/Valeri’s POV/
My heart pounds in the rib cage of my chest as I begin to pace back and forth, stomping my feet impatiently at each end of the room as I stare at the sealed envelope of my baby’s gender in my hand.“This won’t work……” I mutter as I take out my phone to call my best friend Vivian who is like an extra brain that God has blessed me with to help me come up with solutions when my brain fails me.“Hey Vivian,” I say as soon as the call connects.“Hold up…….” Vivian stays, stopping me abruptly.“Did something happen?” She inquires and I contemplate whether to tell her or not because in as much as she helps me think when I am stuck but she also has the bad habit of blowing things out of proportion.“You know what….switch this FaceTime call to a video call so that I can see you because your suspense is killing me,” she says impatiently.“Actually….nothing is happening,” I lie only for my phone to start beeping for me to accept the video call request from Vivian.“So what is the problem?” She inquires as soon as I pick up the call.“There is no problem….everything is fine,” I lie“Everything is not fine…” she refuses to believe.“If everything was really fine as you claimed, there is no way you would have called me Vivian a few minutes ago because that is not what you call me, so it is either you start talking now or I get on the next flight to Orion to see what’s up with you for myself,” she threatens.“Chill out mama….it is not that deep,” I try to calm her down because agitating Vee is not the best bet for me at this point.“Then start talking…” she urges“I finally got the Baby’s gender today,” I start talking and my bestie’s face breaks into a cheerful smile.“Did you open it?” She inquires wriggling her brows.“No!” I answer her sharply.“Why didn’t you tear the envelope open right there and then at the hospital?” She questions impatiently.“That is because I am well aware of the fact that I am supposed to hand this over to my husband who will in turn hand it over to the team that he put in charge of the planning of our Baby’s gender reveal party, but I don’t know if that is the right to do at a time like this,” I answer her waving the sealed envelope in front of her. “Why are you having second thoughts?” She questions.“Well…Grey and I had a major argument this morning that kinda blew out of proportion before I stormed out of the house to attend my antenatal, but the doctor handing me my baby’s gender in a sealed envelope kind of dissolved every bit of anger that was in me, and right now the only thing that I want to do is to be at peace with the father of my baby but I don’t know if he is going to allow things slide easily because of how egoistic he is,” I answer her.“Is it the pregnancy hormones that caused the whole thing to blow out of proportion?” She inquires sending me a suspicious look.“I know pregnancy hormones have made me mad for the weirdest reasons, but this time around my pregnancy hormones are not to be blamed at all,” I answer defensively.“Are you sure of that?” She inquires still eyeing me suspiciously.“Imagine my husband snapping at me and telling me to my face that I am a pregnant woman, so instead of wanting to face off with him concerning the details of my family business, I should focus more on myself and my child,” I inform her about the cause of the argument and her jaw drops in shock.“He told you that?” She questions after digesting the information that I just dumped on her.“Well…you are well aware of the fact that Grey is an egoistic person who hates to be questioned under any circumstance,” she defends him.“…I didn’t think questioning him about his unusual secrecy and non-disclosure concerning the details of my own family business and my own father's properties was going to cause such a hassle, but it did,” I justify my actions because I want my bestie to tell me that I am not the one overthinking things here. After all, lately, I tend to get the vibe that every reaction I have to things is just me being an irritated pregnant woman.“So what do you have in mind?” She inquires.“I don’t know if I should just go straight to his room to present the gender reveal slip, or I should save myself the stress of dealing with my obnoxious husband and just go ahead to hire a new event planner to plan my Baby’s gender reveal party,” I suggest “Based on the kind of person that Grey Remington is, he is surely going to feel disrespected if you hire a new event planner which may cause our misunderstanding to blow out of proportion so I guess it is just better to try to patch things up with him before this gets worse,” my bestie suggests.“But Grey and I share separate rooms, and his room is one of the places that he told me to never trespass unless he summons me,” I protest.“Right now we don’t have the patience to wait for him to summon you, so I suggest that you just go in and hope that the news of our Baby’s gender will stop him from scolding me for being disobedient,” Vivian suggests and I smile because she is always calling my unborn child our baby and I find that very cute“I think that is exactly what I will do….. I’d I perish I perish,” I decide.“There is no way you are going to perish, my love,” she tries to gas me up.“Okay, babes…. I will call you later to give you the full gist on how everything goes later okay,” I say before hanging up with my bestie.I take a deep breath as I stare at the envelope in my hands before making my way to my Grey’s room because if I waste any more time, I can’t trust myself enough not to rip the envelope apart so that I can confirm if I will be having a baby girl or a baby boy. Left to me, I would love to have a baby girl because I don’t think I am ready to deal with another Grey in this house, but whatever the result is, I will just have to accept it that way. I have gone over how to break the news to Grey countless times in my head on my way from the hospital and I just couldn’t figure it out so what I will do is just tip-toe into his room and flash the envelope in front of his eyes because I can’t figure out a creative way to present the envelope to him. I place my hand on the doorknob to open the door slightly to peep and see if my husband is in his room but it seems that there is a visitor that Grey is entertaining in his room which is quite strange. “I have been married to Grey for a year now and I know how he forbids people from entering his room, so why on earth will he entertain a visitor in his room?” I stop to ask myself as the thought of marching straight into the room to see who this really ‘important’ visitor is crossing my mind, but I refrain from it. I decide to wait outside to eavesdrop on their conversation a bit so that I can decide if Grey is having an important business negotiation that will require me to check back on him later or not. “You used her enough, you got your revenge and more so, can we both go back to what our lives were before she got into the picture?” I hear a female’s voice in something that sounds like a heated conversation.“A female voice in Grey’s room?” I mutter in complete shock and confusion/Valeri’s POV/ I further open the door to get a clearer picture of what is going on in the room and I realize that the person Grey is having such a heated conversation with is Madison, his friend who has been staying with us for a while now. “I told you already that I have my plans so why the fuck are you meddling and putting me through unnecessary stress?” My husband raises his voice at her, his gaze so sharp that sends shivers down my spine. “What other plans do you have Grey?” She questions poking him in his chest. “You wanted to crumple the Donalds to give them a beautiful taste of what it feels like to be betrayed by someone they trusted more than anything in the world and you did that, you took over Donald’s hard work and crumpled it like it a used piece of paper in a matter of months and you did that, ” she starts to narrate and I hold on to the door like my life depends on this because if my family is the same ‘Donald’ that she just talked about then it is over for me. “Wh
|Valeri’s POV| I jolt awake to someone splashing water on me and it takes me a while to recover from the sudden shock that came with being baptized with water in bed, that too in a really strange room. “Thank goodness you a finally awake, otherwise I wouldn’t have known what else to do,” my bestie, Vivian remarks.“You had me thinking of how I was going to break it to your parents that you slept and refused to wake up on your big day,” Vivian shudders. “What exactly are you talking about?” I inquire from her because just a few moments ago, I saw myself getting killed and more than that being a dream it felt so real to me. “I was expecting you to wake up early so that we can start with preparations for your big day, but when I got to the room you were sweating profusely like you were behind chased in your dream, you even cried,” she informs me and I quickly touch my face feeling the tears on my face. “Did you just say big day?” I ask Vivian and she nods. “Which big day is it?” I a
/Valeri’s POV/ “Okay...” Vee finally speaks up. “I am extremely lost without any idea of what is going on here, so can you please make all these make sense without being so weird?” My best friend asks in a voice that tells me that she is at the edge of losing her sanity. “It is a long story,” I dismiss. “And I have nothing but time to listen to your story however long it may be so can you start?” Vee answers. “The thing is that I think I kinda went back in time to what my life was a year ago,” I inform Vee and she strangely looks at me before she bursts out laughing. “You are pulling my legs, right?” Vee chuckles but I shake my head. “Just so you know, your strategy at making that joke didn’t sound as nice as it must have sounded in your head when you came up with it, so try harder next time,” Vee says patting my back. “This is not any form of joke, it is real,” I say trying to dismiss Vee's remark but it doesn’t look like she is not going to understand my plight. “You know wh
/ Valeri’s POV/ “So…. What’s next?” Vivian breaks the silence after pressing her phone for a while. “What do you mean by what next??” I ask her trying my best to sound curious. “I meant to ask what you have in mind,” she asks, setting her phone aside and looking at me dead in the eyes. “Nothing,” I answer her flatly. “Nothing?” She says with her eyes widening in shock. “Are you kidding me?” She practically screams at the top of her voice making me shudder at the fear of going deaf because of the pitch of her voice. “Of course, not,” I answer her immediately, with my eyes darting back and forth, wondering why she is overreacting all of a sudden. “What happened to the declaration that you won’t be marrying Grey Remington?” She questions. “I still stand on my decision not to marry him, and nothing is going to change that,” I stand my ground. “Then I am guessing you have a plan so……let’s have it,” Vivian says crossing her leg, waiting for me to fill her in with what I have gott
/Valeri’s POV/ “Riri!!” Vivian screams my name from the room. “I thought you asked me to stay away from you so that you can think well, so why are you screaming my name?” I question her, opening the door of the bathroom slightly so that she can hear me “I need you to come over here to put a leash on your dog that is going rampage,” she screams back, making me furrow my brow in confusion because I don’t remember owning any dog. “I think you fit into the characteristics of the dog on rampage better,” I hear Matilda’s voice coming from the room “Holly shit!” I mutter in realization as I quickly turn on the tap to wash the foamy mess around my mouth away and rinse my mouth so that I can deal with the two people who should not be left alone in the same room. “I have told you times without number that I can’t stand you, so I see no valid reason for you to keep on hovering around me everywhere I go,” I hear Vivian’s voice again. “Bold of you to think that I am okay with seeing your fac
\VALERI’S POV\ ''Hey Mama,'' Vivian speaks up after a very long time of just leaving me to my thoughts which I quite appreciate because it made me feel like she understood where I was coming from a little bit and she is trying her best to respect my decisions and also come to terms with them in the same way that I am, instead of her trying to force what she thinks is the best decision for me on me. ''I know that you are probably still trying to process your emotions after waking up from what your life looked like a year before this, only for you to relive those same events over again, and I promise you that I am trying to see things from your perspective',' she continues and I hold my breath because, from the way my bestie is carefully selecting her choice of words, it is obvious that there is more to the info that she is dishing out. “I know that I must have mentioned earlier that we have all the time in the world to come up with a solid plan, but the truth is that the more I take
/Valeri’s POV/ “I knew it,” I mutter in realization. “Anyways……. Let’s have it,” I urge her. “First of all, you have to send a copy of the document to Caleb via email,” she starts and finally stops pacing around the room like a ragging lion. “Your brother?” I question. “Yes mama,” she answers me drawing the chair from the vanity to sit in front of me. “What has your brother gotten to do with this?” I question her. “Everything,” she answers as a matter of fact. “Let’s have it,” I urge her to explain herself “My brother is a lawyer so it is very understandable that I will want him to check the details of the contract so that we don’t get surprised when anything comes up,” She trails off. “The summary of what I am trying to say is that I want us to be prepared for whatever is going to happen,” she explains and I nod understandingly. “Secondly……?” I proceed “Secondly, you are marrying Grey Remington to get closer to him and beat him against his own game,” she says and I suddenl
\VALERI’S POV\ I did as I was instructed by my bestie, went ahead with my morning routine, and even ended up calling for room service to deliver breakfast to my room because, for some reason, my bestie refused to show up, and there was nothing for me to do to while away the time so I thought getting something to eat was going to relieve me of my boredom, but it didn’t and after eating I ended up sleeping. Thank goodness I didn’t wake up to another nightmare of the things that happened in my past life, but I did wake up with my best friend hovering over me like a helicopter yelling for me to wake up because the clock was ticking closer to the wedding part\get together\whatever the fuck my family members are choosing to call this as if she wasn’t the one that left me unattended to for a very long time. After Vivian gave strict instructions to the nail technician, make-up artist, and hair stylist on what to do and what and not to do with my hair, makeup, and nails, they all got down to
|GREY’S POV|My day started with a series of impromptu meetings and I just had to be on the ground even though Kyle offered to attend the meetings because I have a problem of making sure that I get things done by myself, and towards the end of the meeting, Kyle had to book Valeri and me another flight because we missed our flight already.The flight was quite interesting at first because it was quite interesting to watch Valeri make a fool of herself but she eventually slept and I just ended up going through the magazines that were provided on the plane.When I got bored, I slept for a while and woke up a few minutes before the plane landed, so I woke Valeri up so that we could finish the offboarding formalities.Immediately after we finished our offboarding formalities, I turned on my phone to talk to Kylee who confirmed the dinner reservation that he scheduled in advance with the CEO of Tobias International Holdings, so I dropped Valeri off at the hotel and came all the way here so
|VALERI’S POV|With the help of the PNEUMIA app, I am able to access the important reservations that Grey booked in advance for us via the link he sent, and on checking into the chic hotel in the heart of the city, my heart starts pounding with the thrill of what is to come ahead of me.“Wow, this place is amazing!”“Can’t wait to unpack and call Vee,” I mutter as I drop my things and I start to fish out for my phone in my bag.“Hey, mama…” I speak up as soon as the call connects, but Vee’s end of the call is quiet.“Before you eat my ears out, you need to know that I called you as soon as I got into my room,” I explain almost immediately, only for the phone to start vibrating on my ear.“Hey babes,” Vee says, waiving me as soon as I pick up the video call.“If you are all dressed to go out, we can always talk later,” I suggest.“It’s not a big deal,” she waves.“More so, my date won’t be here until the next ten minutes, so we have enough time to catch up,” she says.“I have only been
|VALERI’S POV|The last few hours have been a roller coaster of stress, with Grey Remington showing up at the Clinton baking company to pick me up for shopping.I was completely taken aback by the fact that he knew where to find me, uncomfortable with his pretentious act of acting like the perfect husband to me, and suffocated with being choked by his attention because I didn’t ask for any of it, but he won’t let me be, and I just had to deal with it because there was no valid excuse I could tender as a valid escape reason.I knew that the whole motive behind the shopping and unnecessary attention was to give the impression that he loved and appreciated me which worked quite well in my past life, but I found it extremely disgusting in this life.I tried to shoo him away from me but he claimed he wanted to keep me company while I packed, so I had no choice but to tolerate him.I eventually got the perfect escape to pretend to be asleep after Grey stepped out of my room to attend a Zoom
|VALERI’S POV|“Having lunch,” she answers.“Lunch?” I question and she nods.“I thought you said that waiting for our enemies to make moves won’t cut it for us, so we need to start taking laws into our hands before we are forced to lay down all our trump cards on the table,” I remind her because I am expecting her to keep the energy that she started with going.“Yea… I know that,” she answers as she ignites the vehicle.“I was just mad that you were avoiding being intimate with Grey Remington and from the little interaction that I have, I know that Grey Remington is a very smart person, so there was no way he wouldn’t start suspecting especially when you avoid something as important as you guys’ honeymoon and he will start paying unnecessary attention to his moves which is not what we want at all,” she explains with her eyes burning with determination while her hand is animated as she talks instead of the hands being on the steering wheel.“We have leverage over Grey with the knowled
|Valeri’s POV| “What the fuck just happened?” I ask as I blink back in shock realizing that Vee just walked out on me when we are in the middle of an argument. “Did Vee and I just fight over this whole revenge thing?” “What did I do wrong to make our misunderstanding escalate in a matter of seconds?” “Was I the problem?” “I stop to ask myself a series of questions as I replay the events that just happened in my head,” “What is the way forward for me now?” “Should I just ignore the fact that my bestie and I are at odds and just focus on the issue at hand?” I bombard myself with a series of questions. “You know what?” I say to myself. “I will just ignore whatever Vee and I have going on between us and focus on the honeymoon shenanigan since she asked me to do what pleases me,” I hiss angrily as I try to go back to my work. I try to focus on my work but I can’t seem to concentrate because that is exactly what happens to me when I am fighting with my bestie, I can’t
|Valeri’s POV| I stay in the same position that I have been since Grey's message came in, reading and re-reading the message over and over again because I can’t seem to wrap my head around why I am getting such a text from him. “Valeri, let’s make unforgettable memories together by going on a honeymoon trip together this Thursday,” he sent. “I have called your secretary to clear your schedule from this afternoon so that you can have enough time to pack your things because you deserve a trip like this and more,” I read again. I have been suppressing the urge to call Vee to get her ass up here since I got the message, but I know that she is busy with her first photo shoot with Donald’s Couture, and if it was just our company that was involved, I would have dragged her out and made her reschedule the shoot for another time, but we are a collaborating with other brands. Also, this first shoot is kind of huge for Vivian because today is just day three of her working in Donald’s
|GREY’S POV| “Hey, I am talking to you,” I suddenly see Kyle in front of me snapping his finger in front of me. “How can I help you?” I question him. “How can you help me?” he scoffs. “Every single time I talked to you, you have been absent-minded, making me repeat myself countless times and you seriously think there is nothing wrong with that?” he argues “What is it this time,” I question him. “It was understandable that you were able to see not motivated to work on Monday because we went through a lot last week, but this is Wednesday and you still had the same attitude you had on Monday,” he complains “What attitude did I have?” I ask Him. “You keep on zoning out,” he complains bitterly. “I have not been zoning out, I have just been critically thinking about something,” I correct him. “What is so important that is making the mighty Grey Remington’s brow take a worried curve?” he inquires, taking his seat in front of me, with worry lacing his voice. “It is not somethi
/Valeri’s POV/ “After an extremely chaotic get-ready with me on a Monday morning, I am finally at work so let's get right into what we have to do today,” I try to motivate myself as I step out of the elevator and make my way to my office. “Hey babes,” Vee sneaks up on me, putting her arms around me. “You are looking really beautiful and radiant this morning,” she complements and I smile. “Thank you babes……you also look very beautiful and radiant,” I compliment her, playing with her cheeks as we both burst out laughing. “So how is everybody on your end, and how did your talk with Grey go?” she inquires, and I look around to be sure that no one heard us. “You completely forgot to give me a heads up,” she grumbles. “Shhhh…..there are eyes and ears everywhere in this office and the last thing I want is for gossip to start flying around just because my spoiled sister and her minions think they know what is going on in my life,” I caution her, as I drag her into my office. “Now that
|GREY’S POV| As if dealing with a drunk wife the whole night was not enough, my first wife came to the room to ally with my ‘little crush’ this morning right in front of me, using the identity of my first cousin and that is rather Unsettling because I have thought of various reason why Maddison will want to be friends with someone like Valeri especially when both of them look so incompatible but the only logical explanation that I can find is that Maddison just wants to make things hard for me even though I already warned her to stay out of my business. “Not today Satan,” I muttered as I walked out of the room because I had a lot of stuff to take care of, especially concerning Maddison’s father who is now on my radar so I couldn’t add Madison’s silly stunt to what I had on my plate. I have been busy with Kyle the whole day trying to figure out how we are going to start putting the people that we bought over at Donald’s Couture to work because I want to take over Donald’s property