Valentine’s happy vendetta

CHAPTER THREE

RHYS’s POV.

I was seated on my bed, about to take a shower when my door slammed open and she ventured into my room as if she owned it. I didn’t bother much about her dress but the tattoo on her neck got my attention and I could see she was trembling too, she was clinging onto her clutch bag.

One look at her and one would know she was not American. American’s don’t usually look like that.

When I thought she would apologize for butting into me , things got a little heated up when she threw a ring at me and asked me to marry her. I was surprised at first, then I wanted to laugh. It was bold of her, very bold of her to walk into my room and throw a ring at me but she looked serious.

I accepted her ring and she did something more bizarre like she was being proposed to, literally screaming yes at a question I never asked.

Right from then, her image became etched in my head and I was wondering what she was all about. Well, I couldn’t blame her, not when her boyfriend and her best friend cheated on her.

Even long after she left my room and I returned from the shower, her scent continued to linger.

Picking up my phone, I called Mr Ma. He was my personal assistant and he came running into my room after a few minutes.

“You called for me sir”

“Here” I handed him the card, “I want you to find out everything about this woman in thirty minutes for me, can you do that?”

“Of course sir” he collects the card from me, “I will get right to it”

I came to the Maldives to try and regroup, after losing my wife two years ago, I still have not gotten used to it but when this lady walked into my room, she gave me something to be interested in.

I remembered the reason why she asked me to marry her and I chuckled, she was insane but I loved her confidence. Having the confidence to walk into my room and asking me to marry her after seeing her boyfriend and her best friend cheating on her was top tier, I immediately felt a kind of respect for her.

Thirty minutes later, a knock on my door made me raise my head from the document I was reviewing and Mr Ma walked into the room again. He has worked for me for close to ten years, I loved his swiftness.

“This is what you asked for, sir” he handed me a document and i immediately collected it, pulling out the paper inside of it.

She was an aspiring ballet dancer but stopped four years ago when she broke her leg during a stampede at the airport while trying to welcome her boyfriend alongside his fans, now she worked for one of the ballet academies in the country, she also co owned a fashion brand with the said boyfriend.

I gritted my teeth, it felt like her whole life revolved around this supposed boyfriend of hers.

Her mother died ten years ago and her father remarried.

“Is this all?” I asked Mr ma again and he nodded.

“Yes sir, that’s all the information on her”

“She is pretty basic” I said, my attention returning to the empty box of ring on my bedside table,

“I want you to order a ring for me in size 5, purely cut out diamond and I need it to be ready alongside the marriage certificates in an hour”

“Are you really getting married to her, sir?”

“Hmmm” I nodded, going back to my laptop, “she asked”

Mr Ma opened his mouth to say something but decided against it, he bowed lightly and made his way out of the room again.

*****

Now here I was seated in a secluded area of the beach, the candlelit dinner looking magnificent. Mr. Ma sure did an amazing job and I loved the entire demeanor of the place and I knew for a fact that she would love it too, I mean who didn’t want to get away from society once in a while?

I raised my head to see her and Mr Ma walking towards me, this time around she was clad in a pair of denim loose pants and a white shirt which was neatly tucked into the pants, her hair was still in a bun and her face bare of any kind of makeup unlike earlier. Guess all the color of the valentine has drained from her, she wore a red dress earlier.

“You came?” I asked as she lowered herself on the chair my assistant pulled out for her.

“I didn’t think you were serious but since you sent your assistant to come get me, I had to come” she said, “I am not one who backs out of deals and I checked my account, fifty thousand dollars is actually too much for a ring”

I chuckled lightly but didn’t say anything regarding that, I didn’t want to.

“So you are here with the sole purpose of signing our marriage certificate?” I decided to get right to business

“Of course” she responds, “we made an agreement remember?”

“I see” I leaned back against my chair, studying the woman in front of me, “so tell me about yourself butterfly”

“I am guessing you already did a background check on me” she replied, “what exactly do you want to know”

“Everything”

“I really don’t think everything about me matters to you, I mean this will be a marriage of convenience right? I am going to be honest with you up front. I thought about it and it seems like you are a man with a lot of powers and you are going to come in handy when I get revenge on my ex boyfriend and my best friend for cheating me for seven years”

She gritted her teeth in anger and I could see her pain, she was actually traumatized but was trying to hide it well.

“So I will be your revenge plan?”

“Not my revenge plan per se, I mean it’s not like I am a damsel in distress. I just want to make the two of them pay for what they did to me”

“I see” I pressed forward again, “I have a few conditions then before we sign our certificates. Six months, if this doesn’t work out then we go our separate ways, we have to live in the same house”

“I can work with that but you have to promise not to interfere with my plan, I want to solely make them pay on my own”

I smirked before beckoning Mr. Ma who handed me the documents and I pushed it towards her

She fiddled with her pen for a while, I could see the look of uncertainty in her eyes.

“Having second thoughts?”

She immediately scribbled her signature on it before her eyes returned back to me.

“Mr Rhys Rockwell, why does your name sound so familiar?”

“You have my name, you can look it up”

I collected the certificate from her and also scribbled my signature on it before handing it back to my assistant.

“I prepared a little something for you, butterfly” I told her, “I mean, there are still a few hours until the end of valentine.

I picked up a bouquet of red roses from a smaller table beside me and handed it over to her.

“Happy Valentine, butterfly”

Her face broke into a gentle smile, “happy Valentine, Mr Rhys, I didn’t prepare anything for you though. I didn’t think we would be pushing through with this”

Without saying anything, I stood up from my chair and walked over to her before removing a small velvet box from my breast pocket.

“My wife needs to wear something more deserving” I told her while slowly taking her hand and slipping her ring off.

She continued to watch me keenly as I slipped in the new pair of ring on her finger and it was just like I imagined.

“You knew my size?”

“Hmmm” I nodded, “it fits”

The smile on her face remained for a while before it slowly faded away when her mobile began to ring. From the look on her face, I knew who it was.

“You do not have to answer that” I told her.

“I know that” she replied, “a toast?” She raised her glass, “to marriage and valentine?”

“A toast then”

She sipped on the drink lightly before pulling her body from the chair and began to walk towards the beach. I let her, the night was still young and she could have dinner when she wanted. I noticed she was limply lightly, you won’t notice if you don’t look closely and for a moment I wondered if that bastard actually knew she limped when she walked.

“Sir” Mr Ma walked up to me, “a man is causing a ruckus outside, he claims his fiancee is in here”

“Tell the security to get him out of the building if he persists” I tell him, “this is our wedding night, we do not need any kind of disturbance”

“Okay sir”

After he left, I returned my attention to the woman who was not standing a few feet away from the water and I couldn’t help but admire her boldness despite the pain in her eyes.

After a while, she plopped down on the sand and spread her arms wide open, I scoffed, she really was something

I also stood up and made my way towards her, my eyes darkened a little when I saw tears glistening on her face. I thought she wasn’t going to cry.

“I thought you were the tough one?”

“Of course I am” she replied, “I am just angry about the fact that I let that bastard deceive me all these years, it feels like a dream”

“Rule number one if you want to survive in this world, be ruthless”

She cleaned her tears and turned to me, “I married you and I don’t even know anything about you. From the way you carry yourself, i know you are an important person but that’s all I can boast off”

“Well, my dear wife” a smug look appears on my face,

“you can get any information about me on the internet but there is one you won’t get, I lost my ex wife two years ago”

I wasn’t sure why I was telling her this but I guess we were bound to find out.

“Oh, so sorry to hear that. So I am guessing you have kids?”

“They both died when she was giving birth”

“I am so sorry to hear that” she apologized and I shrugged.

“You should go back early and get some rest, we leave in the morning”

“I already booked my flight, I don’t….

“I won’t let you travel on a commercial plane when you have a private one at your disposal. I have to go back early and finish some work, Mr Ma will be here Incase you need anything. Goodnight, butterfly”

“I guess I will be seeing you tomorrow morning then”

“Hmmm”

I turned around and made to leave but her next words halted me.

“Happy Valentine, Mr Rhys”

“Happy valentine, butterfly”

With that, I walked away, from the corner of my eye I could see her wiping another set of tears that trickled down her eye.