Chapter Four
Zayden
I went into the bank feeling good. The curious gazes of all my employees upon my arrival did not bother me at all; rather, it gave me a sense of pride: they were looking at me because they knew. They knew that I had managed to get the most amazing woman in the world to agree to marry me. Whether they were jealous or judgmental or just plain curious, none of their whispers and gasps bothered me in the slightest. In fact, it was probably their lucky day, because I was suddenly in the mood to issue an office-wide bonus. Grinning wildly, I approached Aria’s desk.
“Hi,” she said, beaming.
Instead of responding to her greeting, I leaned in and kissed her in front of the whole office. Aria broke off first, perhaps feeling uncomfortable by my show of affection in the workplace. But the smile on her face continued to be radiant.
“My office, 15 minutes,” I said. Then I added loudly, “I love you.”
Aria’s face went completely red as she mumbled something that sounded like, “I love you too.”
Exactly 15 minutes later, my fiancée was sitting across from me in my office, her huge ring flashing the bond that now tied us together.
“I don’t want to wait, Aria,” I said simply.
“What do you mean?” She looked confused. “I already said yes, I don’t know if you remember. I mean, maybe I remember it incorrectly too. It was all happening so fast it’s hard to hold on to the memory exactly as it transpired. That doesn’t of course, explain the ring,” she added cheerfully, surveying her hand. “This is too big, Zayden. I hope you didn’t pay a fortune; it’s not worth it.”
“Don’t you dare ever tell me you’re not worth something again. You deserve the very best of everything in the world and I’ll make sure you have all of it. But I can’t wait, Aria, to get married to you. To make you mine irreversibly forever.”
She grinned. She was obviously in a playful mood. “I’m not too sure about the irreversible part. People get divorced all the time—”
“Don’t ever say that again, either,” I snapped.
“I was,” Aria said, screwing up her mouth. “You know I was joking.”
“Me too. Just wanted to make sure you knew it was permanent.”
“Permanent isn’t a long enough time to be with you,” she said and winked.
I needed to get to the point.
“Three weeks. I want to get married in three weeks. Does that sound okay?” I asked gently. I didn’t want to make her feel inundated in case she needed more time. At the same time, I also couldn’t bear to think of not being married to her any longer.
She opened her mouth wide in shock. “Three weeks? But…planning…and invites…I don’t even have an idea of what to do about my wedding dress.”
I reached over and covered her hands with my own, flashing a reassuring smile. “Aria,” I said lovingly. “It’ll all be taken care of. I already booked Fiona Davis to be your wedding planner, and she will be contacting you shortly about all your needs. Fiona usually has a waiting list of about two years. She is the most sought-after wedding planner in the country.”
She gasped. “Stacey knows all about her. She will kill me.”
“We will book Fiona for your friends’ wedding too then, but since they don’t plan to have the ceremony for another year, we can surely worry about that later.”
“Wait,” she said suspiciously. “How do you know when they plan to get married?”
“Your friend Stacey may or may not have gone with me to purchase your ring.”
She gasped loudly, looking amused. “You aren’t telling me she approved of this magnificent gazillion-dollar ring, are you?”
“Yes, but it’s no big deal.”
“Whatever you say,” she said, grinning.
“Fiona will be in touch with you shortly. She has already booked The Plaza for three weeks from tomorrow. They are usually pre-booked years in advance, but between my influence and Fiona’s, getting that date was a piece of cake.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Aria said holding up her hand and looking utterly confused. “The Plaza. That’s where all the celebrities get married. It’s also in New York. Did you actually think this through?”
“Oh, right,” I said with a content smirk. “I forgot to mention, we are getting married in New York.”
The effect of those words on Aria was exactly what I had hoped. She gasped so loudly a few people came and poked their head in to see if everything was okay. Her eyes started drowning in tears of happiness once we were alone again.
“You said you had never been to New York.” I shrugged. “Obviously, we had to change that. And what better opportunity to do so than during the most special day of both of our lives?”
“But Zayden,” she spoke in stutters. “All my family and friends and everyone I know are here and they can’t exactly afford to take a trip to—”
“I will take care of everything. You have to learn to stop worrying about money. I want you to have the wedding of your dreams. Pick out the best wedding gown, the best décor; pick out an invitation embellished in gold and platinum if you wish. I will pay for absolutely everything. We will put all your friends and family up in five-star hotels. Everything you need will be taken care of. Don’t worry about how or when; just decide what you want and it’s yours. You might as well start getting used to it, because this is not just about the wedding, either. That’s basically how things will go from now on for the rest of your life.”
She was crying into her hands now, unable to process all of this. It made me feel a little weary because I did not like seeing her in tears, not even those of joy. Her tears were more precious to me than anything money could ever buy, and they were not worth wasting.
I stood up from my chair and went over to take Aria into my arms. She was so small and fit so perfectly against my chest.
“Aria, I love you so much. More than you will ever realize. More than the world will ever have accurate measures to quantify. When I decided I wanted to marry you, I also decided that from that moment on, nothing in the world mattered as much as your happiness. If you really think about it, I’m being selfish by giving you the wedding of your dreams. I can only be happy when you are happy. So in the end, I am doing this for me. Okay?”
I hugged her tighter, intending to never let me go.
“I love you so much too, Zay,” she mumbled into my chest. “I can’t wait to be your wife…”
We sat like that in each other’s embrace for the longest time, with the whole office watching through my office windows. When we finally broke apart, I remembered the other thing I had to discuss with her.
“One more thing,” I said, wiping the last of her tears from her face. “There is absolutely no reason for you and me to be apart for another second from now on. I hired some movers. They will be at your apartment tomorrow to get all your things. You don’t worry about a single thing. They will pack all your things and carry everything to my place. Is that okay?”
I felt like it was important to phrase everything as a question. Aria would not be okay with being told what to do, which was one of the many reasons I loved her so much.
“Of course,” she said to my utter relief. “I can’t wait to move in with you, either. The thought of being apart from you is tormenting sometimes. I’ll miss my roommates of course, but I’ll have one last night with them tonight.”
“They will be happy for you,” I said, stroking her hair.
“I’m sure you have a good command on exactly how they will feel, given that they have been sneakily planning things with you behind my back,” she said with a smirk.
“It’s because they love you. How can they not? How can anyone not?” I leaned over to plant a kiss on her lips. “You are so damn lovable.”
“So are you,” she said, kissing me back. “Thanks so much for arranging everything with the move. And for Fiona, The Plaza and everything else. I can’t believe I get to marry you in three weeks.”
“You can have the rest of the day off,” I said, looking at the time. “I have some business to tend to and you have to go talk to your roommates and plan for your move. You can come in to work whenever you feel like it for the next three weeks or not at all if you don’t want to. You won’t be stationed at the teller’s booth—”
“No!” she gasped again. “No, Zayden. I haven’t earned a promotion. You know how I feel about making my own way to the top.”
“Well, that complicates matters. Considering you will soon be part owner of the company. I mean if you prefer to run half of this office while sitting where the tellers do, that’s up to you, but I would suggest that it’s not the best business move.”
“I didn’t earn this,” she whispered again.
“Yes, you did. I have seen your mind, Aria, and fallen in love with it. Remember when I asked you if you would work for me long before I even realized I was in love with you? Even when I had no plans but to seduce you, I was already blown away by your brilliance and your ideas. My company needs young, ambitious assets just like you, and this would be the fact of the matter regardless of whether or not we were getting married in three weeks.”
“But that’s not how everyone else will see it,” she protested. “They will all just think it’s some kind of nepotism or something.”
“Well, give me a list of everyone who thinks that way and I will fire every last one of them.”
She sighed. “That won’t be necessary. Fine, no more teller duties. Where do I sit then?”
“I am having them build you a new office right across from mine. So let me know what you want in that space. Meanwhile, you can just take that desk over there. I don’t think – well, I hope – that you won’t be engaging in much other work than planning your dream wedding for the next three weeks so that shouldn’t be a problem. By the time we are married, your office should also be ready, and you will have your own space to come up with brilliant ideas that I don’t doubt will bring my company heaps of money.”
“You give me too much credit, Zayden.”
It was my turn to sigh. “The fact that you think that is also one of your greatest qualities. God, if you could only see yourself the way I see you. We will talk again after you have assumed your new role in the company for a few months. You’ll see what I’m talking about.”
She shrugged. “If you say so. I’m going to head out now. I have a wedding to plan,” she said joyfully and almost hopped out of my office, leaving me grinning with admiration.