Vengeful Love: Black Diamonds (12 page)

“I can’t believe I get this forever.”

I wrap my arms around his and interlace our fingers. I can’t speak but I can make him feel how much I adore him. Any way. Every way. Always.

Chapter Twelve

Gregory pulls us into the port in a rental Porsche. A completely unnecessary extravagance to get from the airstrip in St. Maarten to the harbour.

“I can’t wait to see the boat,” Amanda squeals, jumping out of the car. “Which one’s yours?” She glances at Gregory then scans the host of white and blue boats docked in the Marina.

Gregory rolls his eyes and I dig an elbow into his ribs. “None of those,” he says.

A port official comes to talk to Gregory and when he leaves, a man maybe in his late twenties or early thirties with a cute tan and ruffled dirty-blond hair makes his way over. His black knee-length shorts and black T-shirt tell me he’s probably crew. He lifts his sports shades to his head and squints as he shakes Gregory’s hand.

“Nice to see you again, sir,” he says with a soft North American accent.

Gregory nods. “Is she ready?”

“Sure is.”

“Thank you, Carl. Is the tender ready?”

“Ready and waiting, sir. We’ll get you out there and Rick will come for the luggage.” He inclines his head in the direction of the wooden jetty. Gregory in turn flicks his head at Amanda, Williams and me.

“Guess that means come hither,” Amanda jibes.

Christ, this could be painful.
Ignoring her, I happily gallop to Gregory’s side, my white sundress floating as I move.

“Carl, this is Scarlett Heath.”

“Miss Heath, pleasure to meet you. And congratulations.”

I cast questioning eyes to Gregory, though he can’t see it for my Bvlgari shades.

“Erm, thank you, Carl. So, you’ll be keeping us above water for the next ten days?”

“Whilst you’re on the yacht, that’s the idea.”

“Then I best keep you onside. Where are you from?” Gregory guides me along the jetty with an unnecessarily protective hand on the small of my back.

“Originally, the West Coast but my family lives in Florida these days.”

“I guess that’s easier for you to get to the boat?”

“Other way around, it’s easier for me to get back to my family. The crew lives on the yacht most of the year, Miss Heath.”

“Scarlett, please.”

Carl eyes Gregory, then me, and smiles.
Guess I’ll be staying Miss Heath, then.

Carl helps me into the small tender boat and introduces me to Bryony, a quite stunning woman about my age with golden thighs and a tiny waist beneath her black shorts and T-shirt combo. I throw a stubborn glance back to Gregory. There’s a ghost of a smile around his mouth and I know those goddamn eyes will be twinkling with arrogance behind his shades. He sits back onto the bench next to me, and crosses a heel over the pale-blue shorts covering his thigh. He rolls back the sleeves of his pink-and-white-striped shirt and lazily drapes an arm across the rim of the boat behind my back.

“No. I haven’t,” he says, leaning into my ear. “But I’m going to spank your arse for being a green-eyed monster.”

I gasp at his crass words and look nervously at Amanda and Williams wondering if they heard, but she’s too giddy looking around at the boat and Williams is chatting to uber-pretty Bryony.

Gregory asks Carl about the weather and the expected sea conditions for the coming days as Bryony backs us away from the pier and turns the boat so we’re facing out to sea, her sun-kissed, glossy hair blowing in the wind.

We break out of the harbour and pick up speed so water crashes against the front screen and spray reaches my bare arms, cooling my skin under the hot Caribbean sun. We head out beyond a huge cruise liner and a yacht, anchored alone, comes into view, gleaming on top of the turquoise sea.

My jaw drops as I switch my eyes between the super-yacht and Gregory. “You. Are. Fucking. Kidding. Me.”

He chuckles, as does Williams. Amanda almost pees her pants.

“I’ve told you to mind your fucking language when you’re not in the bedroom.”

I pull down my shades to peer at him. “Gregory. Come the
fuck
on. That’s your yacht?”

A supercilious grin draws on his face. “Working hard has a few perks.”

“Ho-ly shit!” Amanda eventually says, each syllable laboured.

Williams laughs and wraps his arm around her ribs, pulling her tenderly onto his lap. “Our baby is going to come out preceding everything with ‘Holy.’” He kisses her temple and I want to coo.

“I have a surprise for you,” Gregory says, as Bryony slows the boat to a stop, still twenty meters or so from the yacht.

Carl speaks to someone through a radio, then a man appears on the deck of the yacht, near the nose thingy, which Gregory informs me is the bow. A blue banner hangs over the edge of the yacht. Gregory smiles at me, takes my hand in his, then nods to Carl who gives the okay to whoever is on the other end of the radio.

The banner is rolled up slowly and for the second time, my jaw hangs loose. I’m speechless as I read the black writing stating the name of the yacht.

S.R. Aurora.

I cover my lips with my fingertips and I’m pleased my glazed eyes are masked by shades.
Scarlett Ryans Aurora.

“Presumptuous,” I say to Gregory. He liquefies me with his stunning half smile and I throw my arms around his neck. “Thank you. It’s incredible.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. I really want to hate you,” Amanda says, swiping away a tear.

I feel Gregory’s chest move as he chuckles in my hold. “Alright, Bryony, let’s get on her.”

Bryony and Carl expertly position us adjacent to eight white steps. At the top, another six crew members wait to greet us, all dressed in the same uniform.

Bryony asks if Amanda and I would like to be shown around the ship, which of course we do, and I realise as she talks excitedly in her Barbadian accent about the three hundred foot yacht and all its features, I really quite like her.

She leads us around the bottom deck where there’s an eight seater dining table, two rattan sofas, two matching rattan chairs and four matching sun loungers. The hot afternoon sun beats on my face as I tilt my head and tie my hair back into a ponytail. I open my eyes to a speed boat flying across the sea, two bikini clad girls waving vigorously in the back as water crashes over the front of the boat. Amanda lifts on to her toes in her gladiator sandals and waves back.

“Miss Heath, Miss Darling, my name is Bertie and I handle all the food and beverages on the yacht.” He’s a tall red-haired man and his pale freckled skin makes me think it’s a good job he works in the kitchen rather than on deck. “Can I interest you in a fruit punch?”

“Is it virgin?” Amanda asks.

“Yes, of course, Miss Darling. And might I say, congratulations, Mr. Williams is a fine man.”

A glowing smile pulls on her lips as she takes the pink-orange juice from Bertie’s tray.

“It’s delicious, Bertie,” I say. “Is it your recipe?”

“Sure is. Wait ’til you see what I can do with a bottle of Disarrono and Tequilla Blanco.”

“I’m looking forward to it already.”

Amanda sighs and drains her virgin drink, depositing the empty glass back on Bertie’s tray.

“Another?” he asks.

She shakes her head, clearly sulking.

“D’you guys want to go on?” Bryony asks, gesturing to the stairs, one set going down, the other going up to the next deck.

“Please.”

“Great. Come on. So, down there is really just a deck for getting on and off the boat. If you’re diving, swimming, going on the Jet Skis. We’ll go up.”

There are more gadgets and levers around the steering wheel than I would have expected but the view from the top deck is amazing. Endless, sparkling sea merging into clear blue sky. I hold onto the metal rail and look out to the horizon, wondering whether I’ve ever felt more complete in my life. Lifting and turning my hand, I watch the rock on my finger twinkle under the sun, my stomach flipping as I think about Gregory being mine. Forever. An irrational wave of yearning washes over me and my heart skips when I see him standing at the bow, hands in the pockets of his shorts and looking out. All mine.

At the sound of my bare feet on the deck he turns, welcoming me into his arms. “Have fun?”

I slip my arms around his waist. “Yes, sir. I like your boat.”

“Our boat. It does have your name on it.”

Pulling back, I smile up at him. “Yes, it does. I like that something is ours. But maybe next time we could share something like a case of wine. A yacht seems a tad extreme. We’re in pre-nup territory.”

He pushes me back by my shoulders, his face not humoured at all. “Don’t say shit like that. Pre-nups are for people who intend to break. Nothing is going to break us, Scarlett. Do you hear me? I won’t let it. Everything I have will be yours. Everything.” He takes my hand and places it across his chest. “You already have the one thing I thought I’d never give away. If you break it, I don’t think I’ll survive.”

“That makes two of us.”

He drowns me in a slow, tender kiss.

“Mr. Ryans, sir, a drink for sail away?” Gregory keeps me pulled tight to his side, a closeness I enjoy, as we accept champagne from Bertie. “Pol Rodger Sir Winston Churchill 2002, like you asked.”

“Thank you, Bertie.”

“Would you like lunch when we’re off, sir?”

“What time is it?”

“Two thirty, sir.”

Gregory nods. “Yes, thank you.”

“After lunch I’d like to talk you quickly through the plans for Black Diamonds,” I say. “As in the game, not the stones on my finger.”

“Alright. Not too long though, I want you to have a break. You need one.”

“Yes, sir.”

Williams crosses the deck to us, his free arm loosely resting on Amanda’s shoulder. “Alright, you two, a toast. To finally getting your shit together.”

We laugh and clink glasses. “Heartfelt, Williams, thanks.”

“Oh, trust me, Scarlett, it genuinely is heartfelt.”

Bertie serves up chicken Caesar salad and cool Semillon-Sauvignon. We eat in the shade, a welcome break from the stifling heat. Everything seems right somehow. Williams and Amanda seem happy. Gregory and Amanda have gone forty-five minutes without a jibe passing between them. My perfect man is eating with his left hand as his right strokes the fourth finger of my left. Yet, I have the same lingering feeling I’ve had since Katrina Martin showed up in Dubai. This is just a hiatus. Somewhere, she’ll be thinking up her next move.

“Alright, lady. Shall we talk about Black Diamonds?”

“Oh, hell, I’m off if you’re talking work.” Amanda is out of her seat quicker than she’d hit Harrods in a flash sale.

“Mind if I hang around, old boy?” Williams asks.

“Not at all.” Gregory pushes his seat back from the table, his elbow resting on the red table cloth, his index finger and thumb pinching his chin.

“I just want to bring you up to date with the plan. I get that you want to take Black Diamonds off the market to protect the Jail Run profits but just buying the game doesn’t stop somebody else from coming out with a replica or the actual game if they somehow got their hands on the source code. Now, it can be tricky to register intellectual property in gaming software, particularly app-based games. Well, I don’t need to tell you that, look at the hit Jail Run is taking thanks to Black Diamonds
being a similar concept.
But
, we do need to get you some registered intellectual property rights to give us a starter for ten if someone tries to rip off the game. Otherwise, you’re right back to paying seven hundred and fifty thousand and employing a new software developer.”

“I have a feeling he’ll come good,” Gregory says, more to Williams than me.

“I agree,” I admit. “But the point is valid.”

“And accepted.”

“Good. Now, I’m not an intellectual property specialist but I can obviously hold my own. I’ve pulled together a plan for due diligence and, loosely, registration of an intellectual property portfolio but that part is pretty fluid, depending on what the due diligence throws up. Of course,
most
people would have done that due diligence before putting down an obscene about of money for a game.”

“It wouldn’t be the most costly mistake we’ve ever made if it doesn’t pay off, Scarlett. We stand to lose a lot more if we do nothing.”

I hold a palm in the air. “Let’s not go over old ground.”

“You started—”

“You were saying, Scarlett?” Williams interjects, adjusting his Oakleys.

Gregory scowls. “Go on.”

I take a sip of Sem-Sauv and sit back into my chair. “Halt me if I’m teaching my grandmother to suck eggs at any point. I won’t fill you with stuff you don’t need to know. Suffice to say, there are various forms of intellectual property rights, copyright, trademarks, design rights, for example. We can register them all to an extent based on what I’ve seen of the game.”

“I thought copyright was an automatic right?” Williams asks.

“Mmm, well, it is. Stuart was a one man band and from what I know he wasn’t operating through a company. So yes, copyright vests in him as the creator. But that’s the case under English law. In some jurisdictions copyright has to be registered, same for trademarks and design rights. And that’s part of the due diligence jigsaw. I’m sure it’s all fine but we need to confirm that Stuart does actually hold the copyright and other rights in the game. Once we confirm that and assuming we do, we look to registration. I’ve already got a junior looking into Stuart’s ownership.”

“And what’s the registration plan?”

“Well, it varies from country to country. If everything goes to plan, we’ll start registering what we can. My suggestion, unless you object, is that we start with China and Europe. Then we move to the US and Australia. Then the rest of the world, to the extent appropriate.”

Gregory rubs his chin. “Why do we stage it?”

“Cost, resource. The applications take time. I need support from local counsel.”

“Staged is acceptable but I want the US in the first round with China and Europe. Gaming is too big in the US to delay.”

“Alright. I can fix that. Anything else?”

“What can go wrong?” Williams asks.

I laugh. “There’s a seven hundred and fifty thousand pound question.”

Gregory rolls his jaw stiffly but relaxes quickly.