To Love and to Cherish

by Gina Robinson

  On the balcony, they blew in the gentle breeze, bumping against each other like playful siblings hellbent on aggravating their parents with all the grating noise they made. The balloons mocked me with their cheerful message and extravagance. In a fit of anger, I stomped inside to the kitchen, grabbed a pair of kitchen shears, tromped outside, bent, and cut the balloons loose from their base.

  I held them for a second, clutched in my fist so tightly my knuckles turned white. Rage was a powerful thing. At that moment I hated Jus. I hated him because it was better than falling apart. I couldn't afford to cave to my emotions and break down now. Too much depended on it. I stood and slowly opened my fingers. Oops! The balloons slipped out of my grasp. How sad.

  I watched them float over the balcony railing and into the sky above Bellevue, feeling they were somehow symbolic of my situation. They glinted in the evening sun, drifting upward and away in a much more gentle manner than Justin's love had left me. Suddenly, they caught a thermal and took off, rising higher and higher. Out of my reach. Wasn't that the way with everything in my life right now?

  I had a moment's panic as I imagined the media getting hold of this gesture of mine. Fortunately, squeezed out by rage, the panic fled quickly enough.

  As I turned to go into the penthouse, I tripped on the anchor. I grabbed it, tempted to hurl it over the balcony, too. Only the thought of hurting some innocent bystander on the street below stopped me. Rage makes you blind. It had blinded me earlier. I hadn't seen the gold pendant necklace looped around the blue anchor. A big heart with a little heart cuddled inside.

  Ah. Mommy and baby. With no daddy heart, I might add.

  Fine, Jus! Leave me with this sentimental gesture to break my heart again. I swallowed the lump in my throat. And put on my defiant face as I unhooked the necklace and put it on. I'll wear your token of love and show everyone.

  I may need to pawn this later, I thought. I was that mad and upset.

  My perpetually early, eager parents showed up first, carrying a huge gift box and worrying over it. And me. It was clear from the moment they arrived that they were uncomfortable. And concerned for me. Dad was eyeing me with that physician's look, the one where he assessed my color and tried to determine my overall health. I wondered if he could see the nausea looming just below the surface.

  "What do you get a billionaire?" Mom whispered to me with a nervous titter in her voice. "It's impossible!"

  My answering smile felt brittle. It was so hard to be pleasant when you were angry. "It will be fine, Mom. Jus is easy to please. He'll be happy you thought of him. It's all in the thought."

  And right now, he was full of bad thoughts. But I kept that to myself.

  Mom looked around the penthouse like she was looking for evidence of a theft. "Where is our wonderful son-in-law?" She sounded a little too suspicious.

  She'd heard the gossip. She had to have.

  Wonderful, indeed! He's just abandoned your daughter! I wanted to scream. And your grandbaby. Was it possible to be too snarky and cynical in your thought life? At that moment there wasn't enough snark in the world for me to command.

  My smile started to slip. It was taking conscious thought to keep it in place. What I wanted and what I had to do were two very different things. I wanted to crawl into my mother's arms, tell her how horribly Jus had treated me. And listen to her comforting there-theres while she patted my back and I cried my eyes out over that bastard Jus. I wanted to hear her complete sympathy. I wanted her motherly indignation on my behalf. I wanted her to treat me like she had after all my high school breakups.

  Crying over Jus! It was almost unfathomable. The college me would have laughed in my face at the thought.

  But of course, I was locked in this fake happy marriage. It was nothing more than a job, after all, though, right? And I needed a high score on my job performance review to get that ten-million-dollar payout. Especially now. Damn Jus! I was so mad at him.

  I managed to hold my smile in place and look as absolutely placid as if I was sailing through a happy day. "The birthday guy was called out of town this afternoon."

  My mom's eyes narrowed with suspicion. Motherly instinct sucked sometimes with its pinpoint accuracy. "But…how can you have a birthday party without the birthday person?"

  I shrugged. "Billionaires! They're so eccentric." I winked at Mom. "Seriously. Jus was devastated he couldn't be here. But he wanted the party to go on. At this point, we were going to be paying for everything anyway. Our guests may as well enjoy it!"

  So much fake enthusiasm. So little heart behind it.

  My mom grabbed my arm and pulled me close to whisper in my ear. "Is everything okay between you and Justin? The news is full of your…unhappiness."

  She must have been upset. She couldn't even bring herself to name the gossip.

  I stiffened. I didn't want to disappoint her. At the same time, at that moment, I almost wanted to come completely clean. And save my pride. How could he break my heart, Mom? He never had it. This is just a business relationship.

  "Dad and I are on your side, no matter what. You know that," she whispered to me. "You rushed into marriage…maybe a little too quickly. To a young man you hadn't seen in years. If he isn't the guy you thought he was…well, you're our daughter. We're behind you."

  There was that stupid lump in my throat again. I had to swallow it before it got the best of me and gave me away. There were no true confessions on the agenda. Tonight I had to hold my tongue, keep my head high, and fool everyone. Most especially our parents.

  "Thanks, Mom!" Which I genuinely meant. "But you can't believe everything you hear on the news. Especially on those gossip segments. I've heard the latest. I've learned to ignore it. They make up such outrageous stuff! Next they'll have me having an alien's baby!"

  Wasn't I? Jus was certainly alien to me right now. And we were alienated.

  I laughed to make my point. "Jus and I are fine. Perfectly happy together."

  * * *

  Justin

  As soon as we were airborne, I poured myself a drink. With the full intention of getting bombed. How do you take the edge off a broken heart?

  Dex watched me, his eyes bright and searching. He grabbed my arm. "In the conference room. Let's go."

  I grabbed my glass and the bottle as he pulled me into the private room and shut the door.

  "All right. So talk. What happened between you and Lala?" He crossed his arms and studied me with an intense, piercing expression.

  I fell into a leather desk chair next to the conference table, downed my drink, and poured myself another while I waited for a buzz to kick in. "She cheated on me. With Lazer Grayson."

  Dex cocked an eyebrow. "Lala cheated?"

  I nodded, miserable with an ache so deep even the booze didn't numb it. I swallowed the lump in my throat.

  "That doesn't sound like her. She's a one-man girl. A serial monogamist. The Lala I know would have dumped you first before moving on."

  "I'm her husband," I said, irritated that he was taking her side. Though what did I expect? They were family. Taking Dex along might have been a mistake. "Short of divorce, how was she going to dump me?"

  "Oh, I don't know, dickhead," Dex said with absolutely no sympathy at all. "Your 'marriage' is just a business arrangement. All she had to do was say she's done having sex with you, let's keep it platonic, and move on."

  Dex had never pulled his punches.

  "She got pregnant," I said. "Just so she could get a bigger piece of my assets."

  Dex shook his head. "Dude! I don't see what you're so upset about. Didn't I tell you to knock her up if you want to keep her?" he argued in his typically logical fashion.

  "This just saves you the trouble of subterfuge. If this is true, you have leverage, man. She won't want to let go of that baby. She'll agree to almost anything to keep you from trying to take it away. This is epically good news." He patted me on the back. "Congrats, Papa! And happy birthday to you. This is the best gift she could have gi
ven you."

  I stared at him.

  "Out of curiosity, how do you know she planned it? Lala had several pregnancy scares in college. None of those were planned."

  I frowned, confused. Dex, with his inexplicable logic, was actually making me feel somewhat better. I spilled the whole story while he listened in silence, without interrupting.

  When I was finished, he shook his head. "No. I don't buy it. For one thing, Lala's friends may not be geniuses like us. But they aren't stupid, either. Especially Britt.

  "Little Miss Emotional Intelligence? Sending a dumbass email like that? That's an amateur mistake she'd never make."

  He paused. "Would I put it past her to give Lala the advice to get preggo with your baby? Absolutely not. It's damn good advice, if I do say so myself.

  "Cheer up, buddy! You and Lala have more in common than you thought." He looked genuinely pleased at the thought, and proud of his cousin. "You've been working toward the same goal. But to write the plan out and email it to Lala, taking a chance you'd see it and foil the plan? No way. Not Britt." He shook his head.

  "I know what I saw. It was right there on her phone. I can hack into her email and show you. She uses the world's simplest passwords." I grabbed my phone. Within seconds I was into her account. I showed it to Dex and watched him read it.

  He shrugged. "Still not buying it. There has to be another explanation. Something that makes sense."

  I brushed his comment aside. "Not everything makes sense. And her cheating? I caught her in the act."

  "You caught her being hugged." His voice was stern.

  He grabbed the bottle away from me while I tried to pour another drink. The liquor spilled in a stream over the desk and filled the room with a boozy smell. I reached for a napkin to wipe it up.

  He caught my hand. "Listen to me. Your 'marriage' was nothing more than an arrangement. Lala never had to sleep with you. There was nothing forcing her to be exclusive with you. If she'd wanted to be with Lazer, she would have told you and gone back to the original agreement."

  I wrenched my hand free and took the bottle back. "She doesn't love me." My voice cracked like I was still in junior high. Or maybe that was college for me.

  "I forced her hand." I tried, but couldn't swallow my guilt. "I forced her into this marriage." I was on the edge. "Shit, Dex. I forced her."

  Dex squatted next to me. "What did you do?"

  Chapter Three

  Kayla

  And so the party was going swimmingly. Sickeningly well, actually. The caterer was a hit. The waiters efficient. The band I'd hired so we could have a live rendition of "Happy Birthday" and Jus could show off and sing with them held to just the right volume to make conversation comfortable.

  After a tense moment when they were introduced and eyed each other like competitors in Family Feud, Justin's parents and mine were conversing pleasantly. Watching them, I didn't have any illusions they'd ever be close friends. The way things were going, it didn't matter in the long run. Or even the near short term, for that matter. As long as they made it through the evening.

  Britt was late, fortunately. By the time she arrived I was so busy playing hostess I didn't have time for her. Which was great, because if I was around her too much I was bound to go off on her. And that would not be a good party scene.

  Everyone asked where Jus was. I had to fake it and make excuses. Fortunately my acting skills had been honed by real-life method acting around the clock for these past months. I played dutiful wife with a passion and sweetness that was sickening even to me.

  Lazer arrived with a former Miss Washington on his arm. A flashy auburn beauty in a dress that showed off just why she'd taken the title and won the swimsuit part of the competition. I found that I was surprisingly not jealous of her at all. Only in the fact that they were coupled up. And I was shockingly solo at my husband's party.

  "I see you picked up a date," I whispered to Lazer when I got a chance.

  "Short notice is never a problem for me," he said with a wicked, teasing glint in his eye. "How are you doing?"

  "Acting the part," I said. "You two make a cute couple."

  My stomach was unsettled. Morning sickness threatened to erupt, egged on by nerves. When it seemed like everyone had had enough hors d'oeuvres and was ready for cake, I had the caterers roll the cakes in on a serving cart.

  Justin's birthday cake was a three-layer cake staggered on three separate tiered risers. It was decorated in gold fondant with a fourteen-karat gold number twenty-two on top and twenty-two long, tapered golden candles ready to be lit. It was so over the top, he would have loved it. I was mad at him for missing it. And this lovely, golden party I was throwing him. Cynically, I thought maybe I should snap a shot of it for him. So he could see what he was missing.

  I had my waiters bring around trays of champagne in glasses with gold rims. Each glass had a small gold coin sitting at the bottom beneath the champagne bubbles. Yes, excess. That's what being a billionaire was about, wasn't it?

  I had to do everything golden and extreme during this year. Maybe I didn't even have a year. At this rate, Jus and I would be lucky to make it to our regularly scheduled divorce. We sure weren't going to make it to our golden wedding anniversary. And my golden birthday had been when I was too young to remember it.

  I stood next to the cake trolley and called the crowd to order by ringing a golden bell. When the crowd quieted down, I began my prepared speech.

  "As Justin's new wife, I'm totally crazy about him. All of you here know that!" I grinned devilishly. "And maybe I'm just plain crazy." That much was true. "I wanted Justin's first married birthday to be his best birthday yet." I cleared my throat. A lump was threatening.

  A few guests nodded their agreement.

  "Well, I did my best, and have done my best, but work called Jus away at the last minute." I put on what I hoped was a pretty pout. Though it felt more like a scowl. "Everyone dreams of wealth and success, but to get it takes a lot of work. As Jus will agree."

  People laughed politely.

  "A lot of you here tonight brought Jus gifts, even though I specifically said not to." I frowned and pointed a few fingers around the room, teasingly chastising them. "Guilty. Guilty. Guilty."

  More laughter.

  "It's not that Jus doesn't deserve them." I had to force myself not to break up. And not to lash out, either. I balanced on a precarious emotional ledge. But if things were going to appear normal and happy between Jus and me, I had to deliver the speech I'd been planning to make before things blew up.

  "We're all friends and family here. We all love Jus. It's just—what do you give a billionaire?

  "Because this is our first birthday together, and it's Justin's golden birthday—twenty-two on the twenty-second—I wanted to give him something that no one else has. Something unique. One of a kind."

  I grabbed a lighter the caterers had put next to his cake and began lighting his twenty-two candles. "But before I reveal my gift to him." I nodded to Riggins. "Let's sing Jus 'Happy Birthday.' I can't carry a tune. So Riggins is going to do the honors and lead us." I motioned to the band. "Is someone recording this?"

  I got a thumbs-up.

  "Good!" I looked around the room. "Will someone film this for Jus, too? We can all text him birthday wishes from our unique perspective so he'll feel like he was really here! He'd love that!"

  Take that, Jus.

  The band struck up "Happy Birthday." Riggins sang the lead. The rest of us sang in whatever key suited us. And somehow we made it through. Most people were enjoying themselves. Some of the oddness of having a birthday party for a guy who wasn't there was wearing off. When the song ended, people erupted in applause.

  I rang the golden bell again and grabbed the golden lid of the cake plate on the small cake next to Justin's, ready for my reveal. "Bear with me. I'm not as narcissistic as this looks. Before we have cake, I have to share with you all what I got him. And, yes, Jus already knows and is thrilled." I laughed. "And mayb
e a little overwhelmed."

  I pulled the lid off to reveal a baby-themed cake decorated with tiny feet in pink and blue. "I'm giving Jus the gift of fatherhood!

  "To Jus! Happy birthday, baby! Don't work too hard! Wish you were here!" I raised my glass and took a sip.

  I was rushed by our moms, who were suddenly in competition for hugs with questions flying. As the caterers cut the cake, I was swallowed by the well-wishing crowd. The moment would have been perfect. If Jus had been there.

  Suddenly, I felt hot and nauseated. Suffocated. I broke free from the group and dashed for the bathroom. "Sorry, everyone!"

  The women smiled knowingly. I heard someone say something about "must be a healthy pregnancy if she's sick already."

  I made it just in time. This pregnancy was going to kill me. But the moms were excited. There was that, at least. And already making over me. Diana would personally whip her boy if he dumped the mother of her first grandchild. So the building-loyalty play was working.

  When I came out of the bathroom, Britt was lying in wait. She pounced, grabbing my arm before I could escape. "You've been avoiding me! What's going on? And don't blame it on pregnancy hormones. I know that game."

  I glared at her. "You!" I pointed my finger at her and tried not to sputter in my anger. "How could you be so stupid?"

  "Stupid how?" She was glaring back. Britt wasn't some mellow puppy to be pushed around.

  I grabbed her arm, pulled her into my bedroom, and closed the door so we could talk in private.

  "What's really going on with you and Jus?" she said. "Why isn't he here? He came back to work this afternoon, called Ophie into his office, and flew out of there after ten minutes. He looked pissed. And hurt. Like someone had whipped him or stomped on his aorta or something. And since you're the only one with that power over him…"

  That was the thing about Britt—her emotional IQ never failed her. And she was observant. So there was no use trying to fool her on this one.