"Yes!!!"
"No…" David grew pale.
"Alright, I want to try," Ryan insisted after having calmed down sufficiently. "I can be neither pregnant nor can I have a cyst on my ovary."
Lilly turned towards me.
I shrugged and indicated he could do whatever he wanted.
Lilly took his wrist. "You're really healthy, Ryan!"
"I come from good stock."
"But…"
"Is there a but?"
"You work too much, you don't want to do it anymore, you have begun to change your life in the recent past, you want to escape from the pressure forcing you on, but you don't admit it to yourself, you don't dare to. It's sitting right here!" She placed two fingers against the spot between his eyes. "Your Ajna Chakra is blocked."
"Ouch." He pulled away.
"Did it hurt? Yes, it's clear, it's blocked. Your third eye wants to see but you don't let it."
"Aha, right," he mumbled. "Well, I don't really believe in this stuff anyway."
Lilly winked. "You don't have to."
Nicky, always at the height of things, put an arm around his wife and smiled placably.
"You still have not told me about the boat, Ryan!"
The food was better than expected but the speeches were worse.
The entire table was eagerly nursing on alcohol to overcome the endless ordeal. Except Nicky. He never drank. Not for religious reasons but because he always wanted to be ready to drive Lakshmi. He was already on a different level of consciousness, no matter what.
Finally, about three hours later, everything was said, all games had been played and finally it was time for the waltz. Corinna and Christian absolved it without accidents but also without flair.
Ryan took me by the hand and led me onto the dance-floor. He whirled me around with extreme competence.
Afterwards we went to the terrace where the smokers had assembled, but we left them behind and continued towards the empty tennis courts.
"Do you smoke?" I asked.
"Only cigars, once in while."
I crooned.
"You guessed."
"No," I lied.
"What about you?"
"Only when I'm stone drunk. I used to when I was a teen though. Silk Cut."
"But Michel supplied you. Not the Rugby team."
Before I could say anything else, I was in his arms.
"When can we leave?"
"Not until midnight, there'll be fireworks. Then we're free to go."
"That's forever! What about an outdoor quickie?"
"My parents are here!"
"Ok, but I'm glad you're not generally opposed."
Did he mean he had any future plans regarding our, well, copulating? Plans exceeding this weekend? I shut out the thought. Men say all sorts of things when they are horny.
Women do too.
Why would he be the one to call the shots anyway?
Damn, I thought, Tina had been right, I was getting emotionally involved. Why on earth had I slept with him? It was against all the rules in the dating guidebook world! He could never regard me as wife material. Not after being such an easy prey! Ellen Fein and Sherry Argov would throw raw eggs at me!
But who said I wanted to be his wife material? I did not! I liked being single! He was a great fuck and nothing else. What did I know about him anyway? Nothing but his name! He could be a total maniac! In fact, why would a man who was as rich and as handsome be single at the age of thirty-seven? Something was definitely wrong here!
"Are you cold?" he asked when he saw the goosebumps on my arms.
"A little." I lied again. "Ryan?"
"Yes?"
"Have you ever been married?"
"No. Not that I know of. Why?"
"Oh, I only thought, you know, never mind."
"You wondered why I was still single at thirty-seven. You thought there must be something wrong with me."
"No, of course not!" I protested. "I'd never think such a thing. It was only curiosity. I mean, why not? Nicky was married to someone else before Lilly, it's completely normal these days."
"I didn't have the time. I work too much, didn't you hear? Do you want to go back inside? I don't want you to catch a cold before we start our twenty-four hours tantra workshop."
"Yes, let's go inside."
Fourteen
"We're getting married next week." Anita had stopped drinking the moment Lilly had enlightened her about her condition and she had found solace in talking. "In a lovely little church in Durban. We're both from there."
The rest of us were slowly drifting into numb indifference. I had fallen against Ryan who kept looking at his watch. Philppe Patek. Any questions?
"Forty-five minutes to go…"
"We got married in our car," Lilly yawned.
"How would you like to get married, Jude?" Anita asked.
I looked up with a start. "Sorry?"
"How would you like to get married. In church?"
"Hell, no. If I have to get married at all, I'd do it on a helicopter flight over the Matterhorn."
"I thought you were afraid of flying?" Ryan asked.
"Yes, exactly. I'd be scared shitless. It would be the ultimate sacrifice."
"I don't think you'll ever get married now, Jude." Corinna stood behind us, swaying dangerously.
"Hello, Corry. Are you having a good time? It's a wonderful party."
"I'm having a better time than you have." She laughed stupidly.
"You're the bride, you should be having the best time of all."
"I got him, you see?" She slurred.
"I'm very happy for you."
"No, you're not," she spat and ambled around the table to face me. "I know you still want him for yourself!"
"What are you talking about?"
"What does she want?" Ryan demanded. His German was very basic.
"The usual. It's that time of the night."
"Oh God."
"I know you love my Chris! You have always loved him, you will always love him, but he's mine, you see, mine! Even if you bring your rich man here." She changed into English. "She will never marry you! She wants my husband!"
"Is that so?" Ryan did not even glance at her.
"Yes! Yes! Never. She does not love you."
"How dreadful."
"You're a scheming bitch!" She was back in her native language. "You only came here with this man to make my husband jealous! So he would leave me! You will never accept anybody else."
Without warning, I went hopping mad. The toad had insulted me one too many times. "As a matter of fact, I have!"
"Ha! I don't believe you, you liar!"
"Ryan has asked me last night and I said yes!"
"Never! You'd have a ring! You wear no ring!"
"Yes and do you know why, you mad cow?"
"No, tell me!"
"Because I did not want to upstage you on your wedding day!"
"Ha! You already tried! Do you think only because you look like a Baywatch whore, all men will go crazy about you?"
Ryan giggled. Obviously he had understood the word "Baywatch" and had made the connection.
"I think the only person who's crazy in this room is you, Corinna! Why don't you get help, for a change?"
"You'd never accept him! Never!"
"I already have!" I reached with my hand into Ryan's pocket and found what I was looking for.
"Never! Never! You want to get to Christian behind my back!"
"Look!" I jumped up and whipped out my left hand in a movement worthy of Gandalf.
The fat diamond caught the light and sparkled like a thousand stars.
Corinna looked on in stunned disbelief.
Ryan looked on in stunned disbelief.
As a matter of fact, everybody in the entire room looked on in stunned disbelief.
Only Mary Lou rose to the occasion. Literally. She used the momentary diversion to crawl out from under my parents' table and to leisurely jog across the danc
e floor, where the wedding cake waited to be cut at midnight (and now, you will have guessed it, comes the slapstick moment. But what can I say? This is how it really happened). She gulped it down in three bites.
"I hate you!" Corinna shrieked and ran off.
I stared incredulously at Mary Lou who licked her nose for one last time and raised her head in question as if to say "Anything the matter?"
"I love you," I whimpered and broke into maniacal laughter.
So did everybody else.
Except Christian. Or Corinna's parents.
"I think we should go…" Ryan cackled and I nodded while tears of laughter were streaming over my face.
"The poor girl!" I wailed. "But I cannot say I'm sorry."
Fifteen
"No, Mum, it was from a Kinder Egg." I had called her as soon as we had got into the car. "I brought it on purpose. I knew she was going to pull a stunt. But really, Mum, we're not engaged."
"Oh, how sad! He's such a thoughtful boy."
"He's not a boy. He's thirty-seven."
"Really?"
"Yes."
I looked at Ryan. He had put on the unfathomable face again. I had not seen it in a while, I supposed it meant he was deeply in thought or somehow in touch with his feelings, you know, the things girls think men do, when they are actually not doing anything at all. He was probably only digesting.
As if my mother had heard my thoughts, she changed the subject.
"Do you think we should take Mary Lou to the emergency vet? She did not eat the candles."
"I think if you give her some tummy drops she'll be fine. You can always go to the vet if she gets sick. She has survived more critical situations."
"Yes. You're probably right."
"How's Corinna?"
"She's asleep. Lilly's with her. Nicky pressed some funny point in her shoulder and she went limp. It was really rather dodgy."
"Oh dear."
"She only has herself to blame, darling. I've had a serious conversation with Christian. She needs to go into treatment urgently! Sybille was dreadfully embarrassed, she sends her apologies."
"Mary Lou has avenged me gloriously. All debts are settled."
"Your father is of the opinion you should—"
"Mum, we're at the hotel, I have to get out. Let's talk tomorrow?"
"Sleep tight!"
We walked through the empty lobby. The night manager greeted us with his usual aplomb and kept himself to himself.
The lift arrived and we got in.
I turned towards the mirror.
I screamed.
"Ryan! Why didn't you tell me my entire face is covered in eyeliner?"
"I found it endearing. You're my little sauvage… on her path of war."
"Did I look like this at the wedding already?"
"No, it happened when you wiped your tears off in the car."
"Everybody in the lobby saw me!"
"There was only the night manager."
"The porter was there too!"
"They'll think we fought, you cried and we're about to have mind-blowing make up sex."
I tried to rub some of the stuff off with my hand."Make up sex… how suitable."
He smiled his heart stopping smile. "I don't care what kind of sex it is, as long as we're going to have it."
The lift door opened and we stepped into the suite.
"Before I do anything, I'll take a shower." I removed my earrings and my bracelet and carried Lilly's gift into the bedroom.
"May I join you?"
"Is the shower large enough for both of us?"
"It's large enough for you, me and Lakshmi."
"They'd never let her in there. It would ruin her leather seats."
The shower was large enough for a football team.
We silently stood beneath the rainforest head and I let my fingers roam across Ryan's chest. It was wonderfully hard. I leaned my forehead against it and he rested his chin on my head. His hands ran up and down my arms, my back and onto my buttocks where they remained.
I licked a few drops from his skin.
"You're salty."
"Hm hm hm…"
I pushed myself away from him and looked into his eyes.
"Well, Mr. Corvera-Fabergé, did you have a pleasant evening?"
"Yes, I did. But I presume it's going to get better still."
I dropped to my knees. "You presume rightly."
His eyes went round. "Do you mean, you're going to—"
"Suck your dick?"
"Well, actually I was going to say fell—"
"Only if you'll never say that word again."
He leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes. "Never."
Sixteen
"Holy shit, did you learn that at yoga?"
I climbed off him and collapsed onto the bed where I remained, limp as a rag. I panted heavily. "No. It was a spur of the moment invention."
"Uh."
I panted some more. "If anything, it was a variation of the tortoise pose."
Our conversation momentarily died.
Nothing moved. Only our ribcages heaved.
After a minute he sat up and reached for his water bottle. "My turtles at home don't do anything of the sort."
By then, my breathing had calmed down and my brain was rebooting into cognitive mode. "You have turtles at home?"
"Yes."
"On Pink Pebble Cay?"
He gulped down half the bottle. "You remembered the name."
"Of course."
He held out the bottle to me. "Want some?"
"Yes." I drank.
"They nest on the beach from February to July and we really have to be careful when they come. Someone has to check the island every day and mark the nests."
"Are they cute?"
He raised his eyebrows. "Almost as cute as you are. You're especially cute when you're in the tortoise pose. You do something funny with your nose."
"Do I? What do I do?"
"You wrinkle it."
"Aha." I had never been told I wrinkled my nose during sex.
"It's enchanting."
"Interesting. Right, never mind. — What's it like, Pink Pebble Cay?"
"It's small. Forty-five acres which to you would be about eighteen hectares, I think. It has two white beaches, one in the north and one in the south and a hill to the east which breaks off in a steep cliff. As for buildings, there's the main house and the three guest cottages. The house rests on top of the cliff. It's kind of spectacular."
"It certainly sounds it. How did you come to live on an island anyway? Did you buy it?"
He perched himself onto an elbow and looked down at me. "I don't really live there, I mean, I wish I could live there, at least outside the hurricane season."
"But you have to go to London and New York all the time."
"Yes, and Tokyo. By the way, what time is it?"
"1.45. You still have 45 minutes."
"Until what?"
"You have to call Shiro."
One corner of his mouth went up. "Did you eavesdrop?!"
"About five seconds then I fell asleep."
"I see. Right. To answer your question, no, I did not buy Pink Pebble Cay. I inherited it. It was part of my grandfather's estate."
"What did he do?"
"He was the Duke of Heresford."
"Oh, I see."
The Heresford heirs were, behind some Russians and a few Indians, the richest family in Great Britain. I had never known Laetitia to be one of them.
Did she have bodyguards back in school, I wondered? Where were they when she had given head to the rugby team?
"The title went to some distant cousin of his because my mother was his only child and females can not hold it as yet. But the money and the land went to us."
I frowned. "Why did you get the island if your mother's still alive?"
"The children got everything. My mother was cut out."
"Oh my! You make it sound like a Jackie Colli
ns novel, what happened?"
His index finger circled my navel. "It's a bit complicated. You see, my father lost all our money in the Argentine Depression."
"All your money?"
"Nearly all of it. It was not completely his fault, it happened to many people. The Corvera-Fabergé family owns a lot of land over there but during those days it was worthless. They've always been big in breeding polo ponies, but they weren't businessmen in the real sense of the word. — My father played polo for Argentina. He met my mother at the Queen's cup. He was dashing, she fell in love with him, they got married and not even a year later, there I was. On the day I was born, my grandfather set up a billion pounds in my mother's name to maintain her and her growing family in style. He liked it grand. It certainly created some tax benefits too. Anyway, in 1998, most of it was gone. Poof. My grandfather died of a heart attack at the shock but not until he had blamed it all on my father for being an incompetent and on my mother for having married my father. With his last force he wrote the money over to us and when he died my mother got very little. The bulk of the fortune was divided between the four of us. It was 1.7 billion pounds each including real estate, aircraft, gold and all the rest. Nothing went into charities. I got Pink Pebble Cay in the bargain."
"Sounds suffocating."
"I don't ever grasp it, mentally. It's just there, floating through the aether. Probably it would be different if I had made it myself. You know, we always had more than enough, now it's just… enough-er. And anyway, we were always going to get it, some day."
I experienced a sheer vertigo when I translated the figure into my own currency. Over 2 billion euros, or to my international readers out there, almost 3 billion dollars! To each child! Madness!
"I see. Did your mother blame your father too?"
"No, not really, but she blamed him for Simon."
"Your brother."
"Yes," he sighed, "my father was so shattered over the debacle, he got drunk almost every night and when Simon nicked the Lambo, he didn't notice. My mother wasn't at home, only my father was there, asleep in his study. The terrible thing is, even if they did not get my grandfather's money, they did get Simon's share after he died. There they were, billionaires again, by the death of their fourteen year old boy… my mother never got over the terrible irony, she lives like a recluse in Mallorca. Understandably, she can't stand to see my father anymore. — They're not living together now but they never got a divorce. Too complicated. My father manages the stud."
Billionaire on Board Page 9
