in the liquid. I nodded. “I’m not sure if you know this, but the bubbles of champagne are made entirely of magic,” he said as he fished the berry from my glass. I instantly made a face. That wine had looked so tasty.

  “Don’t worry, my hands are clean,” he grinned before handing off the glass to his assistant. He palmed the strawberry in his hand. “With a little touch of champagne, anything can happen. You’re in Vegas, so you probably already know this.” I laughed. He palmed the berry and after a flourish of his hand, he opened his palm to show that the red ripe berry had transformed into a black casino chip for $100. “Handy trick on the casino floor,” he grinned before he closed his hand again, did another little flourish and opened his palm to reveal that the chip was gone. “That’s typically what happens on the casino floor,” he remarked. “Very rarely does that money ever stay where it’s supposed to, does it?” He closed my hands together and lifted them up in front of me.

  With another graceful gesture, he waved his hands around mine, and then opened my palms to reveal where the black casino chip now lay. I laughed.
“Do I get to keep it?”

  “Well, this is Vegas,” he said. “You can keep that black chip, walk away a winner, and have a great story to tell your friends. Or, you can drop that $100 into your glass of champagne, and see what else Lady Luck has in store.”

  I turned to Devlin. “What do you think?”

  He shrugged, wearing that smirk that made me love him so much more. “What’s life if it isn’t a gamble?”

  The assistant produced my glass, which was still filled with champagne. I took the chip and dropped it in. All at once, it began to bubble and fizz, foaming over instantly. “Oh dear,” the magician fretted. “I was afraid that might happen. Terrible thing to mix gambling and alcohol.” He pulled a black velvet sheath from inside his jacket and covered the glass, securing it at the base with his fingers. He turned it over, and I stepped back, expecting that champagne would now splash all over Darcy’s masterful creation. Instead, nothing happened at all. It was if the glass was empty.

  “Hum,” he said. “That really didn’t work out the way I had hoped it would. I think we’re going to need stronger magic.” He glanced between us. “You’re going to have to kiss.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Devlin drawled as he ambled to his feet. The magician faced us together, each of our hands holding the base of the champagne glass, still covered by the velvet sheath.

  “Hold it tight,” he instructed. “Tighter. I don’t want you to let go.” We nodded as we complied with his request. “Now kiss.”

  That was an easy enough task. Devlin lined down and kissed me, and I responded as chastely as the situation warranted.

  “Oh, come on now. Kiss like you mean it. Kiss,” he said, “like you believe in magic.”

  The music once again filled the air and Devlin’s mouth parted over mine. It was a deep kiss, yet different from all the ones we had shared before. I felt his love in that tender kiss, which made me forget about the magician, the dancers, and everything in between. I was almost dazed when the fire popped again. We pulled apart and looked down at the glass, still covered in the sheath.

  “Look inside your glass, Coralie,” the magician instructed. “See what you’ve won.” Devlin stepped back as I grasped the sheath by the puckered top and lifted it away from the glass, which was now filled with champagne…

  And a five-carat peridot ring.

  It took a whole minute of staring at it to figure out what it meant. I gasped as my eyes shot to Devlin, who wasted no time bending to one knee.

  He held my hand in his. “Coralie,” he started, and I had already begun to cry, completely stunned that this was happening. It was actually happening… “It only took a couple of weeks, but you have changed my life. I can’t imagine one day without you in it. I don’t want to go back to the way things were. I had forgotten how to dream until you came along. Now, I never want to wake up.”

  I sputtered as he fished the ring from the glass. It was the peridot ring I had tried on at the other jeweler’s, and it slid onto my hand, the perfect fit. He took my hand in both of his.

  “Let’s never wake up, Coralie. Marry me. Tonight.”

  My eyes widened. “Tonight?”

  He nodded. “We both spent this entire week never wanting it to end. When I walked you down that aisle at Lucy’s wedding I realized that it doesn’t have to. We are as limitless as they are. We can begin something beautiful, something magical… something perfect, just like they did. I want to be the one who writes your love story, baby. If you’ll let me.” I was done the minute I saw one lone tear creep out of the corner of his eye as he recalled the story I told him about my father. “I’m ready to make every promise and break every rule because it’s all meaningless if you’re not at my side. You’re mine. And I never want to let you go.”

  “Devlin,” I breathed as I practically vaulted into his arms. It was all that I wanted even though I knew it was absolute madness. We barely knew each other. We came from completely different worlds. But I loved him. God, how I loved him. He was right. I had spent the last week dreading that it would end. And I didn’t want it to. Not ever. “Yes!” I squealed as I hugged him tight. “Yes!”

  His arms wrapped around me and he spun me around.

  Clearly part of the plan, the magician and his assistants abandoned the phony “show” as they sent us on our way to make the impossible happen. I was going to marry Devlin Masters.

  #TONIGHT

  I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but Devlin promptly shut me up with a kiss so intense my head spun. “Devlin,” I finally managed to whisper. “Are we crazy?”

  He smiled deep as he caressed my face with his thumb. “Completely.”

  “But I mean… what are we doing? We don’t really know each other,” I started but he didn’t let me finish.

  “The only thing I know is that I can’t go back to the way things were a week ago. You’ve ruined me, Coralie. You’ve taken a bed-hopping bad boy and turned him into a lovesick idiot, who will propose to the girl he loves because he can never bear to let her go.”

  My heart melted. “I don’t want to let you go, either,” I assured him.

  He bent closer. His breath covered warmed my lips. “Then shut up and kiss me, Coralie.”

  I lost myself in those eyes again. There was no arguing for sanity anymore. I gave up that battle the minute I sent an email to a perfect stranger on the Internet just to get laid like I wanted.

  And here I was… getting a groom instead.

  #TONIGHT!

  I kissed him all the way to the county clerk’s office, where we stood in line behind dozens of other couples who had decided to take the big plunge into wedded bliss themselves. I wondered about their stories. How had they met? How long had they dated? Did they dot all the Is and cross all the Ts to ensure that their endeavor to commit themselves one to the other wasn’t complete lunacy?

  I was pretty sure none of the couples in that line shared a story like ours. A fairytale it wasn’t, even if, in moments like the first time he sang to me, or the moment he defended my honor against a drunken stranger, or how he introduced me to his beloved mother and sister, it had felt like one.

  If my mind hadn’t been blown by the epic proposal I could have never predicted in a million years, I might have gotten a little nervous the closer we got to the front of the line. But every time I looked up at Devlin, he planted a reassuring kiss on my mouth, clutching my hand in his, staking his claim and letting the whole world know I belonged to him. It was all I had ever wanted, and here he was–like a dream come true.

  I thought about my father, and Gretchen, and even Lucy. How was I going to explain any of this to them? And did it really matter? I never wanted a full blown wedding. I gave up on those things when Mother died. Honestly, I’d given up on love when Mother died.

  And now here it was, like magic.

  I didn’t want the spell to end.

  So I put aside all my reservations, obtained that marriage license and followed my fiancé–my fiancé!–to the waiting limo which took us to a large observation wheel located just off the strip.

  The minute we stepped into our private VIP car, I burst into tears. There were more white roses and more champagne, but even more importantly there was Lucy, and Gus, and Darcy, all waiting to share that moment with us. I flew into my best friend’s arms. “What are you doing here? I thought you went home this afternoon!”

  That was at least a part of the plan when we booked all our arrangements the week before.

  A week, I thought to myself again. It had all changed in a week.

  “We were persuaded,” she grinned.

  I pulled away. “I thought you were supposed to stop me from going off the deep end. Instead you plan my wedding behind my back?”

  “I would throw my body in front of an oncoming train for you, you know that.” She took my hands in hers. “And if I hadn’t seen you together all week, and if I hadn’t known what you’ve been looking for our whole lives, I’d probably do just that. But i
t works, Ceece. He fits, just like I said.”

  I gave her a playful glare. “You just don’t want to be the only married lady our age.”

  “There is that,” she admitted with a smile. “We’ll play tennis at the club, and then we’ll go shopping and brunch together. We’ll host tremendous parties the envy of the entire neighborhood. And then, when the kids come, we’ll give birth within months of each other so we can attend Mommy and Me classes together.” I made a face immediately. “What will you both need to get there anyway? A month?”

  “Bite your tongue,” I said, eerily repeating the same thing I said when she jokingly referred to my wedding just the week before. “I’m not ready for that.”

  Devlin reached down to hug me. “Ready for what?”

  “Babies,” Lucy told him, though I gave her a pointed stare to shut the fuck up.

  His hand slid around my waist and to my stomach. “Now there’s an idea.”

  I held up my hand. “Let’s handle the wedding first, please.”

  His eyes were dark as he grinned down at me. “Your wish is my command.” He bent for a kiss and the minister cleared his throat.

  “Not time for that yet,” he joked with a smile.

  Lucy turned to Devlin for a hug. “Thank you for waiting until after our wedding, mister.”

  He laughed. “I told you Friday and I meant it,” he teased. “Thank you for being here for our special day.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it for the world!” she said before she hugged me again.

  A waiter brought around some more champagne as the car lifted up into the air. When we neared the top, the minister assembled us by window that faced the lights of the Strip. “Dearly beloved,” he intoned, “we have gathered here together to join these two people in holy matrimony.”

  I listened to him in a daze as he recited the familiar words, words I had just heard two days before at Lucy’s wedding. And now he was saying them about me. Me! I was getting married. I stared up at Devlin, who looked so handsome as he smiled down at me. He was going to be my husband. Mine! I wouldn’t have to share him anymore. I wouldn’t have to think of him with another woman every single time he and I were apart.