“I love them all,” Kari said.  And she did!

“Look at them all again,” Alex said, “and tell me which one is the most beautiful to you?”

Kari looked at them all.  And the choice, for her, was easy.  “That one, of course.  It’s gorgeous.  But how much does it cost?”

Alex looked at his jeweler.  They were in Manhattan, in his exclusive shop on Fifth Avenue.  But if Kari thought Alex was looking at the jeweler to ask about the price, she was mistaken.  “We’ll take it,” he said to his old friend.

“But how much is it?” Kari asked.  How in the world could you buy something this precious without even asking about the price?  It was foreign to her!

But it wasn’t to Alex.  He looked at her.  “Does it matter?” he asked.

Kari smiled.  “To you, I’m sure it doesn’t,” she said and the jeweler, who sat at the table with them, laughed.  “But to me?  I’m just curious to know just how much ring I’m going to have on my finger.”

Alex looked at the jeweler and nodded.

“It is an eighteen carat, emerald-cut diamond ring, ma’am,” the jeweler said.  “And it costs six-point-five.”

Kari didn’t know if he was talking in diamonds or emeralds or some other jeweler-speak.  “Six-point-five what?” she asked.

Alex smiled.  “Six-point-five million, Kari,” he said.

Kari knew she didn’t hear what she just heard.  “Million?” she asked.  “As in rubles?  As in pesos?”

Alex and the jeweler laughed.  “No, madam,” the jeweler said.  “As in dollars.”

“That ring costs six-million-five-hundred-thousand dollars?  Are you serious?”

“As a heart attack,” the jeweler said, out of character.  Then he quickly got back into the stuffy role he knew his customers expected of him.  “Madam,” he added.  And while Kari was yet in shock, he measured her slender finger, took the ring, and headed to the back of his store.

Kari looked at Alex.  “Are you sure?” she asked him.  “Rich people end up poor if they throw away money.”

Alex placed his arm around her and leaned her to him.   He kissed her on her forehead.  “I can never throw away money if I’m giving it to you,” he said.

And when the jeweler returned, and placed the perfectly fitted ring on Kari’s finger, she was surprised that it could all happen this fast.  The last time she brought a nice ring, a two-hundred-dollar ring from Walmart, it took three weeks for it to be fitted and returned to her.  At least she thought it was nice, she said to herself as she looked at that big rock on her hand.

Alex stood, and she stood too.  Alex and the jeweler shook hands.  “Nice to meet you, Miss Grant,” he said.  “Have a nice engagement.”

“But . . .”  She looked at Alex.  And then leaned toward him.  “Aren’t you going to pay for it?”

Alex smiled.  “He’ll send over the bill,” he said.

“I figure he’s good for it,” the jeweler said tongue-in-cheek, again out of character.  “Don’t you?”

Kari smiled.  “Yes, I do.”

The jeweler looked at Alex.  “You’ve got yourself a good one, Alex,” he said.  “And you know how I know?”

“How?” Alex asked.

“In all my years doing business on Fifth Avenue, she’s the first bride-to-be, at least among those not paying for the ring themselves, who wanted it to be less expensive.”

Alex laughed.

“Hold onto that one,” the jeweler said.

“Thank you,” Alex said.  “And I shall.”

“And you know what else I say?” the jeweler asked.

“No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me,” Alex said with a smile.

“It couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” the jeweler said, not smiling at all.

This time Kari was nodding.  “I agree,” she said, and she and the jeweler shook hands too.

Alex placed his hand on the small of Kari’s back, and escorted her out of the store.

And when they got outside, and into their waiting limousine, Alex took a series of business-related phone calls, while Kari stared at the new friend on her finger.  She still couldn’t believe she was wearing it!

“Far cry from what happened in Greece, isn’t it?” Alex said to her when he finished his last call.

“Yes, it is,” Kari agreed.  She leaned her body so close against his to where she her back was halfway on his chest.  “I’m just sorry your mother and sister made the choices they made.”

“You mean to stay in Greece?” Alex asked.  “Zylena is going to marry the man who had become father’s underboss, and mother is going to do her own thing.  But me?  I don’t care.  They made their bed when they sided with father over Oz.  Oz is a lot of things, but he’s also a man of integrity.  My father was just a lot of things.”

Kari smiled.  “I’m also sorry you fired Jimmy Hines.  I liked him.”

“He was given an assignment to hire men who was up for the job.  They weren’t when they weren’t watching and allowed Linda to enter your home.  Those men were under his command.  And mine, of course.  But since I can’t fire myself, I had to fire their direct supervisor.”

Kari nodded.  “Yeah, I know.  You did what was right.”

“I did what was necessary, Kari.  For your safety.  That can never be compromised.  They all know I have a zero tolerance when it comes to your safety.  Yours and Jordan’s.”

Kari smiled.  “Well,” she said, staring at that rock again, “thanks for caring.  I just never touched something so expensive.  No man had ever spent six-hundred-dollars on me before.  Now you just spent six million?”

“I’m sure your previous boyfriends would have, too,” Alex said, “if they could have.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t have,” Kari said, “even if they could.  You don’t know the men I used to attract.  You just don’t know!”

They laughed.  And Alex leaned against her too.

 

But when the limousine pulled up to Alex’s lake estate in the Hudson Valley region of New York, at his beautiful historic home, laughter was not the order of the day for Kari.  Shock was.

She looked as they rode up his extended driveway, looked at Alex again, and then looked at the end of the driveway again.  “Where did they come from?” she asked.

“While we were having lunch and going ring shopping,” Alex said, “I had them flown up.”

Kari smiled.  Another unbelievable part of her day!

She was so happy that she jumped out of the limo before the chauffeur could even open the door.  She ran to her people, because the ones nearest and dearest to her heart were there.  Faye Church was there.  Benny Church was there.  Lucinda Mayes was there.  Her precious Jordan was there.  And Odysseus Drakos, better known as Oz, was also there, grinning like a Cheshire cat. 

Alex brought him back to America with them.  He wasn’t leaving his kid brother behind ever again, he told Kari at the time, especially after what happened to their father and the power struggle within Greece’s mobster world, now that Elasaid was dead, that was certain to break out.

Kari embraced them all, as they crowded around her to see which ring she chose.  It was gorgeous.  The most beautiful thing any of them had ever seen.  And Kari was pleased with the approval.  It would not have mattered if they hated it, but she was glad they didn’t.

Jordan made his way over to Alex.  He wanted to hug him like always when he saw him after a time of absence, but it became too awkward.  Alex was a warm person, but in Jordan’s eyes he wasn’t an affectionate one.

Until now.  Because Alex, who always felt strongly about the young man, wasn’t awkward at all.  He gave Jordan a hug.  Jordan beamed.

“I’ll bet that rock on Ma’s finger cost a cool million, didn’t it?” he asked when they stopped embracing.

“Yep,” Alex said.  “Or six.”

Jordan’s smile froze, and he looked at his future stepfather.  “Six million dollars?  Wow.  Just wow!”

Alex laughed, pulled Jordan closer, and they made their way to the others.

“Let’s go celebrate inside,” Kari said.  “I’ll make you guys an authentic Greek dish.  And it’ll be the best food you ever ate.”

“Really?” Faye asked doubtfully.

But Jordan, in the background, was shaking his head with a not really look.  Faye laughed.

“Before we retire indoors,” Alex said, “I need to give you your engagement present.”

Kari showed him that brilliant ring on her finger.  “Duh,” she said to laughter.  “What do you think this is?”

“It’s a ring thing,” Alex said as he pulled out his key fob and pressed a button.  “But it’s not this thing.”

One of his numerous garage doors lifted up, and behind it, to everybody’s shock and amazement, was a brand-new, Rolls Royce Phantom with a big, red bow on top.

Oz grinned his roguish grin.  “Now we’re talking, brother!” he said, impressed.

But everybody else were in total shock.  Was it Mom’s, Jordan wondered.  Was it Mom’s?!

Kari, shocked most of all, looked at Alex.

“Your rust bucket days are over, babe,” he said.  “You represent me now.  And I don’t drive rust buckets.  That Phantom is yours.  In your name.  Yours.”

Tears were in Kari’s eyes.  And as Oz and her family ran to the car, with Jordan, Faye, and Lucinda racing to be the first one behind the wheel, Kari ran to Alex.  She wanted to tell him thank you, but she was crying too hard.

Alex pulled her into his arms.

And for Kari, it was becoming a life she dared not even dream.  But it was coming true anyway!

“Come on, babe,” Alex said to her as he walked her toward the garage.  “Enjoy your car.  And then let’s get busy planning the wedding of the century.  Because that’s what else I’m going to give to you.  After that, we work side by side making that hotel and casino in Apple Valley a rousing success.  But first: the wedding you deserve.”

The old Kari, the doubtful Kari, would have resisted.  But the brand-new Kari, the one wearing that rock; the one engaged to a legend, didn’t give it a second thought!

The wedding of the century she was going to have, he said.  The wedding of the century for the girl least likely to succeed.  For the girl pregnant and unwed at fifteen.  For the girl denounced as never good enough by practically everybody.  For the girl on a downward trajectory most of her life.  That girl was going to get the wedding of the century?  And it didn’t sound crazy to Kari at all.

It just sounded like Alex.

“Why not?” she said to him, and she wrapped her arm around him too.

And as they made their way to the Rolls Royce in that garage, their song, Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car, ring in Kari’s head like a promise kept!

 

“So remember we were driving

Driving in your car

Speeds so fast I felt like I was drunk.

City lights lay out before us

And your arms felt nice wrapped ‘round my shoulder.

And I-I

had a feeling that I belonged.

I-I

had a feeling I could be someone.

Be someone.

Be someone!”