Page 24 of Always Alchemy

Iused to hate secrets.

It’s more than that.

I used tofearsecrets. I was fucking terrified of them. Of their power, their insidious toxicity, their ability to shatter lives.

Their presence meant darkness; their absence meant light.

Now, though, I have a really good secret, a seriously juicy one that’s building and building and threatening to tear me apart in the best possible way. It helps that I’m guarding it for all the right reasons, and it helps that I’m sharing it with Max (and not just because he’s a devious, diabolical shit who revels in this stuff).

My newest secret involves the incredible woman lying next to me, a brilliant-cut diamond of epic proportions, and a giant leap of faith.

I lie here on my side, taking her in.

The way the softly diffused light of this Italian morning makes her glow.

The new freckles, the ones that have appeared since we turned up at Lake Como.

The softness of her hair, which is currently pale pink. It looks like cotton candy, in the loveliest possible way, and it brings to mind a naked, debauched Marie Antoinette.

The sheet is pooled around her hip, but I can only see one of her tattoos right now—the swirling, intricateDon her waist, appropriately enough. She’s lying on theM.

I’m enjoying having this secret from her. Rather, I’m enjoying the anticipation ofthat moment, of how it will feel and what she’ll say and how copiously Max will weep. It makes every little thing feel pregnant with promise. In a minute or two, when I can’t bear the throbbing of my morning wood any longer and I wake her, I’ll move inside her, all the while knowing that we’re on the cusp of asking her to marry us.

It even makes lying here with her feel special. Max has slipped out to source endless roses for our proposal. He didn’t trust the hotel to sort it, so he’s got one of the drivers to take him to some early morning flower market. I’m pretty sure the team at this sumptuous hotel can sort anything it puts its mind to, but that’s Max for you.

Anyway, it gives me a rare moment alone in bed with the woman who will hopefully be my wife soon, and I plan on making the absolute most of it.

She’s exhausted, though. Her new dance studio in Hammersmith opened a few weeks ago, and it’s going great guns. While Max tossed and turned all night—probably nervous about our proposal—Darcy slept like the dead on the other side of me. The intensity of getting the studio upand running and then launching with a full schedule of classes has really taken its toll.

Thank God I’ve only got one more month at Loeb. Working one’s notice isn’t really done in this industry. They usually shut down your email account and kick you out of the door as soon as you tell them you’re going. But, given I’m not going to a competitor, and as a gesture of goodwill on my part after a far shorter tenure than I know Thum wanted or expected, I’ve stayed on for three months to smooth the handover to my successor.

From next month, I’ll be taking the helm at Rafe, Zach and Cal’s hedge fund, Cerulean, helping Darce with the operational side of running a small business, and possibly, hopefully, planning a wedding.

I shift on the crisp white sheets, and she stirs. Watching her surface, return to consciousness, will never lose its allure. I’ll never forget that first sighting of her—the want that hit me right in my solar plexus, the intoxication of her scent, the tinkle of her laugh, and the white-hot fury that coursed through my veins when I discovered that some dickhead had planted a great big love bite on her neck.

The universe certainly has a sense of humour.

Loving Darcy is easy. Shemakesit easy. She’s dazzling and genuine and so bloody lovable. Sensual. Plainly comfortable in her body and her soul and her desires in a way I was not brought up to be. She draws people in so magnetically they can’t help themselves but fall, and thank fuck Max and I have her to temper our intensity and shine her sunshine.

This feels like a magical little interlude, this moment in time when we haven’t asked her, and she hasn’t said yes, and we haven’t yet embarked on the next stage in our relationship. We’re in a swoony kind of limbo where the world is ouroyster and the possibilities for the kind of future we three can forge together are endless.

Planning for a proposal inevitably leads a man to dwell on what comes next. After the wedding, I mean. Let me tell you, Max and I have been having all sorts of baby-related thoughts recently. Seeing Darcy teaching little girls and boys to dance, seeing her shine her light on them, seeing quite how eagerly they flock to her and how easily, how naturally, she engages with them, from goofing around to excellent cuddles and endless patience, only leads to one—persistent—train of thought.

She may have just turned twenty-six, but she has an ageing boyfriend—not me, clearly—who’s pretty fucking broody, so she’d better watch out.

(Even if I can’t help but think someone had better explain basic biology to Max, because if he goes for her arse as often as he does, all she’ll be popping out are baby versions of me. Just saying.)

My knuckles make a featherlight trail down over the soft, soft skin of her stomach, and she smiles in her sleep.

My wife,I mouth silently to myself.

DARCY

With two boyfriends, I’m no stranger to the joy of a good massage (especially because they almost always have happy endings). But that sweet Italian lady was seriously strong. I feel so light I could float up into the air like a balloon.

The boys booked me this massage as a treat, and it turns out I needed every single moment of it. Teaching five-year-olds how to dance isn’t exactly strenuous in itself, butrunning a business full time is, and I’ve been knackered and not a little wound up this spring.

I finish applying my makeup in the spa’s beautifully lit changing room. I haven’t taken too much sun, but there’s a dusting of freckles across my nose and cheeks that Dex seems obsessed with, and my shoulders are golden. The boys told me they have a surprise for me before we dinealfrescoon the gorgeous terrace that overlooks Lake Como. What it is, I have no clue, but it motivates me to take my time brushing black mascara over my lashes and dusting shimmery illuminating powder onto my collarbones.

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