Page 92 of A Very Happy Easter

We did obtain a marriage licence and found two rings we loved, matching bands made from recovered pirate gold. The jeweller swore they were lucky, and by law, fifty percent of the profits from the gold sales went towards funding ecological projects in the west of the archipelago. The rings came with a centre band inlaid with sand from the beach on Sasurra, and mine had a tiny pink conch pearl as a centrepiece. They weren’t expensive, but they were meaningful and perfect.

Our ceremony would be held on the beach too, in front of Casa Santo, just the two of us and Polly, who’d overheard us making the arrangements and decided to organise flowers and a photographer. It could have been worse. She could have arranged for another delivery of chocolate. Salma had managed to foist another five hundred eggs on various homeless shelters, and the whole drawing room in my house was now blessedly egg-free.

The internet had gone down briefly during the storm, but it quickly got fixed. So we’d sent Zoom invites to Eis and Janie, Liam and Marissa, and Serena and Owen, with a note that they were needed at a very important pre-egg hunt planning event, and not to be late. Expecting them to fly out at the last minute was unreasonable, plus Heath and I were continuing with our “horny and selfish” theme. We wanted to get married for ourselves, not put on a show for the world.

We’d mucked in to help with the cleanup at Mandarin Bay, which had survived more or less intact, just with debris everywhere. The Blount-Fulford wedding went off without a hitch, and thankfully, everyone was too busy gushing over the nearby waterfall and a beautiful sunset to notice Constance’s bump. And while she might have asked the photographer to crop out the evidence, she’d also carried a printout of the ultrasound in her bouquet, plus she’d spent more time googling nursery furniture than she had panicking about the revised seating plan, so I knew the baby would be very much loved.

There was an awkward moment when Polly leapt for the bouquet—now minus the baby picture—and managed to bat it straight into my face. I put up my hands to avoid a broken nose and caught the bloody thing, and for the rest of the night, random ladies kept congratulating me and saying, “You’ll be next,” which made Heath chuckle every time.

In less than a week, it would be our turn.

I only hoped he loved the wedding present I’d bought for us as much as I did.

“What is it? Did something happen?”

Eight a.m. on Good Friday, my wedding day, and Vic was calling. Why was Vic calling? She didn’t know we were getting married. Only a dozen people knew, and none of them were in England.

“Oh my gosh, did I wake you? You sound so sleepy.”

“Uh… It’s okay. I’m still overseas.”

“Same, same. Zurich’s an hour ahead of London.”

“San Gallicano is four hours behind.”

Four hours behind, and Heath had kept me awake until the early hours. Or I’d kept him awake—who was counting? Anyhow, I’d realised it wasn’t sex I’d had a problem with for all these years—it was a lack of trust. Once the bond was there, the rest had fallen into place.

“Crap, I’m sorry. I just thought you should know, well, Neil’s balls got stolen.”

“Huh?”

“His balls.”

“Like…tennis balls?”

He’d played competitively in his teens, but surely he had more important things to worry about right now?

“No, balls, balls. Testicles.”

“I’m not sure I follow.”

“He swears that’s what happened. He went to sleep last night and they were there, and when he woke up this morning, they were gone. Then he called the police and got arrested.”

“Arrested for having his balls stolen?”

“No, for arson.”

“I think maybe I’m still asleep. Can you start again at the beginning?”

“Okay, okay, so do you remember Kirsten’s brother, Don?”

“Unfortunately.”

“So, it turns out that he’s still friendly with Neil, and when Neil got out of prison, Don put him up for a few weeks and then let him borrow a flat of his in North London. It’s waiting for renovation or something.” So that was where he’d gone after he left the penthouse. Don managed the family’s property portfolio, I knew that much. “Anyhow, when Neil fell asleep last night, everything was allegedly in full working order—and when his alarm went off in the morning, no more walnuts. There were, like, stitches in his ballsack. So he called the police to report the, uh, theft, and they arrested him in A&E because apparently, he set fire to a block of flats in North London and stole a moped. So he got locked up again. That’s when he tried calling Dad, even though Dad told him he wasn’t part of our family anymore.”

“Is your dad helping him?”

“I think he’s doing the bare minimum—making sure Neil gets medical care and a court-appointed solicitor, basically. Mum said Neil deserved everything he got. Anyhow, I just thought you should hear the news from me before it makes the papers.”

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