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We share the same values. Our families are friends. Whether his family will still be friends with us if they know the truth is to be seen. I doubt that. But Colin is different. He’s never been judgmental. For a fleeting moment, I catch a glimpse of a safe, tranquil life with him, a life in which there’s no crime or fear. No bad history.
The idea of that life is so appealing that I tell him. I tell him everything, starting from the beginning when my dad made the deal and ending with the ring I still carry in my pocket. I don’t leave any sordid detail out.
He doesn’t interrupt me once. He listens intently until I’ve finished. When I finally fall quiet, I hold my breath, expecting his scorn or his disgust, but Colin being Colin, he simply wraps his arms around me and hugs me.
The relief is so overwhelming that I burst into tears. It’s not just the weight that lifts off my shoulders. It’s that after everything I told him, he doesn’t hate me.
“How can you still like me?” I ask through my tears.
He rubs circles over my back. “Oh, Bella. How can I not?”
Pulling back, I wipe a hand over my face. “I didn’t want to put you in a difficult situation.”
“Hey.” He brushes a hand over my hair. “Your secrets are mine, remember?”
I smile at the reminder of the pact we made as kids.
“Tomorrow,” he says, his gaze earnest as he catches mine. “We should get married in Cape Town. It’ll be easier to organize there. We won’t be able to find a marriage official last-minute here, and the minister won’t do it on such short notice. He’ll insist that we attend those compulsory marital sessions first.”
“I don’t want you to marry me just to save me.”
He smiles. “I’ve always been saving you, haven’t I?” When I frown, he takes my hand. “Look, I know you don’t love me with sparks and fireworks and all that jazz. That’s not what I want. My job is going to be hectic. Someone like you will get that. You won’t expect me to be home for dinner at six every night. I want someone who’ll give me the freedom to be me, and I’ll give you the space you need to grow. We can just take it day by day. We’ll figure it out.”
“What about your family?”
“They’ll be ecstatic.” He stands, pulling me with him. “They don’t have to know the details. We’ll just say we decided to get married on the spur of the moment.”
I better go home and tell everyone the news. Ryan won’t have to drive to Cape Town after all. “I don’t deserve you, Colin.”
He wraps an arm around my shoulders. “You deserve happiness, Bella.” Leading me toward the path, he says, “Come. We have a lot to do.”
ChapterTwenty-Four
Angelo
Like the first time I landed in Cape Town with my father, I stop at a lookout point on the cliffside road to stare at the sun rising over the ocean. Thick bands of orange and red overlay the deep purple on the horizon. A few stars still twinkle in the dawn. The crash of the waves on the rocks is deafening. The treacherous sea is always restless. Angry. Unpredictable. No wonder they call it the Cape of Storms. The beauty is devastating. It’s both hypnotizing and destructive. Much like the journey I embarked on since my path crossed Sabella’s.
What would’ve happened if my father hadn’t insisted that I meet her when she turned sixteen? Would things have been different if I knocked on her door when she was already eighteen? I often wonder.
Our history is as violent as the nature of this country in which she has her roots. Our fate is just as destructive, but it’s also a certainty. It’s always been. I knew she’d be my wife from the day she turned ten.
I was only fourteen, yet I’ll never forget the peace that knowledge brought me. My future was paved, my partner for life decided. It seemed so effortless and graceful at the time. Such a noble notion.
The promise I made my father on that first visit to this country rings in my head. I assured him I’d see this deal through.
My gut clenches when I inhale the salty air. I swear I smell a whiff of cigarillo smoke on the breeze. Just like on that day when my father stood here beside me on this very spot. We visited the vineyards to buy wine. He was drinking in the view, soaking up the hours he had left. He wanted to settle me in my future. He didn’t want to die before his job here was done. That’s why we came.
The memories are almost too much to bear. It’s difficult to believe that was already three years ago. Sometimes, it feels as if my whole life is condensed into these past three years, as if nothing before that mattered.
It took a lot to get here, not in distance, time, or cost but in sacrifice. It feels as if I’ve waited a lifetime for this day, and now, it’s finally arrived.
Our wedding day.
I stay until I can’t stand the haunting emptiness beside me any longer, and then I drive back to my hotel. My rooms at the five-star hotel in Cape Town are as luxurious as the villa in Camps Bay, but the honeymoon suite isn’t where I’m planning on bedding my wife for the first time. When Sabella becomes Mrs. Edwards-Russo, I’ll consummate our marriage in the house where she’ll bear our children. In our home.
The arrangements are in place. I booked a private jet to fly us to Marseille in France. Private jets aren’t good for the environment, but I don’t want to share our first moments as husband and wife with four hundred strangers in a commercial plane. Those hours are sacred. I’m selfish like that.
From Marseille, we’ll take the yacht. The skipper will pilot it. I’ll have seven hours to ravish her body, but I will only come inside her when my seed can spill on the sheets of my bed. That doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy her until then. There are many ways to please her without using my cock.
