Blazed (33 page)

I was going to teach her how to be loved, and show her that loving didn't have to hurt. I thought that I might be halfway there already.

WHEN I walked into
The Roses
with her on my arm, I felt like the luckiest man in the world. She couldn't have looked any more different from the woman I'd met, but I knew that she was still in there— fragile, lost and confused. But she was wearing a ring that I knew she wouldn't have accepted under sufferance when there was such an easy exit. That was all that mattered to me; that she loved me enough to take it even though she would never say it out loud. She had enough faith to take the risk. She loved me more than the man who made her ill, and I'd earned that love fair and square.

The dress I'd picked out looked perfect on her, the viridian satin clinging to the lush curves she'd grown into since we'd met. It had looked great on the assistant who'd modelled it, but Emmeline
 
made
 
it. Her hair swept over her shoulder and tumbled in soft curls down to her ribs on the right side— the unscarred side— leaving me access to kiss the dimple that creased her left cheek every time she gave me her shy, lop-sided secret smile. God, I loved that dimple, and I loved how she'd sat there patiently and let me dress her and curl those soft tresses that were definitely better blonde. I got to see and touch so much more of her than anyone else, and that was my honour.

She took the chaos of the mixer in her stride like she'd been doing it forever. People loved her dry, quick wit and congratulated me on finding her as much they congratulated us both on our engagement. When everyone else could identify and appreciate what a rare and amazing beauty she was without even seeing her face, how could she not realise that it was true?

Whenever we were torn away from each other, I felt her eyes on me. She was obsessed as I was, and so acutely attuned to me that she knew where I was without even looking. And I was watching her. I watched the way she chatted with my long time friend, Cornelia, like she was her friend too, and I couldn't help but smile when she felt comfortable enough to laugh. Emmeline was an enigma— 
my
 
enigma, and worth standing in the heat of my personal hell when she caught my gaze and told me what she couldn't put into words. 
I love you.

I DIDN'T HEAR most of the conversations I had, and I barely tasted the wine. All I could focus on was being next to her
— getting back to her and keeping my arms wrapped around her satin sheathed frame. When I had to answer a call of nature, I was overcome with irrational concern that she wouldn't be there when I came back. Then, to add to my irritation, I was roped into several conversations on my way back to her. Thank god the cavalry arrived.

Henry Tudor was a great man. His business ethic was a little off, but he was jovial and obtusely hilarious. He didn't excuse or pardon himself when he pulled me away from Cornelia's boyfriend
— a man who was ridiculously self-reverent— just spoke over him until he went away on his own like only a successful man who took no crap could.

"Looked like you needed saving there, young man." He had no idea. I knew he'd keep me in one place and Cornelia would encourage Emmeline to come over for introductions.

"I appreciate it, old boy. You never stop saving my bacon, do you?" He grinned and beckoned me over to his table, where he retrieved a large glass of brandy. I noticed that he was one of just a few people not drinking the wine circulating the room. My unusually audacious fiancée was another. 

Seemingly reading my mind, he raised his glass in a solitary toast. "What's the point of babysitting the establishment if you don't get to raid the liquor cabinet, eh!" Babysitting? I didn't probe, just laughed along with him, getting caught in his good mood that rivalled my own. Henry had done so much for me in the past and I still owed him. He wouldn't let me give him back all the money he'd frittered away on my university fees for years and I could never repay him in kind for all the times he'd let my band perform in his upmarket venues so we'd get noticed by the right people. But I could afford him my utmost respect. He deserved that of me for all the magic he'd worked.

"So is everything going well in Tudorland?" Not probing. Just making conversation.

He grunted and shook his head at himself. "No,
New York sorely needs someone to go out and throw their weight around at 
The Seymour.
 I just don't have the time to go myself and Tallulah is a halfwit."

"Is your youngest still refusing to partake in the family business?"

"Blaze, my boy— I would do anything to get my little ball-buster in and Tally out. I still maintain that you'd get on like a house on fire. You could be good for her." If Tallulah was anything to go by, I really doubted that we'd have any common ground, though secretly I admired that she wouldn't participate in the family business, giving the less legitimate side of it an extremely wild berth. Henry hadn't become so successful by making friends and had too many enemies. I could imagine his life being very lonely.

Besides, I had my woman. "Sorry, old chap. I've very recently acquired a ball-buster of my own."

I looked up because I felt her approach me. Not the confident woman who'd been working the room all night, but the lost ghost I'd met at first. But I could still see how much she wanted me in the way she reacted when I looked in her direction. Her cheeks underneath the mask flushed, her eyes flared with desire and her step faltered. I could make her remember every way I'd touched her in the bedroom and just by glancing in her general direction.

And when she was thinking about it, so was
I. "And there go my balls."

The closer she got, the more I wanted to step forward and pull her into my arms, pick her up and carry her out of that room to make those memories a reality. But I also wanted to show her off so she knew that I was proud to have her with me. "Henry," I reached for her and curled my arm around her waist, "meet my very significant other." Emmeline offered her hand bashfully, keeping her head low like he was too rich to look at. She looked so sweet and nervous.

Henry kissed the back of her hand and smiled to himself. "Miss White, yes?" He'd obviously seen the seating plan. "Not very talkative, are you?"

"She's here under sufferance, I've just brought her to show her off." Because I was elated to have arrived with the most beautiful woman in the room, maybe the country. Almost certainly the planet.

"At a masquerade party? Daft sod." As silly as it seemed to him, I'd had my reasons. I knew the anonymity would comfort her around the people she'd feel awkward forcing conversation with; people who oozed affluence and wealth.

She stood patiently like a serene statue while Henry and I spoke, watching and absorbing all the action. We exchanged polite chit-chat about work and family, musing over gatherings past before the Tudor's followed their youngest daughter into
London and Henry's staffing problems.

Emmeline spoke clearly and coolly when she was spoken to, smiling when appropriate and allowing Henry to look at her engagement ring without pause for thought. Anyone would have thought she'd been perfectly trained in the proper
 etiquette for these kinds of events— she didn't appear even slightly ruffled if she was being watched.

"Beautiful, just beautiful. Like the young lady beneath that mask, I suspect." Henry gave me a many slap on the shoulder and winked so Emmeline couldn't see. I had his approval on my choice of woman, and that stood for a lot in my eyes. He was a shrewd judge of character. "I've taken up enough of your evening. Show the lady how real men dance."
 
Finally
.

I loved the way she nestled up against my chest to dance, and how she was just the right height for me to rest my cheek on her head so she could hear me sing to her. I could feel her smile, and when she looked up at me for a kiss, her innocent smile made me melt a little— an innocence dispelled by the hunger in her kiss.

"Are you bored? You're very quiet. You could have spoken to Henry, he's not all that bad." It was important to me that all the big characters in my life got on with each other. I hated time wasted on conflict.

She ran her hands up my jacket as she snuggled in closer to me, moulding against the muscles I knew she could feel well through my suit. That was why I'd worn it— I wanted her to feel as proud to me as I did her.

"What was I supposed to say to him? Tell him that he should stop frittering money away on new property and ventures and focus on what he already has? That throwing money at a problem doesn't make it go away and comfort can't be bought? His employees are flailing through lack of leadership, not lack of inspiration."
 I arched a brow in surprise. She never ceased to amaze me when she opened that mouth and came out with something unexpectedly profound and intelligent. I knew her so well, and yet so little. Now, I had a lifetime to learn more. "What? I'm not as stupid as I look. That 'dumb blonde' is only fifty percent accurate."

"You've done a survey of blondes?"

"No, you're either a dumb blonde or you're not. Fifty-fifty." 
Oh. Embarrassing
. Secretly, I blamed her for catching me off guard and being so outstanding in every way that it made my brain go soft like mush.

WHILE we danced, I let my imagination get carried away with me. I dared to imagine our first dance, how she'd look in an elegant white dress I'd have to resist the urge to pick for her, and how she'd look underneath it. Even images of how she'd look swollen with my children growing inside her flooded my mind, if that was even a possibility after her 'difficulties' as a teenager. There definitely wasn't a good way to broach that subject.

But I wanted all of that with her. I wanted those little dreams to become little realities, and I knew that I had to set my affairs straight before they could happen. There were a few discrepancies and inconveniences that needed my attention, and they were the only things stopping me from taking Scott's little joke about Vegas and turning it back on him.
 

Esme strode across the dance-floor between us, wanting me to answer the question I knew her eyes were screaming.
 
Did she accept the ring?
 She fist-pumped the air when I made my barely discernible nod, and closed the distance between us, complimenting Emmeline on how beautiful she looked. 

"Mind if I pull her away, Blaze?" I might have objected if Emmeline hadn't look so pleased to see her. As her only female friend, Esme was the only person who could really relate and enjoy our engagement in the typical girlish-giggling way. The gay couple might have had their fair share of opinions on the big day, but Esme could enjoy the hype that lead up to it, something that would last for a while yet.

WHEN they left, I was inundated with questions from clucking women who'd seen us dancing, asking who my partner was, how serious we were and what had been so wrong with the daughters they'd been trying to pimp out for years. More annoyingly, I was collared by Helen Rosen, a notoriously conceited and self-obsessed woman who knew my mother. She rambled incessantly about her son, who I'd never met but got the impression that he was as big-headed and pig-ignorant as his parents. They'd found wealth like Henry
— 
because
 
of Henry— and weren't even slightly modest about it. It was hard to guess which parts of Helen were still real.

I didn't want to know about her son's wedding. I didn't want to know about all the things his
 fiancée did that mine didn't. And no, I didn't want to see the photographs, but she showed me anyway. The wholesome copper haired boy next door standing with a long, raven haired stick figure of diluted Asian origin, painted on smiles all round. Yeah, I liked to think that Emmeline and I looked a little more edgy and a lot happier. In fact, I knew we did. 

"Excuse me, lady and gent," the huge red mask that was Esme sashayed to us and positioned herself in the middle of the unwanted conversation. Again, thank god for the cavalry. "I hate to interrupt, but Ivy would like to test her third eye on you and your lovely new
 fiancée." 
Shit
. Ivy Tudor had a gift for spotting soul mates and poor matches. What the hell would I do if she gave us the death sentence? Would Emmeline take it to heart and give up, and would I let her? 

But they were standing together, and I wanted to be near my girl. I was confident that she'd see in us what she'd seen in all the other couples I'd watch grow closer and more blissful. I wanted that thumbs up.

"Blaze, darling!" Looking outlandishly youthful, Ivy Tudor peered at me from behind her bright pink mask. How had her oldest daughter gone so wrong when she looked so magnificent for her age, topped in blonde curls with an almost embarrassingly impressive figure? It made me wonder what the other Tudor daughter looked like.

"Ivy." I kissed the back of her hand and turned my attention to the beauty pressed up against me. I'd wrapped my arm around her without even realising. "You look wonderful.
 And you appear to have met the only other woman in the room who comes close enough to compare." You had to give me my dues, I knew how to handle rich, important women.