Page 105 of Lovers' Dance

Matt arched an eyebrow. “They’ll smell a story, a sordid story that will be spun in the worst light, and your Aunt Cleo will—”

“Okay,” I cried. It was the mention of Aunt Cleo that did it. “I’ll go, you manipulative beast.”

Matt chuckled and hugged me as close as the seatbelt would allow. “I adore you, poppet, but you should know better than trying to blackmail me. Have you not learnt anything from Google about me?”

“Humph.” I snorted, then smiled, albeit, unwillingly. Matt always made me smile. “I’ve not Googled you since that day at the pub. But, Matt, come on, you can’t be serious about this.”

Matt leaned into my ear, his warm breath dancing over my skin deliciously. “I want to do this right, Madi, and, when we do make love,”—he nipped my ear and I broke out in goose bumps—“I promise it will be worth the wait. Patience, poppet.”

“You’ve turned me into a monster,” I mumbled, squirming in my seat.

“I know,” he replied without remorse. “When I decide the time is right, you can do anything you want to me.”

On that note we fell silent, sharing secret smiles on the journey to Central London. When the car went past the security gates at Matt’s headquarters, I stared in awe.

“What?” he asked, unbuckling his seatbelt.

“You work here?” I asked. “Your family owns this building?”

“The building itself not wholly, the land it sits upon, yes. Don’t look astonished. I’ll call you later.”

I received a brief kiss before he exited the vehicle and he waved once before we pulled away.

“Oh my freaking word,” I said turning around in my seat to peer at the building.

“Beg your pardon, Ms DuMont?” the driver called.

“Nothing.” I said, turning frontward and feeling totally out of my comfort zone. This had to be a dream. I mean, how had I ended up going out with a handsome billionaire? It didn’t make sense. I was going to wake up one morning and realize this was all a crazy dream as a result of eating too much cheese late at night. What on earth did Matt see in me? Whatever it was, no one else had spotted it before. Could it be the virginity thing? Maybe he liked the fact he was the only man to have dipped in my sacred pool. Maybe he was going through a pre-midlife crisis. Maybe…maybe…

Maybe he loved me? He assured me he did. Why was I unsure about our relationship? Because rich white men like him didn’t love financially challenged black girls. That was Aunt Cleo’s voice reverberating in my head. It was a voice that put a downer on my mood. Why couldn’t she be happy for me? If she knew Matt, she would love him, too. They all would. He was kind and caring, arrogant and clever, fiercely protective and so sweet sometimes it made my heart ache. Matt was the perfect man, wrapped up in the perfect package. But I still felt fate’s mailman got the address wrong. And, tomorrow, we would be on show again. I sighed in frustration. Matt’s driver glanced at me in the rear view mirror before averting his gaze, leaving me to my thoughts. I guess after dinner at his parents’ place, nothing could be worse. Right? Matt would handle the media, he wouldn’t allow anyone to make me feel as if I didn’t belong. He would be my knight.

I would be the damsel in a kickass dress—who wasn’t really a damsel—but a tough de facto New Yorker who’d flown across the ocean to attain her dream. I deserved good things like everyone else. I wasn’t jinxed. Good things happened to good people. It was the unspoken rule…or was it bad things can happen to good people? Either way, I wasn’t going to throw away my happiness. It had been so long since I’d had any. So long.

And this was how it started. The emotional rollercoaster preluding the run up to my birthday that was a few weeks away, then the anniversary of my beloved parents’ deaths. Where everything, even the good things in my life, seemed wrong. Shit. I couldn’t let Matt see me when I got that way. What if it freaked him out and he dumped me? Around that time, it was impossible to hide how damaged I truly was. I hoped to God Matt would be abroad on business, because it was highly unlikely he’d miss my birthday. The man had bought me a freaking SUV and diamonds because I was mad at him. Or, I could play the busy card. Technically it wasn’t lying, we were insanely busy at the studio. A shudder went through me as I recalled Matt’s voice when he warned me about lying to him. No, I was definitely not going to end up on his bad side.

“Would you like me to turn off the air conditioning, Ms DuMont?” the driver asked. He must have been watching me in the rear view mirror.

“No, thank you. I didn’t catch your name.”

“Dan, it’s Daniel Mills.”

“Hi, Dan. You can call me Madi.”

“I don’t think Mr Bradley would be happy with that, Ms DuMont.”

I flashed him a small smile and looked out the window as the buildings whizzed by. London on a Saturday, just like home.

Sunday had arrived and I was having a bad face day. My cheeks looked puffy, my eyes squinty, and my nose—had it grown as I slept in my bed last night? It didn’t help this was my fourth attempt at applying makeup. I had stupidly decided to use foundation, something I had never used by myself before. The girl in the High Street pharmacy had assured me it was the perfect colour match at the counter. I had driven into the city centre this morning to get make up supplies. I didn’t normally wear makeup unless it was for a show, and Bri did our makeup. Okay, I’ll say it: I’m crap with makeup. A little face powder and lip gloss, what more did you need?

‘Oh, it’s perfect,’ she had said. She lied. When I took a proper look at my reflection in the mirror after painstakingly dabbing it all over my face, I screamed. It was not a perfect match. It was NOT a perfect match. It looked much darker in the bottle. On my face it was shades lighter than expected. I looked like a weird half-dead version of myself. I had run to the bathroom to wash the shit off my face. When I dried my face and looked in the bathroom mirror, there were traces of it along my hairline, evilly bonding with the roots.God, why?I had to use a wet towel and rub like crazy to remove it, which messed up the front of my hair and caused me no end of worry to re-do.

The second attempt, without foundation—I’d learnt that lesson—fared no better. The eye shadow was more sparkly than I wanted, and I was so stressed over the previous foundation drama that I poked my eye with the eyeliner, which caused me to tear up and I had to wash my face,again. Halfway through my third attempt, I noticed my skin looked dry. Sahara desert dry. Of course it did. I had stupidly forgotten to moisturize after each washing. I raced downstairs in my underwear, poured myself a shot of whiskey to steady my nerves, then raced back upstairs to get the job done right. Enough moisturizer. The perfect amount of face powder. Things were going well. The eyeliner I applied with a surgeon’s precision. Thank goodness for the calming properties of whiskey. I chose a different eye shadow, still silvery, but with a lot less shimmer factor going on. I held my breath as I applied mascara.

“Thank fuck for that,” I muttered when the ordeal was over, critically peering at my face in the mirror. I walked towards my bed where the dress lay. Reverently picking it up with a delighted sigh before stepping into it and pulling it up my body.

“Looking fine, girl,” I said to my reflection, then glanced at the nightstand clock. Five fifty-five.

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