by Jenna Payne
“Until the wedding,” Jake says.
“Well, after the wedding, we won’t have to worry about it,” Ramona says, “just like always. There’ll be a tragic boating accident, blah, blah, blah, we take the money and get out.”
My heart stops beating. I know what they’re planning now. I know what’s going to happen to Gus. My eyes fill with tears and I don’t want to listen to anything else. But, I can’t seem to pull myself away from the door.
“You promise this is the last one, right?” Jake asks. His voice is quieter than it was before. He almost sounds sincere.
“Honey,” Ramona says in that fake flattering voice I hate, “of course this is the last one! I promised, didn’t I?”
“You did,” Jake answers, though he sounds uncertain.
“Then trust me,” Ramona whispers and I hear the fabric of her skirt slide against the couch.
I’m sure they’re kissing and my heart constricts. I try not to but, I can’t help imagining his hands in her hair, his mouth desperate and insistent on hers just as they’d been with me not three hours ago.
“I’ve got to head out. I don’t want to keep you from Emma too long,” Ramona said.
“Oh, don’t worry about her,” Jake says. “She’s sound asleep. Stay a little while.”
I suddenly have a desperate urge to burst open the door and throttle him. But, I know that would do no good. Ramona would just charm her way back to Gus and then kill him herself. All while I was locked away for assault or possible murder.
“I can’t,” Ramona says finally. “I’ll see you tomorrow. I love you.”
“I love you too,” Jake says.
I hear the door close and I know that Jake’s coming back into the room. I rush to my side of the bed, lay down and close my eyes.
I don’t fall back to sleep. Instead, I think about what I’m going to do next.
The first thing will be to get up early, dress and leave before Jake can see me. Then, I’ll have to go to Gus and break the news to him.
Not only is his fiancée cheating on him, but, she’s also a raging psychopath who wants to murder him for his fortune.
*****
“I don’t believe it,” Gus says. I’ve just told him what I heard last night. He’s standing beside his desk, staring at me with hard eyes.
“It’s the truth,” I say quietly. “I heard it myself.”
“Emma, if this is about what happened here last night, I told you, I’m sorry.”
“It’s not about that,” I say, feeling my ire growing now. The fact that he thinks I would make something like this up just to get back at him for kissing me and leaving makes my blood begin to boil.
I take a deep breath to calm myself down and continue as best I can.
“No matter how I felt, no matter how upset I was...I wouldn’t lie about something like this,” I say.
“You must’ve been pretty upset to run home with some guy you’ve only known two weeks,” he says sullenly. “That’s something I never thought you’d do either.”
He’s looking at me through squinted eyes and there’s something more than anger behind them. Something like jealousy. As though he’s upset that I would go home with Jake at all.
One month ago this look would have sent my insides into a dance of delight. But now, we’ve both got bigger problems.
“Look,” I say, “all I’m saying is...postpone the wedding. Look into Ramona a little bit. Look into Jake. I mean, what do you really know about either of them?”
“You want me to do a background check on my own fiancée?” he asks, as though the idea is near to criminal.
“I’m saying, I know what I heard,” I answer. “She’s not who you think she is. And it’s got nothing to do with you and me. I just...I don’t want to see you die in some planned boating accident. Is that so hard to understand?!”
My voice has raised to a fevered pitch and I can feel an angry swell of heat in my face. I’m standing in front of Gus glaring at him in a way that tells him not to press me.
He recognizes the look and I see him begin to back away towards his desk.
“Okay,” he answers, “let’s say, for arguments sake, I do believe you. Let’s say I postpone the wedding or...or even call it off.”
I can tell he’s thought about this. All of this since I told him to go home and sleep on it last night. Something in his voice tells me that he may have been planning to call the wedding off anyway.
“If Ramona and Jake are planning...what you think they are...they’re going to try to get at least some of my money any way they can. What happens if Ramona sues me for wedding expenses, or, worse make some kind of allegation against me.”
“You’re saying a lawsuit is worse than you being dead?” I ask, my arms still folded over my chest.
“I’m saying we’d need evidence,” Gus says, “I mean, if what you heard last night was true...it sounds like they’ve done this before. And, if I don’t fall for it, even if she doesn’t sue me or try something else, they may do it again to some other rich man. I couldn’t live with that.”
I uncross my arms and think about that. I have to admit he’s right. I knew when Ramona promised Jake that this was ‘the last time’, it meant that there had been times before. I also knew that, no matter what she promised, it would not be the last time. Something in her voice told me that she had no intention of stopping her little game. She liked it too much.
“All right,” I answer. “How are we going to get evidence? We’d probably need them to confess, or something like that.”
I watch as Gus purses his lips and begins to pace in front of his desk. This is the look he always gets when he’s thinking.
“A background check will take too long and probably won’t turn up anything,” he says, “If they’re professionals, they’ve probably changed names and addresses several times.”
“And, if they are professionals, they’re practiced at this,” I say. “If we try to confront them, they’ll just deny the whole thing.”
Gus stops pacing and turns to look at me. His lips aren’t pursed anymore and he’s staring at me like he’s seeing me for the first time.
“Emma,” he says. “Are you sure you told me everything you heard last night? Word for word?”
“As much as I remember, yes,” I say slowly wondering what he’s got planned.
“If that’s true,” he says, “then Ramona’s nervous about you but, Jake isn’t. He says he’s got you eating out of the palm of his hand.”
“Yeah,” I answer quietly. “The arrogant prick.”
“Maybe,” Gus says, “but, arrogant pricks tend to be very sloppy and pretty stupid.”
“What are you saying?” I ask.
“I’m saying you’re going to confront Jake about what you heard last night,” Gus answers.
I remember the sound of Jake’s voice, what he said when he thought I was asleep. I don’t want to face him again.
“That won’t work,” I say hurriedly. “He’ll deny everything.”
“Trust me, he won’t,” Gus says. “I’ve dealt with guys like that before. They think they can tell women whatever they want and get away with it.”
“Why can’t you talk to Ramona?” I ask.
“Because,” Gus says moving to his chair and flopping down into it, “she really will deny everything and I’ll probably believe her. You’ve seen us together. You know she’d tell me to go jump off a cliff and I’d do it.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” I mutter, a smile coming to my face.
“I know you weren’t,” Gus says with the beginnings of a smile himself. “That doesn’t mean you weren’t thinking it.”
My smile grows as I look at him and I can tell I don’t need to answer. For one moment, it’s as though we’re not talking about a plan to murder Gus at all. For a moment, it’s like nothing’s changed and we’re just about to go into a particularly difficult business meeting.
“Ok,” I say, “I’ll do it.”<
br />
*****
We’ve got a plan. The signal for me to ask Jake if we can talk in private is Gus leaving his office “for a lunch meeting.”
This means that I’m forced to sit at my desk with Jake all morning making plans for place settings at the wedding reception, and pretending like nothing’s wrong.
“You ran off on me this morning,” he says when he’s sure no one can hear us. “I was planning on making us breakfast.”
“The marketing guys asked me to come in early to look at the campaign for the new software,” I lie. “Sorry, I should’ve at least said goodbye.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he says with that charming smile. The look that used to make me blush while my stomach did backflips now makes me cringe.
Luckily, he doesn’t say anything more about our one night stand. We continue talking about ice sculptures and seating arrangements while my palms begin to sweat and my heart races with anxiety.
Finally, at eleven thirty, Gus leaves his office. This is it.
I turn to Jake and ask if I can see him in private. I nod to Gus’s empty office and he smirks at me before standing from his chair and following.
Once inside, I see he’s still brandishing that suggestive smirk.
“Sneaking into the boss’s office for a ‘private conversation’?” he asks raising an eyebrow. “Apparently I’ve been a bad influence on you.”
I feel something like spiders begin to crawl up my spine at his insinuation. I shake them off as best I can and turn to him with a full frown.
“So, I heard you had a visitor last night,” I tell him, my arms crossed over my chest.
“Well, I should hope you’d know about that,” he says looking at me with a smirk. “You were there, after all.”
“I mean another visitor,” I answer. “She came in when you thought I was asleep.”
Jake looks at me confused.
“What are you talking about?”
“I heard everything, Jake,” I answer him, “I know about Ramona, I know about your plan, I know about all of it.”
His shoulders slump and his face goes pale for a moment. But, one second later, he shakes it off and looks at me with a neutral expression.
“Have you told anyone else?” Jake asks.
“No,” I lie. “I wanted to wait for you. I thought you might have some...I don’t know...explanation or something.”
“You think there might be a reasonable explanation for what you heard?” he asks now moving towards me menacingly.
“I don’t know,” I answer as boldly as I can. “That’s why I’m asking you.”
He pauses nods for a moment and looks away. Finally, he looks back at me and heaves a sigh.
“The problem is, I can’t come up with anything either,” he says, “Nothing you’d believe anyway. Ramona was right. You’re too smart for that.”
“So...it’s true?” I ask. “All of it?”
“Yes,” he says nonchalantly. “We’ve been planning this for several months. Ever since your stepbrother showed up in Canada. When he dies, Ramona gets everything. That’s how it always works.”
I stare at him for a long while, taking this in. I knew, of course, coming in here, that what I’d heard was true. But, I didn’t expect Jake to come straight out and tell me that. And I certainly didn’t expect him to be so casual about it.
“Why are you telling me this?” I ask. “You know I won’t let you get away with it.”
“I’m telling you this,” Jake says, stalking towards me, “because I know you won’t say anything to anyone else.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I ask, squaring my shoulders and giving him a glare that usually makes men shrink away in fear. He simply smirks at me and moves closer.
“Because,” Jake says, “I know things about you, Emma. Things you probably wouldn’t want anyone else knowing.”
I blush when I remember what I revealed last night under the influence of red wine. I’d told him all about me and Gus and our history.
“And, if you try to tell Gus about what happened, Ramona and I will just say that you’re jealous. You’ve always been in love with him and you’ll do anything and everything to stop his wedding,” he says.
“And what if I go to the police instead?” I ask. He chuckles.
“With what evidence?” he asks. “And even if you do acquire some, we’d stop you before you even made the call.”
“How would you do that?” I ask.
“Well, Emma, unrequited love is a very powerful thing. It makes people do things they wouldn’t normally do. A lot of people have killed themselves for less. So, when they find you with a rope around your neck and a suicide note, I’m guessing no one’ll think twice about it.”
He moves towards me and I step back, finally I’m pressed against the wall of the office.
“So, you see, Emma? I’ve got the upper hand,” he says. He grabs my neck and kisses me fiercely. I stand rigid and motionless.
He pulls back still smirking.
“See you after lunch,” he says. “We still need to go over the color scheme for the reception.”
With a chuckle, he leaves me standing in the office with a look of terror and shock on my face.
When the door closes, I replace the feigned look with a smile of my own.
Slowly, I saunter over to the computer on Gus’s desk, turn the microphone back to its original position, further away from where Jake and I were standing and press the stop recording button on the desktop.
*****
It takes two days for the police to come back with information on Ramona and Jake. It turns out their real names are Gene and Robert, and have links to the mysterious deaths of four other men under various aliases.
I make sure I’m there when they’re both taken into custody. The memory of Ramona screaming and crying to Gus that it’s all a huge mistake as well as the memory of Jake looking at me in shock as he’s handcuffed and taken away is one I’ll relish forever.
The best part is, Gus asks me to go out for celebratory drinks with him that night.
“I still can’t believe I was that stupid,” Gus says. We’re sitting in a booth at our favorite bar just a block from Gus’s apartment.
Deciding I’ve had my fill of red wine, I’m sipping on a light beer as Gus drinks his traditional Guinness.
“It wasn’t just you,” I tell him honestly, “I’m the one who decided to go home with some guy I’d only known for two weeks. That’s why Jake...Robert...whoever he was thought he could blackmail me.”
“Honestly, I’m glad you went home with him,” Gus says. I put down my beer and my eyes widen in shock.
“I mean, I’m not glad you...you went home with him...like that,” he amends quickly. That adorable blush is coming into his cheeks and I can’t help but smile, “I’m just glad you heard what they were planning. If you hadn’t, I’d have been dead in two weeks.”
“I’m glad I heard it too,” I say with a smile, “I like you alive.”
“That makes two of us,” he says with a smile of his own.
We sit at the bar for another hour. We don’t talk about what’s just happened. Instead, we talk about the new Star Wars that’s just about to come out, (Gus thinks it’s going to be amazing, I’m nervous about it); about the new gossip around the office, and about what music is trending.
In short, we talk about everything and nothing. When both of us are feeling fairly inebriated, we finally decide to close out the tab. I offer to split the bill, just like we always do when we go out for drinks together, even though he is so rich. But this time, he insists on paying.
“You saved my life,” he tells me when he hands his card to the bartender. “I think that’s worth a few drinks.”
I can’t help but smile as a pleasant tingling sensation begins in my stomach. The reason we always split the bill is that Gus didn’t want his outings with me to feel too much like dates. He said it would be too weird.
Now, clearly, something’s
changed.
The tingling sensation continues when he invites me to stay at his apartment so I can sleep the drinks off.
We walk in silence the two blocks to his building. Tension seems to be growing with every step we take.
When we reach his apartment and step inside, I almost don’t trust myself to act normally around him.
I try as best I can when he offers me a glass of water and we both sit on the couch.
I see him sipping out of his water glass out of the corner of my eye and I can’t help but imagine crawling into his lap, kissing him and continuing right from where we left off in his office three days ago.
“You know it is a shame,” he says finally.
“What’s a shame?” I ask trying to keep my voice as steady as possible.
“You did all that work for the wedding,” he answers. “The church is booked, so is the reception venue. The flowers, the invitations. We’re going to have to cancel the cake, the silverware, the catering. Everything.”
“It’s okay,” I answer. “Like I said, I’d rather you be here and alive than pull off a perfect wedding.”
“I know,” Gus says. “But, I’ve been thinking about it the past couple of days and I thought...well...if you want...we could still have a wedding.”
“What do you mean?” I ask my heart beginning to hammer in my chest as I pray he’s talking about what I think he’s talking about.
“I mean,” Gus says, “I love you, Emma.”
My heart stops beating and my breath catches in my throat.
“I...I think I have for a long time,” he says. “I just tried to ignore it because I thought it would be too weird. I think that’s why I proposed to Ramona in the first place. I thought if I was with someone else, I could get you out of my head. But, it didn’t work. Even before I found out about...you know...I still couldn’t stop thinking about you and—”
He never gets a chance to finish. In one move I reach over, wrap my arms around his neck and press his lips desperately to mine.
It’s not long before he kisses me back, pulling my body once again into his lap so that I’m flush against him.
He pulls back gently and whispers.
“Does this mean you’ll marry me?”
