A gentle rap at the door shook her out of her reverie, Laura White heaved a heavy sigh and glanced at the grand wall-clock, noticing that it was her cue to leave. Squaring her shoulders, she mustered up her usual aloof composure and stated calmly, “Come in.”
The door opened and her secretary stepped in, “Miss White, your car is outside.”
“In a moment,” she gave a curt reply and rose gracefully. Once seated comfortably inside her lush black Limousine, she turned her head towards the side mirror and gazed impassively outside, wondering if she had made the right decision.
In her early thirties, Laura White had accomplished everything in life a woman could possibly dream of. Starting from scratch, she had laid foundation to the now well-known worldwide Black and White Organization, her private construction company. She had engineered in the art of dealings, blossoming into a dexterous businesswoman. To put it quite simply, life had splayed everything at her disposal after the death of her loathsome husband, everything except the one thing she most desperately wanted. Happiness. That, however, had been ripped away from her long ago. She wondered how he would be, the man who had haunted her memories with his coal black eyes glinting with purpose and had driven her crazy with longing to hear his velvety, baritone voice and rich laughter.
Dean Black and Laura White had known each other since childhood. Their relationship had burgeoned from profound affection to potent love but they had kept it a secret, fearing the ultimate, bitter consequences. Fate, nevertheless, had different plans for them. At the age of twenty when Laura’s parents had brought up the subject of her marriage, she had emphatically pleaded them to forget the notion of marrying her off to a wealthy eligible gentleman and instead pay heed to her happiness, but as expected, they had cringed with horror at the mention of Dean’s name. To her parents, money was the key to bliss and prosperity, which was not in copious amount in Dean’s life. They had mocked her so called ‘naivety and gullibility’. Within days she had found herself being shipped off from her hometown in Hampshire to Illinois and handicapped in the ties of marriage to her distant cousin. Dean had been unaware of these developments and by the time he was brought to light his entire being had been rigid with the pain of Laura’s betrayal and her heart wrenching treachery. For a year Laura had suffered at the hands of a harsh drunkard of a husband but eventually her freedom had made an appearance in the mask of his death. Unfortunately her bliss had been short-lived as soon the news of Dean’s marriage had brought her world crashing down around her.
Laura winced at the pain the memory still brought her. That day she had vowed to break all her ties with Dean Black and throw herself head over heels in the world of business and dealings. Soon she had earned the fame and popularity that most envied. Over the years the news of arrival of Dean’s son soon followed by divorce to his ill-suited wife had wafted to her but she had refused to be budged. Now it was time to set some strings straight and tie some loose ends of the past. For over two years her solicitors had been bringing up the subject of her heir and she had studiously ignored it, flinging it away with humorless jokes and empty chuckles, but not anymore. She knew she needed to find an heir worthy of her business, and she knew just where to look.
Gathering her scattered nerves and grasping a firm hold on herself, Laura rang the bell of a house so achingly familiar that she felt tears burn at the back of her eyes. Still, never in her wildest dreams was she prepared for the sight that greeted her next and knocked the air out of her lungs. Dean Black stepped out, wearing a shaggy pair of black trousers and a matching black shirt. The crooked, winsome smile plastered on his face made her frantic heart skip a beat.
“Dean,” she rasped out in a voice thick and hoarse with emotion.
“That would be me,” he confirmed, puzzlement at her obvious emotional turmoil vivid in his eyes.
Laura could no longer hold back, scalding tears started streaming down her face. She devoured his sight hungrily, taking in every lean contour and rugged feature. In taking its toll, all time had been able to do was to leave some streaks of grey in his coffee brown hair and some wrinkles beneath his eyes.
“Excuse me, do I know you?” he asked, scrutinizing her through speculative, narrowed eyes. Almost instantly they widened with recognition and his pupils dilated.
“Laura,” he breathed as all the color rushed out of his face while the best she managed was to give him a thin, watery smile of affirmation. A long silence stretched between them in which Dean’s features transformed and became inscrutable, his eyes devoid of all sentiments.
“Well, let’s not stand on ceremony here,” he finally stated in a voice so cold that it sent tendrils of alarm up her spine.
Inside his living room, Laura fidgeted with her fingers nervously under Dean’s unwavering gaze, raking her paralyzed mind for an appropriate way to start when he abruptly broke the silence,
“You know, I’m quite surprised Laura, for a woman as quick-witted and intelligent as you, it took you a rather long time to come up with a reasonable lie and confront me.” His bluntness shocked her and words slashed at her heart, nevertheless, she refused to be daunted.
Mustering up her courage, she asked, “Will you please listen to my explanation?”
“Although I don’t care, but for old times’ sake, I’d like to see you try.” He replied with mock indifference.
Finding the opportunity she so desperately wanted, Laura poured her heart out to him, pausing now and then to quench the shudders and sobs racking through her body.
Dean drank in all the information she provided, finding it harder with every moment not to believe her. The Laura he knew had been many things, but never a liar. Besides, he had never really gotten to know her part of the story. The news of her marriage had blinded him with such intense pain and fury that he had never bothered to seek her out and demand a justification for her actions. When Laura finally quietened and raised her tear-brimmed eyes to him, he lost the last vestige of self-control he possessed at seeing the truth shinning in their jade green depths.
The full realization of Laura’s innocence struck a deep chord within him with a force so brute and nerve-racking that he felt his life being squeezed out of him. He stumbled towards the bar at the end of the room to pour his-pitiful-self a glass of Scotch, and soothe the hot inferno of anger and self-loathing ignited by the recent revelations, that poured through him like an acid in his veins, clawing and tearing at his flesh, sending scorching pain rampaging through his entire being. He had been too busy licking and nursing his own flesh wounds that he had not bother to notice her large gaping hole. After what seemed like hours of futile attempts to abate the pain searing at his soul, he walked to her and, wordlessly, wrapped her in the warm confines of his arms while her tears started cascading down her face with renewed force. He held her fragile body tenderly against him and tortured himself with each blistering tear soaking his shirtfront as she cried herself into near oblivion, helpless to comfort or console the only woman he had ever loved.
Laura Black eyed her heir with glowing pride and unfathomable love as he maneuvered a business meeting to their advantage with an adeptness and impeccability that rivaled her own. Dean’s son from his first marriage, Jaden Black was a man of invincible talents and implacable determination, which with just the right amount of guidance from Laura had turned him into an heir worthy of Black and White Organization. Laura caressed her wedding ring with adoration and said a mighty prayer of heart-felt gratitude to God for bestowing her with the so called heaven on earth.
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