Trashed (36 page)

So we bought it at the end of last year and we’ve spent the last six months building the houses. Dawson’s done most of the work overseeing the construction, since he’s taking a two-year hiatus from filming. Everything was finished two weeks ago, and we’re meeting on the island for the inaugural visit.
 

Des hasn’t met Dawson and Grey, yet. We’ve been so busy and those two have been traveling the world. I think they’ve been in a dozen countries in the last year, and they make a point of staying at least a week in each place. I’m excited for this, honestly. Dawson is great guy, and Grey is sweet as sugar, but she’s tough, too, reminding me of Des in that way.
 

I glance at Des, who is sleeping beside me, her head on my shoulder. God, I love her.
 

I pull out the ring and look at it. I spent four months designing it, working with one of the world’s premier custom jewelers. It’s a flawless, one-in-a-million pink diamond, teardrop shaped, two and half carats. The band is comprised of over three hundred individual strands of filigreed platinum woven together, the strands merging and reaching up to capture the stone in an ornate, intricate web.
 

I hear Des murmur in her sleep and hurry to nestle the ring back in the black velvet box, and tuck the box back in my backpack. She stirs, stretches, blinks up at me. “We almost there?”
 

I smile down at her, wipe my thumb across the corner of her mouth. “You’ve got a little something here,” I say. “Yeah. We’ll land in about twenty minutes, and then there’s another short plane ride to our destination.”

“And you still won’t tell me where we’re going?”
 

“Nope. It’s a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises,” she grumbles.
 

“Well, I think you’ll like this one.”
 

We land on St. John, transfer our one suitcase to a Jeep, and sit in easy silence as the driver takes us from the airport to the marina, where a twin-engine float plane waits. The pilot is a grizzled, weathered old man with a long graying red beard. He’s been hand-picked by Dawson and he’s got more flight time logged than any of us have even been alive, Dawson says, and that’s good enough for us.
 

I take our suitcase and shoulder my backpack as well as Des’s and we cross the dock. I put one foot on the float, the other on the dock, and toss the suitcase in, and then extend my hand to Des. She takes it, steps to the float and then into the plane.
 

Ron, the pilot, takes off smoothly, and then we’re buzzing a thousand feet over the blue waters of Caribbean.
 

We’re alone in the airplane. I could ask her now.
 

No. No. I’ve got a plan; stick to the plan. Dinner on the beach, a moonlight proposal.
 

I lose track of time scripting out what I’m going to say, and then Des is gripping my hand so tightly it hurts as we sink toward the water.
 

“Holy shit holyshitholyshit!” Des is shaking, petrified, eyes scrunched shut.

“Relax, missy. Done this a hundred thousand times. Ain’t nothin’ to it.” Ron’s voice is smoke-roughened, an unlit cigarette tucked behind his ear.
 

“It’s terrifying!”
 

Ron chuckles. “First time is a bit scary, I guess. Just keep your eyes shut and hold your man’s hand. Be down ’fore you can blink twice.”
 

Sure enough, barely a minute later, there’s a light splash, a brief sensation of weightlessness, and then we’re skidding across the water. I lean in my seat, trying to get a glimpse of the island through the windscreen. It’s all green trees, with a stripe of white sandy beach at the edge. I can see sunlight gleaming off glass, a dock extending several hundred feet out into the water. Ron brings the seaplane to a gentle halt at the edge of the dock, shuts off the engine, and then shoves open his door and jumps to the dock with an easiness that belies his age. He ties the plane to the dock, and then takes the suitcase I hand to him. I jump down, and then hand Des down after me.

She takes two steps past Ron and me and then stops, hand to her mouth, staring in awe at the island. “Adam, this is…incredible.”
 

I just laugh. “You haven’t seen anything yet, babe.”
 

Ron gestures toward the island. “Y’all go on. I’ll bring your bag up for you.”

“What
is
this place, Adam?”
 

I lead her off the dock and onto the sand, up a stone-lined path leading into the jungle. Unlit tiki torches mark the path on either side. It leads up a steep hill and curves around, following the shoreline and then cutting inland, emerging in a clearing. We’re around the curve of the island, so the dock is out of sight. The clearing is easily two full acres, the jungle rising high on three sides, tall trees casting shade on the back of the house that sits in the middle of the clearing. The house faces west, into the setting sun, with another, shorter, rock- and tiki torch-lined path leading down to the beach, smooth wooden steps and handrails in places to assist the way down the hill.
 

The house itself isn’t massive, just over five thousand square feet. But it’s all richly appointed, the footprint extending north and south so every room faces the beach. There’s a covered porch that wraps around the perimeter of the house, which sits on the cusp of a hill, so there are actually two floors to the home, one at ground level, and the lower one set into the curving hillside, each level connected outside by an elaborate series of walkways, bridges, and gazebos. The porch, walkways, and gazebos are lit by strings of white lights and gas-fed, electronically controlled tiki torches.
 

Dawson took me on a complete virtual tour last week, showing me every feature, every control panel, every little nook and cranny, so I’d know the layout and how to operate everything. The floor plan of the house is stunning. It’s all open plan, but the square footage is spread into cozy nooks and comfortable spaces, every wall a floor-to-ceiling window that can be slid open to let in the constant Caribbean breeze.

I take Des on a tour, pointing out the wine cellar, the gym, the incredible kitchen, and, last but most importantly, the bedroom, which is its own entire wing set at an angle to the rest of the house, connected by a covered walkway. It’s glass on all four walls, which like the rest of the house can be opened all the way. There’s an en-suite bathroom with an outdoor shower and an outdoor soaking tub set directly into the hillside, shielded from view from the rest of the house behind clever landscaping and design.

She’s speechless. “Adam. Seriously. What is this place? Is it a resort of some kind?”

I laugh as we sit on the porch of the master bedroom, watching the waves lap on the beach. “No, babe. This is ours. Welcome home.”
 

She turns to me, eyes wide. “What do you mean, welcome home?”

I grin even more widely. “This is the real graduation present, Des. Not just the trip here, but the island, the house.”
 

“The island. Explain that one, hon. The
island
?”

I love her inability to comprehend this. “We own half of this island.”
 

“You mean you do.”
 

I shake my head. “Nope. We.” I lead her back toward the kitchen. “Come on, there’s something I need to show you.”
 

On the counter in the kitchen is the paperwork, laid out in piles, with a yellow-highlighted ‘X’ wherever a signature is needed. I take the pen Dawson left, and sign each page, and then extend the pen to Des. “Sign, and it’s really, truly
ours.
Yours and mine. Both our names.” With a provision enabling us to update the paperwork if Des was ever to take my name. But I don’t mention that proviso just yet.

She stares at the papers, then out at the water and the sun lowering itself toward the horizon. “I don’t understand. How can we own half an island? Who owns the other half?”

“My friend Dawson Kellor, and his wife Grey.” I wave toward the other side of the island. “They have a house over there, a lot like ours, with the dock in between. On the opposite side of the island from the dock there’s a boathouse, with a sailboat and a powerboat.”
 

“So you and your friend bought a whole island?”
 

I grin cockily. “Sure did. It’s a small one, though, not even a full square mile. It was owned by some rich guy who wanted to build a house here. He actually did most of the hard work, creating a workable, self-contained power and plumbing infrastructure.” I tap the papers. “And not just Dawson and me, but you and Grey, too.”
 

She sets the pen down and walks back outside, and leans on the railing. I follow her and lean my butt against the rail, and wait for her. “This is big, Tory. Really big. And really permanent.”
 

God, she’s serious. She only calls me Tory when she’s feeling emotional.

“Are you scared?” I ask.

She shrugs, and then nods. “You bought a fucking island, Adam. Jesus. I mean, what am I supposed to do on an island?”

“Des, baby. This is a vacation home. A getaway. I’m still going to act, and now that you have your degree, you can do whatever you want. You want to stay in Detroit? I’ll buy the apartment. We’ve got my place in L.A. Where else would you want to live? I’ll have to fly back to L.A. for filming, and I’ll have shoots in other places—that’s not going to change. This doesn’t change us, Des. It’s just somewhere we can go and get away from the studio and the interviews and the paparazzi, and everything. Just be us, no interruptions.”
 

“Oh.” She glances up at me. “Do I want to know how much you and Dawson spent on all this?”

I grin. “Nope. You might pass out.” Big numbers make her dizzy.
 

When I bought her that Prada clutch, she asked how much I spent, so I told her. She got weird. Tried to convince me she wanted me to take it back, even though she had it in a death grip. Another time, I was on the phone with my agent, discussing an offer. It was for sixteen million, and my agent thought that was lowball, so I told her to counter with twenty-five, not realizing Des was standing behind me, listening. So I tried to explain to her how a big-budget payout worked, and she just shook her head, waving me off. She doesn’t like to think about money, I’ve realized. She’s lived so frugally her entire life, never having enough of anything, and I think the shock of the change in lifestyle was just too much for her to comprehend. So she doesn’t. She’s perfectly content to let me take care of money and not tell her about it.
 

“So,” I ask, “are you going to sign or what?”
 

“It’s too much to process,” she answers. “Can I think about it?”

I pull her to me and kiss her. “Take all the time in the world, babe.”
 

*
 
*
 
*

He’s wearing a tux, barefoot, the cuffs rolled up past his ankles, jacket sleeves pushed up. Black bowtie, hair slicked back and to one side. Fucking gorgeous. Such a beautiful man, so powerful, his arms stretching the sleeves of the coat. His eyes blaze, hot and intense in that unique, incredible shade of green. I never get tired of staring into his eyes. It’s cheesy and sappy, but I just can’t get enough.

And he’s looking at me with those eyes, and an emotion I never thought a man would ever feel for me shines from him, pours off of him:

Love.

I’m fighting tears, overwhelmed by the reality of this island, the stunning, breathtaking beauty of the property and the home. I’m even more overwhelmed by what he’s got planned for this evening.

He had a catering company set up a small table, covered in a white tablecloth, right on the beach, near the surf, so the waves lapped against our toes. Torches, planted deep into the sand, flickered in a row behind us, circling us. The torches extend in a double line out into the water, forming a corridor of orange flame on the black, moonlit water. The moon is rising just now, sliding up from out of the waves, up from the horizon, huge and full and white, her light shining in a gleaming silver pathway down the corridor formed by the torches.
 

Fifty yards up the beach, a violinist and cellist play, surrounded by more lit torches.
 

Dinner is four courses of light but filling fare, a citrusy soup, a garden salad, some kind of flavorful, flaky fish with jasmine rice and steamed vegetables, and then dessert.
 

We share a bottle of chilled, expensive white wine that tastes great. I don’t tell Adam but it tastes just like any other wine, to me.
 

Once the food is finished and the last drops of wine have been swallowed, Adam stands up, one hand in his pants pocket, and leads me away from the table, into the water, toward the pathway lit by moon and by fire.
 

The hem of my dress floats in the water.

He stops, turns to face me, his gaze serious.
 

I gaze up at him, expectant. As soon as I saw the setup, I knew what this was, what he was doing, and I’ve loved every minute of it. It’s perfect. Incredible, romantic.
 

But he could’ve proposed to me in an airport bathroom and I would’ve said yes.

“You are my Destiny.” He leads with this, and with a smile. “I love you.”
 

My throat closes, and my eyes prick. “I love you, Adam. So much.”

“Hey, I’ve got this all scripted out. I’m gonna forget something if you start talking.”
 

“Oh. Sorry.” I lean into him, slide my arms around his back. “Continue.”

He shakes his head. “No, now I’ve lost it all. I’m gonna have to improvise.”

“You don’t need a speech,” I tell him.

“I don’t?”
 

I gesture at the table, the quartet. “This is your speech. Just get to the good part.”

“See? This is why I love you. I never know how you’ll react.” He takes a deep breath and lets it out. “You changed everything for me, Des. From the day I met you on Mackinac Island, you changed everything. All I knew was that I had to have you, that I had to know you. I’m so glad I jumped off that carriage. Because it’s led me here, with you.”