° Amelia °

"Everything is going as planned," Mr. de Vries said. "Bridgette fell for the act."

"I wondered how long it was going to take for you to get her under control. Her jealousy could have unraveled this entire mess," Tessa whispered.

"It's handled. The last thing we need is for her to start questioning Bradley's paternity."

I kept my body flat against the wall of the house, feeling like I was a super spy in a dark and twisted family parody. Sweat beaded on my forehead as I struggled to breathe. Why on earth was I even holding my breath?

"The Sintus guy you hired is a loose cannon. He needs to go," Tessa stressed. "My son is in a coma because of him."

"We had to plant a seed of doubt in everyone's mind. Including Bradley's. We didn't think the interaction would spook him out. He drove into oncoming traffic without looking."

"He's eleven? What did you expect? He has enough daddy issues as it is. He's calling his uncle father and he rarely speaks about Pieter."

I took a risk and peeked behind the wall. Tessa was dressed to kill, strappy heels wrapped around her ankles and her flower-patterned sundress didn't match her evil demeanor.

Mr. de Vries on the other hand had his back partially turned to me. His full head of graying hair gleamed in the sun. Dressed like a retired millionaire sitting on a private island in Greece, he didn't seem to have a care in the world. He had enough hired pawns to do his dirty work.

"Does Willem know about Sintus's role in that incident?" he asked.

"No, they still don't have any leads on the guy witnesses saw talking to Bradley right before the accident. But Sintus showing up here last night like a mad man made Willem suspicious. He's going to investigate and he's going to want a paternity test done. Bridgette told him about us and it's only a matter of time before he starts putting two and two together to make four."

"I highly doubt he'll get a DNA test done. Bradley is the spitting image of my boys."

"Of course, he is. He's your fucking son, Jan." She started pacing, coming closer and closer to the end of the wall.

I closed my eyes and flattened myself against the wall some more as if that would somehow make me invisible. Sweat trickled down the side of my face and I used the back of my hand to wipe it away.

"All of this mess could have been avoided if you got Willem to sleep with you when we found out about the baby. Marriage would have followed soon after," Mr. de Vries said.

"That plan was bound to fail from the start. Willem and Pieter weren't just brothers, they were best friends. Willem would never betray his sick brother by sleeping with his wife. I tried to seduce him but he shot me down every time."

"You didn't try hard enough. He's a man with needs."

"And great self control apparently, but enough of that. What are we going to do now?"

"You need to get with Sintus. Make it believable. It's not right that you're still single a decade after your husband died."

"I am not getting with that oaf," Tessa said with disdain.

"You don't have a choice. They can't ever find out that Bradley's mine. I provide you and him a lavish lifestyle and that's all it's ever going to be."

"That and random fucks in the closets of this villa or some cheap hotel downtown."

Mr. de Vries or Jan, whatever his name was, drew closer to Tessa, gripping her arm with enough force to pull her against him. "De Vries enterprises owns eighty percent of the hotels on this island so we can't very well show our faces there. Use your brain woman."

"Maybe if you acted like a normal grandfather we wouldn't have to sneak around like kids," she sneered, wrestling her arm from his grip.

He clenched his jaw and I remembered all the times I'd watched his son do the same. I missed Willem and wanted to kiss him for resisting Tessa's sinful advances all those years.

"I can't get too close or too involved," Mr. de Vries said. "It's risky. And ease up with the private jets, flashy cars, and designer clothes. Your family is supposed to be bankrupt."

"Not happening. I'll just tell everyone that Pieter had a good life insurance policy."

"That was ten years ago. Surely you would have gone through that money by now living the way you do."

Tessa rolled her eyes. "Maybe we should just tell them and get it over with."

"I would lose everything," Mr. de Vries said forlornly, and I couldn't believe his audacity. He wanted to have his cake and ice cream, and eat it too.

"But you would have me and Bradley." The desperation in Tessa's voice made me sad.

I was once her. Craving to be wanted, to be loved. I'd carried so much resentment with me and I'd envied other people's love life while looking down on people like nurse Brimmer for staying with her no-good husband all those years.

Lost in my thoughts, I felt something long and itchy climbing up my right leg. I glanced down but couldn't see what it was. I shook my leg and regretted it instantly as whatever it was stung me and pain reverberated up my leg.

I screamed and stomped my leg several times until a baby centipede dropped from my pants only to scurry off into the nearby garden before I could kill it.

My leg started throbbing where the hundred-legged beast had bitten me on the lower end of my inner thigh. I hoped I wasn't allergic

"Shit," I muttered and then lifted my head only to come eye to eye with Tessa. Her blue-green eyes narrowed with suspicion. Behind her, Mr. de Vries regarded me with worry scrawled over his hard-as-brick face.

Was he worried about me? Or was he worried that I'd overheard his conversation with Tessa? I couldn't tell because the man rarely showed emotion.

I turned around without saying anything, making my way to the kitchen. Tessa followed me inside, leaving the door open like an idiot, causing the heat from outside to penetrate the cool interior.

"What were you doing outside?" she demanded.

"What? Where? In the garden outside my husband's house? Don't be ridiculous. I'm not explaining shit to you." I pulled open a cabinet looking for something to use as a hot compress against the centipede's venenous bite.

"Were you eavesdropping? It's childish and impolite." She walked around the island to face me as she spoke, her heels clicking on the bright marble flooring.

"Please shut the door. The air-conditioning is on." I slammed the cabinet door and moved on to another, ignoring the pain in my leg.

She remained where she was. "I can't believe Willem went out of his way to marry you. You're so. . . so wild and rude."

"I think the word you're looking for is ghetto."

"I never said that." She tucked her blond tresses behind her ear with impatience.

I smiled. "You didn't have to." I slammed another cabinet door shut and the sound was so satisfying. "Where is Filo when you need her?"

"I'm right here," she said from behind me. I turned around, relieved to see her. I needed some of her inner peace to transfer over to me. I was this close to losing my cool with Tessa. "And why is that door open? Tessa, get the door," Filo said.

"Yes, Filo. I was on my way out." She paused at the doorway, glaring at me, daring me to utter a word about what I'd overheard outside. She turned her back and the door closed, her premature exit leaving an uneasy knot in the pit of my stomach.

"Tell me, child, what did you need me for?"

"A centipede bit me on my leg and I was looking for a hot compress."

"Were you out in the garden? I forgot to warn you about them. I've been bitten a couple of times while kneeling in the dirt." Filo shuffled around and started preparing the hot compress. "Why don't you go upstairs and change into something comfy. I'll be up shortly with everything. Have you eaten?"

"Not yet," I said, exhaustion from playing super spy and then getting caught weighing down my voice.

"We still have food leftover from breakfast with the parents. I'll arrange a plate."

I said thank you and made my way upstairs. The door to Willem's room was left ajar. A cleaning trolley filled with cleaning supplies and a hamper hanging to the side of it was left just inside the room.

The messy bed in which Willem and I had made love all night had been made. The old sheets were on the floor next to the trolley.

I saw blood on them, my blood from losing my virginity, and I cringed. I quickly grabbed the sheets, rolling them into a ball so that the bloodstain was no longer visible.

"What are you doing?"

I spun around, embarrassed, and saw Xiomara looking at me weirdly. "I was just. . . ."

"Trying to hide your love stains on the sheet," she finished for me. I could tell she was trying not to laugh and that made me like her more than I did when I first met her.

I nodded. "Do they go in here?" I asked, referring to the hamper at the side of the trolley.

"Yes. Next time put a towel down on the bed if you want to have sex on your period. Makes my job a lot easier," she muttered.

"Oh, it was nothing like that." I propped the sheets to the bottom of the hamper and smiled. I missed Willem and I wanted to make love to him again. "I was a virgin," I supplied when Xiomara kept looking at me, waiting for an answer. I knew I was giving her too much information, but I was hoping we could be friends.

"I thought you and Willem had sex before. In Anguilla?" She frowned.

"Nope. We came close, though."

"Aren't you like thirty? And you waited for marriage, good for you. I lost my virginity at the back of a car when I was fifteen."

"I'm twenty-eight, and I guess everyone has their timeline."

"Was it good?" she asked, chuckling. "Willem just seems so serious. I can't imagine him being soft and gentle and romantic. Oh god, no. Now I'm thinking about the two of you having sex. Blegh." She laughed.

I smiled. "It was more than good. How are things progressing with Omar?"

"He's been nothing but good to me. He wants me to move in with him."

"But?"

"It might be too soon. And I think he only asked because of the baby." Xiomara twisted her long dark hair as she spoke. "I want him to want me for me. Not just the baby."

I swallowed. I really should have been more careful with Willem. If we were to have a child, it would change everything. I didn't want to decide to stay based on a baby.

Filo entered the room with a plate in one hand and the hot compressors in the other. "You haven't changed," she said.

"I was getting to that," I said, going for my suitcase. I still hadn't unpacked my clothes.

"I can unpack your stuff if you'd like," Xiomara said.

"It's okay, I'll get to it sometime." I pulled out blue jean shorts and a black tank top.

"Sometime in this decade, I hope."

I laughed. "We should get lunch sometime so we can talk some more about the idiotic men in our lives."

"Sometime in this decade as well, I hope," Xiomara teased, smiling as she loaded her trolley for take off.

"Let's do next week. You pick a day."

Xiomara left and I changed into the clothes I'd picked out. I sat down on the bed and held the warm compressor to my inner thighs. The area was slightly swollen and the pain had receded to a dull ache.

Filo regarded me with wise eyes. "I called Willem and told him that a centipede bit you."

"I'm fine, Filo. You didn't have to do that."

"He's on his way anyway. Leaving his meeting early too. I don't know what you did to him, but that man hasn't left a business meeting early since I've known him."

I bewitched him with my vagina, I thought to myself, laughing at my silly antifeminist joke.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said instead, smiling. I hope my scent still lingered on his car seats as he made his way home to me.

"I'm sure you don't, but these walls know a lot. Too bad they can't talk."

Filo smirked and left the plate of food on the nightstand. I took a boiled egg and peeled it. I bit into it and then ate some fruit before getting up.

I went down the hall looking for my father. I eventually found him in the kitchen with Francois.

Francois smiled when he saw me, his blue eyes lighting up. "Amelia, come in. You look lovely today. We thought you would be resting still."

"Filo told us about the centipede bite," my father said when I just stood there with a blank look on my face.

Why in the world did I think Francois was referring to the sex marathon with Willem last night? It seemed like everyone had somehow figured it out.

"I'm fine. The pain is getting less and the swelling is at a minimum," I said. "Papa, I was wondering if you'd like to go for a walk with me."

"Yes, lead the way." He gripped the counter tightly, wobbling unsteadily on his feet as he stood up.

"Watch out for the centipedes in the garden. It rained last night and those suckers love that," Francois said as I reached forward to make sure my father didn't collapse on the floor.

I hooked my arm around his elbow and we made our way to the backyard. There was a trail that led to the beach and I knew my father would love to sit on a beach chair while we sipped on some piña colada.

I also had to tell him that I was thinking about moving to St. Maarten for good.

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