Dinner is served alfresco on the hotel veranda with all guests seated in a square, Sandy and Jackson central and blissfully happy. The whole event is luxurious – exquisite seafood, fine champagne, wonderful music – yet all very intimate and charming, all very much Sandy and Jackson.
Gregory’s mum looks wonderful in a damson, floor-length dress. She’s gone matchy-matchy with Gregory’s stepfather, Lawrence, teaming his cream linen suit with a pink shirt.
We return to the table for speeches and toasts. I delight in Jackson’s rare public displays of affection for Sandy, and through Gregory’s easy-mannered speech for his bodyguard and close friend. Even Amanda rolls her eyes because I catch her smiling and laughing in all the right places as Gregory speaks.
He’ll win you over, Amanda Darling, just you wait and see.
There’s a break after the speeches to give the evening entertainment a chance to set up. The steel band strikes up again as the guests spread out around white rattan furniture on the beach.
‘Can I take you for a stroll?’ Gregory asks, holding out his hand.
He’s taken off his blazer and now looks outstanding in just grey trousers, resting invitingly on his hips and across his pert arse. The combination of his thin, white shirt and champagne makes me think of where else I’d prefer to be with this man than on a public stroll.
Brushing it off, I slip my hand into his.
We amble barefoot and hand in hand along a deserted section of the beach until the sound of music is replaced with only the gentle swooshing of waves and synthetic lights are replaced by the late setting sun. For once, there’s no work, no crazed biological father drama, no Alzheimer’s, no probate issues or trying to sell my childhood home; it’s just us and the vastness of the Caribbean Sea.
As we pause to soak it in, a light wind causes my hair to tickle my bare back and a contented shiver kisses my body. Gregory stands behind me, wrapping me in his arms as we watch the gentle crash of the waves on the shoreline.
‘Thank you for today, Gregory. This whole thing is wonderful. What you’ve done for Sandy and Jackson, flying everyone out here, paying for the wedding. You’re amazing.’
He takes my hands to the small of his back, twisting me and pulling me to him. ‘It’s not just for them, Scarlett. I know how much you wanted Sandy to have the wedding she dreamed of.’ He brushes my hair from my cheek and I lean into his palm as he speaks. ‘You’ve saved my life, in more ways than one.’ The sincerity in his gaze is magnetic. He’s changed so much since we first met, at least with me. ‘I feel reborn with you. Like I get a second chance to live and have everything I want.’ He pecks my nose. ‘Need. And I want you to have everything you want, too.’
‘I already have everything.’
‘If there’s ever anything that you want, just tell me. I mean, do you even want to work? You don’t need to and I would never think any less of you. I’d happily have you as my plaything at home.’
‘And let them call me your gold-digging girlfriend in the nextTimes Rich List?’
He doesn’t laugh.
‘I enjoy my job, Gregory. Being a lawyer is part of me and it’s part of the person you fell in love with. I want her to stick around for you.’
‘I had a feeling you’d say that,’ he says with a mischievous grin.
‘Why are you looking like that?’ I pout, playfully raising one brow.
‘I have two questions to ask you.’
My heart flutters in my chest. ‘Go on.’
‘Well, we make a good team, you and me. And I don’t give your firm legal work, not really; I giveyoulegal work.’
My heart rate returns to normal and I internally curse.Of course he wasn’t going to ask youthat.
‘Are you listening?’
‘Mm, yes, of course. We make a good team. Like Jekyll and Hyde.’
His lips curve. ‘Something like that. So, I was thinking, why don’t you move in-house? Come and work for me at GJR as my head legal advisor?’
‘Work for you?’
‘Ja.’ He laughs nervously, his eyes searching for an answer.
I step back and nibble my bottom lip, turning slowly on the spot, the hem of my dress floating up from my thighs. ‘That could be trouble.’
He looks to the sea across my shoulder and it’s his turn to bite his bottom lip as his hands move to his trouser pockets, uncommonly vulnerable. ‘Ja.’
