The Honest Affair (Rose Gold Book 3)

by Nicole French

Relief washed over me. “Well, that’s good. I wasn’t sure. It’s an antique, that ring.”

  “More than an antique,” Nina said. “This is an heirloom, Matthew. Vintage Damiani. Art deco.”

  I frowned down at her. “How did you know that?”

  She smiled up at me, preening proudly. “I do know a bit about fine jewelry, you know.”

  I raised a brow. She was good, but was she that good? I hadn’t seen much in the way of antiques on Nina’s person.

  “All right,” she admitted. “I looked at the marking on the inside when you were in the bathroom.”

  I snorted. “I see. Connoisseur, clearly.”

  “Did you find it in town?” she wanted to know.

  “Ah, no. It was…” I didn’t know why I was so damn nervous to tell her this. “It was Nonna’s. She gave it to me after Nonno died. To give to the woman I was going to marry.” I picked up her hand again and passed my thumb over the familiar stone. “I’ve had it ever since. Never thought about giving it to anyone until I met you. Not even Sherry.”

  Nina was quiet for a long time at the sound of my ex’s name. I didn’t talk about her much—you tend not to when the story involves her fucking around while you’re on the other side of the world getting shot at. But Nina knew about her. She knew what it meant.

  “I’m…I’m honored,” she said at last. “Truly I am.” She blinked against my chest, her eyelashes tickling my skin. “What about your grandfather? Do you know how he got it?”

  I relaxed against my pillow and told her the fable of how my grandparents met on the subway platform only a few months after Nonno got off the boat from Naples. How Nonno had seen the girl who turned out to live only a few blocks from him and proceeded to escort her to her catering job, waited hours until she was finished, then took her right back home, safe and sound.

  “Well, you’re right about the heirloom. It’s been in the family for a while. The story goes, the day after he met Nonna, he booked a ticket right back to Naples. But not to stay—to get his mother’s ring. He was only seventeen, but he knew the moment he saw her that she was the one he was going to marry.”

  “I suppose when you know, you know,” Nina said as she gazed at the ring.

  “Yeah, you do,” I said, though I was looking at her. “Which is why the night after we met, I pulled it out of my sock drawer. And I’ve been carrying it around ever since.”

  We lay there for a long time, her looking at the ring, me looking at her. It was perfect. Peaceful. I could have stayed in that room forever.

  But forever can’t exist in a room. It has to include the rest of the world too.

  “Matthew,” Nina said. “We have to talk.”

  “Don’t even think about giving that back, duchess. You took it. It’s a binding agreement.”

  She smiled. “That’s not what I was going to say.”

  “Then what?” I was trying hard to stay playful, but it wasn’t easy. “Baby, you’re looking at me like you’re going to kill my puppy.”

  Nina sighed with something suspiciously like regret. Goddammit.

  “It’s all right,” I said quickly. “I know you can’t wear it when we get back. Maybe you can put it on a chain or something. Keep it close to your heart or whatever until he finally signs the paper…”

  I trailed off, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice. I was trying to be fair, but it was going to be damn hard to return to New York and not be able to shout from the rooftops that Nina de Vries was going to be my wife. Goddammit. What had I done?

  Nina was quiet for a long time.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m ruining the moment.”

  “No, you’re not,” she replied. “I was just thinking about something else.”

  “Oh? What’s that?” She was trying to save my feelings, I was sure of it.

  Nina sat up, her dark blonde hair falling to one side, just an inch or so from her shoulder. She took a deep breath. “You said everyone is allowed their secrets. But I don’t want to keep them from you. Not if—not if I’m going to be your wife. Your real wife, Matthew.”

  I understood what she meant. After living in a farce of a marriage for years, Nina was being explicit. Nothing about us would ever be for show. If I hadn’t already done it three other times, I would have made love to her right there just for saying so.

  But.

  “More secrets, duchess?” I asked softly. My heart ached, but not because I was scared of what she would say. It could be anything, but I’d never leave this room without her with me. It hurt because of the fear I saw mirrored in her silvery eyes.

  We stared at each other for several minutes, a deadlock.

  “Not right now,” she lied.

  I knew she was lying. Just like I knew I couldn’t press her. Because I had said it myself: secrets had to be earned, not expected. As badly as I wanted to know I’d earned every secret she had, it wasn’t my place to say that for her. Not now. Not ever.

  “All right,” I said. “One day, then. I can wait. It doesn’t matter now. Not when I have everything I need.”

  “Everything?” she ventured doubtfully. “Do you really think I believe you’ll be content as a house husband? Or a bartender?” She rubbed my arm. “I know you miss your work.”

  I swallowed bitterly. “Maybe. But not as much as I missed you. Maybe I don’t need to be a lawyer anymore.”

  Yeah. Even I couldn’t convince myself of that one.

  Nina knew it too. “You don’t really mean that. You love your job. It’s who you are.”

  I frowned. Something about that bothered me. “Who I am is not a job, doll.” I sighed. “One thing’s for sure, though. When we get back to New York, I probably need to find a lawyer of my own.” Fuck. That was going to be expensive.

  Nina frowned. “What? Why?”

  “You didn’t think I was just going to head back to the shadows after this, did you? You think your husband’s going to be happy that you’re shacking up with his former prosecutor? I guarantee he’s going to try to have my license revoked. But I don’t plan on letting him, no matter how much it costs.”

  At that, she sat up and looked down at me, apparently forgetting that she was naked. “I will not have you ruin your life for me. I will not have it, Matthew. Absolutely not.”

  I frowned. “I wouldn’t be ruining my life. In case you didn’t notice, I’ve been pretty fucking miserable without you. That’s not going to change if I end up getting my job back, which is looking more and more unlikely these days.”

  Cardozo had been dodging my calls for weeks. Gardner’s trial wasn’t for another couple of months, but I figured that by now, my boss would at least have a plan for bringing me back unnoticed.

  Unless he didn’t.

  “So, what will you do instead? Tend bar?”

  I cringed. I wasn’t going to admit it, but I hated working at Jamie’s. Nina was right. I missed…well, not the office, per se. But I missed my work. Investigating a case. Putting together an argument. I liked the puzzle work of the law as much as the satisfaction that I was doing some good with it. I missed knowing every day that I wasn’t a total waste of space on this planet.

  My reaction was clearly all over my face.

  “What if I could ask Eric to give you—” Nina began gingerly.

  “Don’t even think about it,” I cut her off sharply. “If you even think the word allowance or trust or imagine for a second that we are getting married without an ironclad prenup, you don’t know me for shit, Nina. I am not marrying you for your money, and I won’t have a single person even thinking it. No arguments.”

  “But if it’s because I cost you your job—”

  “For the last time, you didn’t cost me my job,” I barked. “I cost me my job, Nina. And I’m getting a little tired of saying over and over that I’d do it again in a heartbeat. I made my choice. I’ll take the slap on the wrist, maybe get fired, and move on. And I’d do it again in a heartbeat if it still meant falling in love with you,
so just drop it, all right?”

  She had the decency to look contrite—so much that I felt a little sorry myself for snapping at her.

  “Look,” I said, turning to cup her face. “It’s going to be all right. It’s a job, not my life. Besides, now we don’t have to hide, right? That’s done with now. It’s over.”

  But for some reason, that gleam didn’t return to her eyes.

  “Nina. Isn’t it?”

  “Matthew,” she said quietly. “You don’t know him like I do. He’s vindictive. More than you can possibly imagine.”

  I almost asked her why she thought that, but decided against it. I wanted to know where she was going with this.

  “Think about what he’s already done,” she said. “Matthew, he forced his cousin to pretend to be me for ten years to get what he wants, and it can’t have only been because using my name got him what he wanted for his business. He wanted to ruin me in the end, at whatever cost to himself. Calvin is…”

  “An uncouth, egomaniacal, sociopathic motherfucker,” I finished heavily as I reached the same conclusion. “Who is unfortunately not as stupid as I thought. And the second he knows that we’re together, much less engaged, he’s going to fuck things up for me permanently. That’s what you’re saying, right?”

  “I can’t imagine he won’t try,” Nina said.

  I chewed on my lip. As much as I wanted to believe that Calvin’s potential threats had no teeth, I knew the truth. It was one thing to admit I had fallen for a defendant’s wife and allow myself to be put on administrative leave. It was another to be splashed across the New York tabloids and have every detail of our relationship picked apart by the press, even if I managed not to lose my license. Calvin and Nina were national news, and I couldn’t afford to be blacklisted in every state and county.

  The truth was, if I didn’t have the ability to do my job in any capacity, I didn’t really have much of anything beyond the woman next to me. And as much as I wanted to say that being her husband would be enough…she and I both knew the truth. It wouldn’t be. That’s not who I was.

  “Fine,” I agreed irritably. “You’re right. But I have to see you. Nina, we have to see each other still.”

  “Of course,” she said, capturing my face between her hands and kissing me.

  I slipped a hand around her waist and pulled her close, kissing her for a good long time, more than was really necessary just now. But Nina gave as good as she got. We were both feeling that desperation.

  But when we broke apart, she continued speaking.

  “Matthew, tell me you understand. Until I am fully divorced and Calvin’s trial is finished…no one in New York can know about us. Not even Jane and Eric. You know Jane. She can’t keep a secret to save her life.”

  Slowly, I nodded, hating myself more every second. “No one can know.”

  Nina pressed her forehead to mine. “We have to be quiet. We have to be careful.”

  I inhaled her scent of roses, feeling that heady high of love, not fear. That’s what would keep me going for the next several months. The promise of this scent. The knowledge of this night.

  “We keep it quiet,” I repeated, every word tasting like lead. “Until the trials are over. No one will know a thing.”

  Interlude II

  New York Sun

  April 14, 2019

  Gardner trial verdict pending

  After months of delays, the explosive three-week trial of New York financier Calvin Gardner finished this week at Kings County Criminal Court, with all parties eagerly awaiting a verdict.

  In what’s been called an extension of the largest human trafficking case in New York State history, Gardner, 49, was charged with sex trafficking, fraud, and identity theft in relation to a Brooklyn-based real estate scam tied to munitions magnate Jonathan Carson, who was killed in De Vries Shipping CEO Eric de Vries’s apartment in May of last year.

  “The Brooklyn DA lost its primary target when John Carson died last year, and now he’s looking to put a feather in his cap at any cost,” said Craig Moroney in a statement outside the Kings County courthouse. “He tossed around accusations like spaghetti at a wall. Except not a single one stuck.”

  Prosecutor Greg Cardozo had a different perspective. “It’s simple,” Cardozo told reporters. “Calvin Gardner and others like him believe they are above the law. They believe they can buy their way out of trouble when they’re caught. But the Brooklyn district attorney’s office is here for one reason only: to get criminals like him off the street.”

  Cardozo argued in court that similar investigations were ongoing across the region. None of the prosecutors’ offices in New Jersey or Connecticut could confirm.

  The trial reached its pinnacle on Monday with the testimony of Gardner’s estranged wife, Nina de Vries, 31, who filed for divorce last fall after pleading guilty to misdemeanor charges of permitting prostitution in conjunction with Gardner’s schemes. Ms. de Vries served as the signatory on nearly every property through which Gardner and the shell corporation, Pantheon LLC, allegedly funneled young women from a variety of Eastern European countries.

  The prosecution successfully argued for Ms. de Vries’s testimony to be admitted as evidence as an exception to spousal privilege because of her involvement with Mr. Gardner’s alleged crimes.

  On Monday and Tuesday, Ms. de Vries was questioned extensively by both the prosecution and the defense. She described finding false documents in her husband’s study, discovering Hungarian strangers in her property in Newton, MA, who appeared to be prostitutes, and dropped the bombshell that her husband had hidden his own Hungarian name and identity from her for the duration of their marriage.

  “It’s the reason I immediately changed my name back to de Vries,” she told the jury. “For ten years I believed I was married to someone named Calvin Gardner. Imagine my shock when I discovered his real name was Károly Kertész.”

  Gardner’s defense, however, was quick to rebut, objecting to Ms. de Vries’s commentary as speculation, and then argued there was nothing inherently wrong with changing one’s name and that the majority of Ms. de Vries’s testimony amounted to little more than hearsay.

  “Immigrants have been changing their names upon arriving in this country from its beginning,” said Mr. Gardner’s attorney in a statement. “It’s about as American as apple pie. Mr. Gardner has done nothing but support his wife and family for more than a decade. Perhaps Ms. de Vries’s discomfort with Mr. Gardner’s original name reveals more about her own bigotry than anything he has supposedly done to her. Or perhaps this is simply the remnant of Ms. de Vries’s grievances against her husband that she intends to air during their divorce.”

  Whether that is the case or not is ultimately up to the jury. A verdict is expected sometime next week.

  April 2019

  “And have you reached a verdict?”

  “We have, Your Honor.”

  Calvin Gardner edged forward on his seat, ignoring the way the back of his khaki gabardine pants stuck to his thighs with sweat or the way the hard wood chair dug into his hamstrings. His palms were clammy as he wiped them together in anticipation, and the brass buttons on his navy blazer clinked on the edge of the table.

  According to his lawyers—overpriced hacks who had taken over the case only after he had promised to bring his divorce case to the firm as well—they had a good chance. But the deliberation, at seven full days, had been longer than usual. Nina, goddamn her, was a sympathetic witness, even if the sharks next to him had seemed to tear apart every word she said. Still, he couldn’t deny the way his heart thumped when she described Ben perfectly. He knew he shouldn’t have given them the Brookline house. It was easily his worst move, catching her attention when nothing else had. Plus, everyone liked blondes. Especially ones that looked like her.

  Unable to help himself, Gardner stole a look over his shoulder. There she was in the third row, patiently waiting with her hands clasped in her lap, the only sign of nerves the way her lip was clen
ched between her teeth.

  She was dressed nearly devoid of color again. An ice-gray coat with a high collar that, along with her hair, tended to give her an angel-like appearance, but were fitting in other ways. Devoid of personality, yet too pure to spoil. “Suffragette white, of course,” his lawyer had joked when she had taken the stand last week. Gardner hadn’t found it funny. The idea that she had been silently protesting him for years made Gardner want to jump over the desk and throttle her there and then.

  When she realized that he was looking at her, Nina startled like she was one of her damn horses on Long Island.

  Gardner leered. She looked away. Bitch.

  “We the jury, in the case of The City of New York versus Calvin Gardner, find the defendant…”

  Gardner leaned forward, causing his chair to creak loudly through the courtroom.

  “…not guilty of the charge of human trafficking in the first degree.”

  There was a minor thrill of voices through the gallery. Behind him, Gardner heard his wife gasp: “What?”

  He smiled, feeling his entire chest balloon with relief and pride.

  And so they went on, down the list of charges, one after another. Gardner did his best to maintain a placid expression, but inside, he howled with victory. He had won. He had won, in spite of those fucking threats from Janus and the clout that Eric de Vries thought he had over this goddamn city. Blackmailing the judge had been a last-minute effort, but it had paid off in the end when he had tossed out more than half the prosecution’s evidence. Certain types of men couldn’t say no to underage pussy, and this one was no different. It had been a risk—a huge risk.

  “Congratulations,” said Clyde, turning to Gardner with an outstretched hand.