Vengeful Love: Black Diamonds (14 page)

She starts paddling towards me.

“Get away from me.” I laugh so hard I lose my footing in the sand.

“I can’t help it. It’s the Pee Monster in me, it wants you, bad.”

“You’re gross.”

“I’m more sanitary than going in those toilets with kids’ dribble on the floor and dirty door handles.”

Shaking my head, I flip onto my back and move my legs in upside-down breast stroke, the sun beating on my face. “Amanda, I’m booze-crazed.”

She chuckles and bumps into me, her body in the same pose as mine. “I know.”

When we make our way back to the loungers, Jake heads over with another punch, a watermelon shake and a bottle of water. “Thanks,” I say with an easy smile. “When in St. Maarten.”

Punch five has me blindo. I can’t remember the last time I was drunk and not throwing up outside a club, making a mess of my relationship with Gregory, and embarrassing myself in floods of tears. The thought of being drunk-happy makes me kind of fuzzy inside.

“Coming inth sea?”

Amanda moves her hands restfully behind her head. “I’m good here.”

“S’kay.” I trip a little on something, maybe a shell, as I wander into the water.

The beach is emptying, though the sea is the warmest it’s been all day. Lifting my cup to make sure it doesn’t get contaminated with Amanda’s pee, I turn in circles, round and round, feeling happy. I close my eyes and remember my father turning me to music in our lounge as I stood on his toes. I remember the times Gregory has turned me, held me close as we’ve danced. Our perfect moment on top of Primrose Hill. Just us. Our world.

Opening my eyes, looking far out to the setting sun, I know I’ll never look at a sunset, the blue sky, the topaz sea the same way again.

“I’m alive,” I whisper to myself as I stop and watch the sun slowly descend, sipping the last of my scrumptious punch.

It’s a presence. A charge. I know he’s here. I can feel him. Turning to Amanda on her lounger, I find Williams sitting on the edge of her bed, massaging her feet in his lap. And my angel, sitting up, straddling my lounger with a bottle of Corona in his hand, watching me with a smile.

“You drunk, baby?” he asks with a smirk as I stroll towards him.

I don’t know what the right answer is to his question. It’s not like it’s a difficult question. Words just don’t seem to be fitting together right. Instead, I shrug. That’ll have to do. Leaning forward to put my empty cup on the lounger, I stagger, then turn around to look for whatever it was that knocked me off balance. Whatever it was is gone now.

“Oh well.” I shrug again with a giggle. My giggle makes me giggle more because it’s such a funny giggle. Weird. A little girl giggle. So funny.

Amanda laughs and her laugh is really far too funny, too. So, so funny.

“Alright, gorgeous. I think you’ve had enough fruit juice for one day.”

Bending my knees, I fall to the lounger between Gregory’s spread legs. I need to make him understand. “The juice s’really good here, Ryans. Yoush try it.”

He leans back laughing.
Oh, bloody hell, his laugh is really funny, too. So funny I could pee.
“I gotta go,” I squeal, dancing to my feet and making the toilet a target.

As I exit the wooden swing-back door of the toilets, business taken care of, I’m hoisted straight up over Gregory’s shoulder.

“Bye, Jake! Thans for the good juices. So fresh.”

Jake waves. He looks so peculiar from upside down. It makes me laugh. Hard. Gregory doesn’t find it as funny as me. He doesn’t laugh out loud. But see, he’s not upside down. Maybe he should be upside down, then it would be hilarious.

When we’re back at the yacht Carl helps Amanda first, then offers me a hand and practically pulls me onto the first deck.
Our
yacht.
S.R. Aurora.
I like the sound of that.
Scarlett Ryans.

“Rum punch?” Carl asks.

“A little too much rum punch,” Gregory replies.

“Bertie was set to serve dinner at eight thirty, sir, would you like it sooner?”

“Maybe something to nibble on would be good and water, lots of water.”

I lean into Carl and pat his chest with both palms. “He’s so bossy, Carl. So, so bossy.”

“Baby, I’m going to change. Are you coming with me?”

“Nope. Nada. Neine. No. Niente.”

“Niente means nothing, baby.”

“Yess’know, Gregory.” I roll my eyes and shake my head. “You can be so silly.”

“Okay, Miss Silly, are you coming with me?”

“No. You said water. Going to sit up there and I’ll have water.”

Amanda pats Gregory on the arm, fond and touching. She nestles into a rattan chair and pulls her knees underneath her. She looks sleepy.

“Let’s dance,” I say. “We should dance.”

“Alright. What do you want to dance to?”

I wiggle my hips as I move towards her on the chair, swirling a finger just in front of her nose. “I think you know.”

“Mr. Brightside!”

“Carl, can you—”

It’s not obvious whether he’s laughing at or with me but I don’t care because The Killers’ “Mr. Brightside,”
my university party piece, comes over the speakers of the yacht as we slowly back out of the harbour into the ocean.

As the guitar kicks in, I walk backwards to the bow and Amanda struts towards me in time to the music, her lips pursed like a rock star. The beat drops. The voices. Base. Drums. Amanda screams, running towards me.

We hold hands, jumping, shouting the lyrics.

Backing away from her, I cover my eyes as the lyrics hit,
I just can’t look it’s killing me.
I’m jumping, arms in the air, the balls of my bare feet pounding in time to the beat. Amanda leans forward and unties her hair, letting her auburn locks swing as she bangs her head up and down.

“I love this sooooong!” she squeals.

Hips wiggling, knees bent, I slap my hands on my chest and pull off my imaginary dress, miming the actions being sung
.

We both fling ourselves to the floor, falling on our knees, screaming to each other, “Letting me goooooooo!”

Hell, I forgot how much fun we used to have.

Amanda stands in the verse, fanning herself as she moves to a lounger and sips cool water. I’m sweating, I’m hyper and I’m on top of the world.

Air guitar.

Head down, one leg bent and bouncing, I play that damned air guitar like a wild thing. I jump, my feet kicking out beneath me, my arms punching the air above my head.

Then I see him. Arms folded. Watching me.

I stop and bite my lip. I look back at him, then over myself like I’ve just had a dancing exorcist-type experience.

Oh, fuck it!

I jump again to the final chorus and repeat my dress removal action as a massive smirk pulls on his lips and Williams joins Amanda in hysterics.

“Scarlett, come away from the edge,” Gregory shouts over the music.

I stop dancing, check the position of my feet, then challenging him, I shuffle back towards the edge.

“Scarlett.”

“Oh, Gregory, she’s fine. Bloody hell.”

He scowls at Amanda and starts walking towards me.

“Scarlett, I won’t tell you again.”

I shuffle my feet back further. “What will you do about it?” He speeds up when my heels hang over the edge. “Will you spank me, Mr. Ryans?”

He darts towards me, knocking me off balance and ends up catching me, pulling me into him as I chuckle. “Baby, flirting with men on the beach, getting drunk without me, you were already in spanking territory.” I swallow audibly under the intensity of his stare, the heat emanating from his body moves directly to my sex without passing Go. “For this, you’re going to be tied to the bed and you’re going to accept my cock until you make me come in that fucking marvelous mouth of yours.” A sharp breath fills my lungs. “
Then
, I’m going to spank you.”

“I want you so bad right now,” I confess.

“My cock is twitching to be inside you.”

“Give in,” I whisper.

He draws his fingers gently down the side of my face and tucks my sea and wind messed locks behind my ear in that way he does. “I love seeing you happy.”

“Tha’s very fortunate, Mr. Ryans, ’cause you make me es’tremely happy.”

“God, I love you, Scarlett.”

His hand moves to my nape and pulls my mouth against his. Like there’s no one else in the world, he scoops me up, my legs locking around his waist, my fingers gripping his hair.

“Alright, alright, Jesus, you two!” Amanda shouts. “Put her down.”

“She’s horny because Williams won’t fuck her,” I whisper against Gregory’s lips. “Says he’ll hurt the baby.”

“Not my fucking problem. You need a shower before dinner.”

I mumble my agreement and let him carry me below deck.

Chapter Fourteen

I wake with a start. I’ve been dreaming and have a lingering sense of emptiness but I can’t piece together the story. Reaching out for my comfort blanket, I find sheets and mattress but no Gregory. Rolling to face the bedside cabinet, I see it’s four fifty-five in the morning. I pull on a short silk nightdress and go in search of Gregory.

His nightmares are less frequent now but they still have a realness that makes him restless in bed, sometimes crying out. They still make him retreat and put up his walls.

The yacht must have docked at a new port whilst we were sleeping. We’re tied up at the back of the harbour, the spot closest to the ocean. The bay is full of smaller boats and flanked on either side by cliffs. Moonlight bounces off the gently rocking waves. A new place, in darkness, silence, stillness. It could be beautiful but it fills me with an eerie sense of apprehension.

Walking out along the main deck, I see him leaning over the rail at one side of the boat. His ripped torso is bare above his black lounge bottoms, his muscles taut as he braces himself on his forearms. He drags one hand back through his untamed bed hair. I think it must have been a bad nightmare but then he speaks, his words short and sharp.

“Give them more. Everyone has a price, Sydney. We’ve got until twelve your time before they run the story. It’s already after nine. Put the money to them now. If they don’t accept it, ask what it’ll take. One way or another this is not going to print. Call me back.”

As if he senses me, he hangs up on his head of PR. His face when he turns is haunted. “Go back to bed, baby.”

“You said you’d paid them off.”

“I never said that. You assumed that.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me they wouldn’t accept money?”

“Scarlett, I’m fixing it.” His words are subdued, like he’s fed up of fighting. I go to him and wrap my arms around him. He holds a hand over mine on his chest as I lean into his back and gently press my lips to his shoulder.

His Blackberry rings and he answers through speaker phone. A small act that means more to me than he probably realises.

“Sydney, did they take it?”

“No, I’m sorry, Gregory.”

“How much do they want?”

“Gregory, I don’t think they have a price. They’re a small paper. They realise the big guns are tied up in settlement agreements. They think this is too big a story to let go.”

His grip tightens over my hand. “Stay close. I’ll call you back.”

Gregory storms to the front of the boat and I follow, sitting down onto the edge of a rattan lounger, pulling one knee under me. He paces, one hand on his hip.

“Level with me,” I say, not confrontational but certainly authoritative.

He turns to face me, his legs firmly planted, looking outrageously stunning as the moon’s light shines on his lean abs. He folds his arms across his chest. Disappointing but actually good for my concentration.

“They aren’t this excited about a self-defence story that’ll blow over in a week, so tell me what they’ve got.”

“I don’t want to drag you into this, Scarlett.”

“Too late, Ryans, I’m in it for the long-haul. You’ve got me.”

“The payoff.” He barely mumbles the word.

I want to freak out. I want to lash out or cry in hysterics. Instead, I sit up straight and draw air into my lungs. “How? What do they know?”

His shoulders visibly drop a half inch. “They’re clutching at straws. There’s nothing to find.”

“Don’t try to make light of this and patronise me. They’re not clutching at straws, they think they’ve got something solid. No small press turns down the money I know you’ll be offering if they’ve got nothing. They wouldn’t just make up something like a bribe. So tell me everything. Right now.”

His eyes widen and his brows rise in surprise at my tone.
Yes, Ryans, this is
our
future.

“I’ve told you everything there is to tell. The money was in relation to the gun. That’s all. It had nothing to do with the murder. The deal was, if there was no murder charge, the gun would disappear.”

“Do you seriously expect me to keep believing this?”

“Yes. Because it’s the truth. I’ve never lied to you, Scarlett, never. There are things I haven’t told you in the past but you asked me outright and I told you, that arrangement had nothing to do with the murder charge.”

“So if the charge had gone ahead...” my body shudders, “...you know what, I don’t want to think about that. What concerns me more is how convenient it is that one of the few papers that could print something on this has wound up with the information. Don’t you think that’s strange? Who knows about the bribe? Who made the deal?”

“Me, Jackson, Barnes and his contact at the CPS.”

“That’s it?”

“John Harrison would be an idiot if he couldn’t work it out.”

Holy shit.
“And I thought lawyers were supposed to have integrity.” Then I snort, thinking about the irony of that statement. I killed a man and lied about it. I know about a bribe and I’m hiding it.

“They can’t talk, Scarlett. Jackson and Barnes aren’t even a concern but the others have too much at stake. They’d implicate themselves.”

“Well, someone thinks you bribed a government official, Gregory. It’s an imprisonable offence for Christ’s sake, you don’t just—”

It hits me like lightening, burning through my body, turning my stomach. “Katrina Martin.”

He nods slowly, resolute. “I agree.”

“I knew she wouldn’t go away. She’s got a vendetta and she won’t back down. She’s not that kind of woman.” Dropping my head into my hands, I roll my fingertips over my temples, trying to make sense of everything, trying to get my head straight.

He bends to his hunkers and peels my hands away from my face. “Baby, please, don’t let this drag us down. No more. I’ll fight the world for you but don’t let this keep coming back.”

In this moment his exterior might be strong but I know that’s not how he’s feeling inside. He needs me as much as I need him.

“They won’t find a bribe, baby. Katrina Martin has nothing concrete. There’s no trail. There are no more people involved than those who absolutely had to be. She’s got a hunch, that’s all. The paper will investigate and eventually they’ll come up empty.”

“That’s not the point though, is it? That’s not even your biggest concern.”

He closes his eyes and covers my hands in his. “No.”

“You don’t want them to dig into your past.”

“It makes me look weak, Scarlett, and if that doesn’t ruin my reputation, the fact that people will draw their own conclusions about my motive for killing my father will do it. But it’s more than just me.”

“You don’t want them to find Elsa.”

He shakes his head, opening his eyes. “She doesn’t deserve it. And it would break my mother. I need you to trust me, baby. I’ll fix this. If we panic, we tell the world we’ve got something to hide.”

“I’m so sorry, Gregory. This is all my fault.” Tears roll warm down my cheeks as a knife twists in my chest.

“You saved me, Scarlett. Please don’t be sorry about that. I never will be.”

He drops to his knees and pulls me into his chest, squeezing me against his warm, bare flesh.

“What are we going to do?”

“Right now, I’m going to lay you down and make love to you.”

There are ten things we should be doing instead. The working day is beginning in England. But he needs this. We both need it. Just us, nothing else.

“As long as we’re good,” he mumbles into my neck.

“I love you.”

His kiss is deep, full and passionate. His tongue flecks against mine, then licks the inside of my lip as he lifts me from the lounger, grabbing the cushion, and carries me to the bow of the yacht. He throws the cushion on the deck then lowers us down, my back pressed to the bed cushion.

He hovers over me, his muscles displayed to their greatest advantage, tense above me. “I need us to be okay,” he whispers against my lips.

“We are.”

He kisses me desperately, his lips still plump and tender like mine from our session just hours before. He cups my breast, moving the silk of my nightdress over the sensitive ends. He bites my other nipple leaving a wet mark on the silk. My legs fall wider apart. My fingers indulge in the velvet of his dark hair and pull him back to kiss me, my hands exploring the harsh line of his jaw, relishing the graze of his day old stubble against my skin.

Taking his weight on one forearm, he lifts my hands above my head, stretching out my body, making my back arch, fully exposing my chest to him. He holds them there as he fucks me with his mouth, drowning me in the pleasure of our warm moisture fusing.

“You’re so fucking beautiful.” The tip of his nose runs down my sternum, between my breasts and further south until my hips are gyrating, aching to feel him inside me again.

He inhales as he runs his nose across my cleft, then pushes my silk nightdress up my stomach, lifting me so he can take it up to my chest. His teeth lock onto my nipple and tug the hardening mound of hypersensitive skin, still sore from earlier. The striking, almost unbearable pleasure of his touch forces his name to roll off my tongue as a lustful beg.

I push my pelvis against him, craving contact with his solid shaft. As his silk bottoms press against my tight knot, he moans.

“Let me feel you,” I plead, my hands grabbing his firm arse cheeks, feeling them flex as he rolls his hips in a hard grind against me.

I grip his sack, gently pulling him against my sex. His balls harden and his length thickens as I draw my hand to his end and feel his first release of pre-come.

“I love your hands,” he says on a low, rumbling growl.

I take that as my cue to work his length with my fist, pumping up and down, rolling my thumb around and over the swollen head, each move building my own muscles into a frenzy.

“Let me feel your mouth.”

He kneels, freeing himself of his bottoms, his body straight and tall from his knees, his erection proud and long against his abdomen. The erotic sight has me licking my lips. Slipping my feet beneath me, I kneel low. He lifts the hem of my nightdress and peels it over my head, letting it pool beside us, then he yanks me back to him, my breasts against his chest. He cups my face with one hand and fixes me with hooded, veracious eyes. Then he pushes my head back and drags his hand over my throat to my breast, pinching the tip as he sucks and bites my neck.

Sitting back onto my heels, I fix my eyes on his heavy browns as I slide my fingers down my center, moaning when I feel myself drenched with desire. Stroking my wetness over my clit, then moving back inside, I let my head roll back as Gregory growls and moves his hand to his cock. He’s rock hard as he works himself, his naked body towering above me. My insides tremble.

Sitting up, I move my wet fingers to his anus and roll around the entrance as a rough, visceral noise leaves his throat. My fingers slide just inside. His hands fist in my hair and I push one finger deeper. His body tenses but he doesn’t stop me. Curling my finger, I apply pressure and he yanks harder at my hair. Bending forward, I lick the base of his erection, drawing my tongue slowly over his sack.

“Fuck. Jesus!”

The sound and sight of him unravelling sparks flames in my core.

I wrap my lips around him.

“Fuck, Scarlett.”

With my free hand, I grip his base, working his anus and his cock slowly as I move my mouth greedily up and down. His hips move cautiously. His arse cheeks tense.

“Jesus! What are you doing to me?”

His sack hardens and lifts and with a bark, he spurts into my mouth, pulling out and continually pulsing against my stomach. His body shudders and spasms the last of his pleasure onto my skin.

He holds me to his chest, his chin resting on my head as his breathing subsides. “Christ, Scarlett, no one has ever done that to me. You took everything.”

He lies me back on the cushion and attacks me with his mouth. “That was. I don’t know what that was.”

I smile against his kiss. Maybe he finally understands how he makes me feel. How my head fogs, my eyes blind and my head empties when he gives me that kind of orgasm.

He wastes no time in moving between my legs and pushing my knees apart. The cool air of the night welcome on my hot skin. His tongue swirls over my clit then dips between my lips. “I think you liked that, too,” he says, his breath hot on my already built up sex.

“Gregory, I need to come.”

He moves his tongue in and out of my entrance and slides his thumb through my moisture before turning it in deep, smooth circles over my clit.

“Gregory!”

“I can feel you, baby. Give it up to me.”

He works me harder, more frantically and I squirt around him, throwing my hand across my mouth to stifle my scream in the silent darkness of the harbour. His fingers move lazily until my muscles have settled and my breathing returned to normal. Then he crawls over me and rolls us onto his back. I shiver when his lips press against my temple.

“You’re cold.”

“I don’t care.”

He pecks my temple again. “I do.”

“I just want to lie with you.”

“I know, baby. Me, too. But I need to deal with the paper. Then we can spend all day in bed if you like.”

Grumbling petulantly, I take his hand and let him pull me up to stand. Once we’re back in our night clothes, the reality of the situation sets quickly back in.

“I need to speak to Barnes and Jackson.”

I nod.

“Scarlett, I don’t want to involve you in this. I can go to someone else. But—”

“You need an injunction.”

“Yes,” he almost exhales.

“Okay. I’ll go get my laptop. Get Sydney to send me everything she has. I’ll call Richard, he’s the partner at Saunders who deals with this kind of thing. I’ll brief him and get him on the case. It’ll cost you because it’s a rush job.”

“Money is no object.”

“Alright.”

* * *

Thirty minutes later, we debrief each other. Richard is filing for an interim injunction to stop the tabloid going to print and is confident it’ll be granted given the lack of foundation to the paper’s argument and the attack it represents to Gregory’s reputation. It’ll take a few hours so it’s a waiting game for now. Gregory has told Jackson what he needs to know to keep him in the loop but doesn’t want to pull him away from his honeymoon. Katrina Martin is in London and Barnes has put the wheels in motion to suspend her on the basis she’s investigating a closed case without consent and she’s suspected to have leaked confidential details.