Chapter 17
“Something will have to be done about my father,” Danica said at midnight, sitting in front of the unlit fireplace in Julia Moreau’s study. “I can’t be around either of you until something is done about him.”
Julia, sitting across from her daughter and Alicia on another couch, nodded. “He is a vindictive, twisted man. Should he find out about either me or Alicia… it won’t be good. Our bodyguards will only be able to do so much. Assuming they’re not paid more to look the other way, like mine used to be.”
Danica flinched as she leaned forward. Alicia remained wrapped around her arm. The emerald ring twinkled on her finger. “I have a plan. I’ll need both of you to help me, though.” She fondly looked at her fiancée. “I’ll need your cooperation the most of all, my love.”
Alicia stroked Danica’s cheek. “Anything for you.”
She meant it, too. That spite was still in her heart. Only now it was no longer directed at Danica. It was directed at Russell, at the people who would come between her and Danica. The world. The industries and hierarchies waiting for them to fall.
Alicia had seen her future, as Danica had seen hers years ago. To make her dreams come true, however, she would have to assume the mantle of a woman she still barely knew. Both in herself and sitting across from her.
She looked up at Julia, who in turn watched her carefully. “Tell me everything I need to know,” Alicia said. “I want to be prepared for anything.”
The first time alone with her Mistress was one of the most relieving of Alicia’s life.
“I missed you so much,” Danica muttered, kissing every inch of her throat as she held Alicia in the back of the limo. She had already arranged a hotel room for their reunion, but someone was unable to wait until they got there. “I am never going without you again.”
“I don’t want you to, ma’am,” Alicia replied. She was happy to do whatever Danica wanted. Soft and slow? Beautiful. Fast and furiously carnal? Delightful. Both summed up their relationship quite succinctly. “I want to always be available to you.”
She kissed her so hard that Alicia whimpered against her lips.
Alicia soon found herself falling over Danica’s lap.
“Remember what I said earlier about you disobeying me?” Danica grabbed Alicia’s ass as she inhaled the leather of the seat beneath her face. “Come on, Alicia, did you think I forgot?”
On the contrary. She had been counting on Danica remembering.
The first cry of the night was the weakest of them all. Alicia still needed a little time to assimilate into the role she so desperately wanted to fill.
Danica presented her with the first of many folders carefully put together for her reading ease. At least she had the decency to do it in the privacy of their hotel room. Alicia had a feeling Danica would not be so gracious in the immediate future.
“Don’t sign anything now,” Danica said, pouring her another glass of wine. “Take your time going through it. I’ll arrange for you to have one of the best lawyers in the business.” Her smirk was more relaxing than the wine. “I know he is, because my lawyer hates him.”
Alicia attempted to read the legal jargon splattered across the page. Colored stickies highlighted the most important parts.
She expected all of it, but knowing it was about to become a reality? That it was something she would never be able to walk away from and still be the same woman in the end? That was frightening.
“It’s all right,” Danica said, sensing her trepidation. “Remember that I love you. We’re doing this because we love each other. Because it’s the right thing to do.”
Alicia flipped over the first page. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Acting like I have anything to worry about.”
“So you trust me?”
“I should be asking you that.” Alicia showed her one of the terms on the second page. “After all, you’re the one with everything to lose from this arrangement.”
“Your love is the only thing I mind losing.”
Alicia grinned. “Then it’s settled. I’m cleaning you out ten years from now.”
“A whole ten years. That’s more than most get.” Danica kissed her forehead. Then her ear. Then her shoulder. With any luck, Alicia would make it through another page before she was asked to get on her knees. She hoped it wouldn’t take that long.
“I am satisfied,” Alicia’s lawyer said. “My client is also satisfied.”
“Then it’s settled,” Danica’s lawyer replied. “I daresay, this is the easiest time I’ve had with you.” That was directed at Alicia’s lawyer.
“Because your client wants to shoot herself in the foot. Who am I to say no?”
Danica had already signed the primary document. She flashed a wicked grin at her fiancée across the table.
You’re an idiot. Alicia carefully signed the document as if her penmanship would be judged. I love you, and I know you’re doing this for me, but you’re an idiot.
She touched the collar around her throat. Did it clash with her orange sundress?
“Is that tender?” the doctor asked as he pressed Alicia’s stomach. “Tell me yes,” he mouthed.
“Yes. It’s very tender, doctor.” Alicia sat up. “I haven’t had a period in six weeks. Have I told you that yet?”
“Yes, Ms. Colbert, I believe you have.” Danica’s favorite doctor, who could be paid to say anything on any form, smiled at her. “I’ll have to run a blood test, but by all accounts, I think I’ll be able to tell you the results that you and Ms. Moreau want so much.”
“How lovely!” Alicia swung her legs over the table. “I’ve always wanted to be a mother.”
The situation was unfortunately simple: Alicia couldn’t be seen in any high-profile places, so when she went to New York, she flew commercial and kept her shopping to the boutiques the middle class considered upscale.
To Alicia, the dresses she thumbed through on the racks were made of the finest quality and romantic. Set aside those romantic notions. Okay, maybe a little romance. Was it a terrible thing to giggle as she pulled a discount Dior dress off the rack? The bargain!
“That one would look so beautiful on you,” the salesperson said behind her. “Would you like to try it on?”
Alicia held up the strapless cocktail dress to the mirror. “I think so.”
As she slipped into a fitting room, she received a text from her mother. “Are you still visiting tonight?”
Of course Alicia was. She wouldn’t go to New York and not visit her parents on Long Island, right? Besides, this was her last chance to see her family before everything officially changed. For all of them.
“Dee!” Alicia dropped her shopping bags and jumped into the woman’s arms. “I was hoping it would be you!”
“Ah, shucks. When Ms. Moreau calls me to come back to work for you, I ain’t gonna say no. You’re fun, ma’am.”
“Please. Alicia.”
They parted. Dee was back in her bodyguard uniform, and all felt right in Alicia’s world.
Well, minus the part where she now needed a bodyguard more than ever.
“You’re back at work on time. Tomorrow’s the big day.
” Every time Alicia thought about it, her heart fluttered and her stomach exploded in anxiety.
That was normal, right? Everyone got cold feet.
Under Danica’s watchful eye, Alicia rearranged her paperwork she kept in a safe in the hotel room.
“As soon as your name is attached to that account, it will be all yours,” she said, stroking Alicia’s long hair.
The leash coiled from Alicia’s collar to Danica’s other hand.
A kiss touched the top of her head. “All the money I put into it will be rerouted through five different countries. I’m not saying it’s totally untraceable, but it won’t be easy even if someone is looking for it. ”
“You take such good care of me.”
The leash tugged at her throat. Alicia wasn’t done with her reorganizing, however. “I’ll start putting money into it as soon as the paperwork goes through. It’s all yours, my love. Pay your bills, invest, do whatever you want.”
“I will, ma’am.”
She stopped her chore long enough to tip her head back and kiss her Mistress. Alicia almost fell beneath her spell for the second time that day – but there was work to do! So much to do. Tomorrow was a big day.
“You sure you don’t want to invite your friend or even your mother?”
“No,” Alicia said after endless consideration. “They wouldn’t understand. Let’s save it for the real thing.”
Danica agreed. The fewer people who knew, the better.
“You’re sure you want to use that ring?” Danica meant her mother’s wedding ring.
“What better trinket to send a message to your father?” Alicia had few pleasures to indulge in. Her fiancée and the look on Russell’s face when his whole world crumbled were two of them.
“You’re more sadistic than I ever gave you credit for, my love.”
“Takes a sadist to know one.”
“Touché.”
The judge stepped out of his chambers and shook Danica’s hand. “Look at you! Thought for sure you were bullshitting me when you called me last week.” He shook Alicia’s hand, too.
Danica kept a protective arm around Alicia’s midsection. The Dior dress kept riding up her thighs, damnit. “I trust that your reelection campaign is going well?”
“With your donation? Of course.” The judge gestured to the podium at the front of the room.
Julia and Dee already stood there, dressed in Sunday best. Julia pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed her one good eye.
It was that sort of thing that gave Alicia strength today.
“Shall we?” The judge’s voice was as ominous as the seven trumpets heralding the Apocalypse.
“You’re beautiful,” Julia said to Alicia.
Dee blushed when asked if she was Alicia’s witness. “Guess so,” she said.
This wasn’t how Alicia imagined this day when she was a little girl. But, she reassured herself, Danica had promised a proper ceremony as soon as her father was taken care of.
“Alicia,” Danica whispered, clasping her hands and gazing into her eyes. She was liable to drown in that amber. Not a bad way to go. Suck me into your gravity again, my love. “Promise me that this is what you want.”
She nodded. “I want to be with you forever, Danica. I don’t care how we achieve that.”
This monumental moment should’ve been given more care, but they didn’t have time for ostentatiousness or full-page spreads in the papers. One day. When this was all over and they could be normal again.
Well, as normal as a couple with billions of dollars at their disposal could be, anyway.
Alicia smoothed her skirt as she followed Danica down the hallway. Her pulse kept time with every step, even though she had known about this appointment. Knowing didn’t make her any less anxious.
The room was sterile. Alicia perched on the padded bench, the paper beneath her crinkling, and folded her hands in her lap. “This couldn’t be any less romantic,” she admitted. “Can’t wait to tell my future grandchildren about their origins in a doctor's exam room."
Danica turned the lock with deliberate calm before setting her folder on the counter.
“No, precious,” she corrected, crossing the room to stand between Alicia’s knees.
“It’s ours. I’ve been preparing for this since long before I met you.
I only waited until I had the right woman to share having a family with. "
Her certainty warmed Alicia more than the bright lights could. “I know.” She swallowed. “I just… what if it doesn’t work?”
“Then we try again.” Danica bent, brushing a kiss over Alicia’s temple. “I have no shortage of foresight, and you have no shortage of courage. Between us, it will work.”
That was Danica – turning Alicia’s jitters into something powerful.
When Danica opened the slim velvet case from her folder, Alicia exhaled in relief. Not handcuffs. A pen. A heavy, gold instrument meant for signatures that forged dynasties.
“I thought we’d already signed everything,” Alicia teased, though her voice wavered.
“This is the last of it.” Danica slid the paper forward, her tone brisk but her gaze unbearably tender. “A formality. To make certain there are no cracks anyone can exploit. I promised you certainty.”
Alicia took the pen. Her fingers shook, but Danica steadied them with her own. Their hands moved as one across the page.
“There,” Danica murmured, sealing the moment with a kiss to Alicia’s knuckles. “No one can take this from us now.”
The envelope she tucked away afterward looked small, ordinary, almost unworthy of the gravity of the situation. But Alicia knew better. Her nervousness ebbed as she let Danica’s hand rest against her stomach, claiming what they both had already chosen.
“Ready?” Danica asked.
Alicia nodded. “Yes. With you, always.”
She rode the elevator up with no one but Dee to accompany her. To be sure, the security downstairs was not pleased to see either of their faces. Russell had made sure they were no longer welcome there.
Too bad.
The doors opened to the carefully controlled chaos that was Moreau Industries’ main office. Straight ahead was Abby, the colorfully clad receptionist who sat at her floating desk and barely gave Alicia any thought as she approached.
Alicia stared at the embossed letters hanging above Abby’s head. MOREAU, they screamed at her. That’s right. Don’t forget that.
“Good afternoon,” Alicia said with all the strength she could muster. “Could you do me a favor and send a memo to the whole building?”
The receptionist balked. At least she turned it into a cordial laugh. “And what should I tell the whole building, ma’am?”
Alicia produced a copy of her marriage license. “That I, Alicia Marie Moreau, now own half of everything you see here.”
Suffice to say, the receptionist was speechless.
END OF PART 2
Continue the saga in part 3, REIGNED!