The Satin Sash

n to reunite the men, she had failed to predict the sheer enormity of the blazing hostility between them. It was suffocating. Her lungs burned for oxygen, her knees wobbled, and she could not seem to move.

“Unbelievable,” Heath muttered as the gorilla proffered the tangle of balloons ceremoniously before her. “Where on earth did you find that thing, Richards?”

Grey looked ready to explode in some kind of internal combustion, and Toni felt the turmoil in him as if it were her own.The guy in the gorilla suit was jumping with glee, either too stupid to realize what was happening or too frantic to do his job to care. But the stark emotion in Grey’s simmering gold eyes was so vivid, his face seemed to grow black with his pain.

Releasing a freakish king-of-the-jungle sound, the hairy black beast lumbered forward and dropped to one knee, extending a gift to her. A dangerous weakness crept up the back of her legs, loosening her spine. She took the small box with trembling hands.

Grey cursed and went to stare out the blinds.

And Toni flicked the box open. A beautiful diamond ring sat nestled at its plush velvet center. The stone was brilliant, dark and different and sophisticated, and so beautiful it robbed her of her breath. It was Grey. And it was heartbreaking.

“Grey, what is this?”

He was seething with energy, frustration and anger sharpening his words, each piercing her like a needle. “You know what it is.”

“You said . . . you said we wouldn’t do it. Ever.”

“Well, I want to do it now.”

The gorilla was punching its chest, doing goofy stuff around the room; then it made a silly noise and tooted a little horn.That was all it took to make Grey lose it.What had not happened in thirty-five years happened when the gorilla tooted that little horn.

Grey threw himself at the man, grabbing him by the shoulders. In the oversized suit the guy was no match for him. In a flash of fury, Grey jostled him out into the hall, yelling, “Out, out, out!”

The slam of the door made the walls vibrate. Motionless as concrete, Heath and Toni regarded him with caution as he returned, but Grey only had eyes for her.Wounded eyes. Eyes full of accusation and torture.

He stared at Toni with those eyes. Toni, with the box in one hand.With her sash in the other.With her heart in her eyes and no oxygen to speak with.

Out in the hall, she heard voices. Doors. The elevator dinging. But the inside of her apartment was dense as a coffin; there was no life here.

“Did you give Heath your sash?” Grey asked in a voice so taut it sent prickles of unease down her back.

“Yes.”

“May I know why?”

Her throat felt dry as sandpaper as she swallowed.“So he’d come back.”

Plunging a hand into his hair, Grey circled the room. And circled. And circled.

Toni stared hopelessly at the ring again. Oh, how she’d wanted this ring. How she wanted to marry Grey. Vow her love for him before the world and god and a roomful of people.What she would give to be his wife! But how could she? How could she now, with Heath here, humbly asking to be part of her, too? Her eyes clouded with tears. Her throat worked as she tried to speak.

“Grey, about the ring . . .”

“Forget it,” he said blandly. And as though this were any ordinary day, with that confident, take-on-the-world stride of his, he disappeared into their bedroom, pulled open the closet doors, and very carefully began to draw out his clothes.

When Toni realized his intentions, she hurled both the ring and the sash on the bed and rushed to stop him. “Grey, what are you doing? No!” Panicked, she seized the hangers in his hands and frantically tried to shove the clothes back inside. “Don’t do this—don’t leave me!”

“Grey,” Heath said in a threatening voice from the doorway.

Grey pivoted, his face taut with rage as he pointed a commanding finger at him. “You stay the fuck out of this, Solis.”

While Toni struggled to return the armful of shirts to his side of the closet, he reached for his laptop on the nightstand. He unplugged it, shoved it into his leather briefcase, strapped it inside.

Toni rushed to him, her eyes stinging, the words barely getting past the painful obstruction in her throat. “Grey, don’t you dare leave me. Don’t you dare!” She grabbed both his biceps and pushed her face into his neck, shaking her head a thousand times, certain that she was falling, torn by not knowing what to do, and fearing that this time Grey wouldn’t catch her.

He cursed under his breath and dropped his forehead to her shoulder. His chest heaved so roughly she thought his clothes would tear. “Grey.”The word was a shaky plea against his collar. “It would work, you know it would.The three of us . . . the three of us love each other.”

Even as she began to speak, he was shaking his head, shaking his head faster, blocking her out, blocking out her words. She trapped his jaw in her hands, her voice almost a shriek. “Please, please, listen to me! We can be together. All three of us. Grey! Please listen.”