by Cynthia Dane
“Yes.” The lawyer looked between her and Ethan. “Like prostitution.”
“That’s uncalled for.” Ethan did not break his gaze with his lawyer.
“Uncalled for, maybe, but the truth. As unfortunate as it is for Miss Bliss, I’m afraid there’s not much we can do, legally.”
Ethan argued with him for another half hour, neither of them breaking any ground. By the time the lawyer got up and left, nothing had been resolved. Jasmine knew that there was no evidence that Jackson had hired someone to kidnap her. Nor could she prove that she had been there against her will, even with Monica as a witness.
“I don’t care,” she finally said to no one in particular. “I just want to be safe.”
For the first time since arriving in his house, Ethan talked to her directly. “You will be safe. You can stay here for the night. Tomorrow, I’ll have someone escort you back to your apartment. You have somewhere you can go, right?”
Of course he’s not offering to let me stay here for longer. Not after what Jasmine had done. “I guess I can go to my parents’ house. It should be far enough away. Although I don’t know what I’ll tell them…”
“Then go there.” Ethan turned, stomping toward his desk on the side of the room.
Impulse led to Jasmine leaping to her feet and rushing toward him. “Ethan, I… well, thank you.”
There was nothing romantic, loving, or even affectionate in the way he looked at her. He didn’t push her away with his hands, but Jasmine felt the force of his scorn from that look alone. “What, like I would leave you to that brute?”
Jasmine didn’t respond right away. For all he knew, that was exactly what she was thinking. “I only mean that you didn’t have to go there yourself. Especially after what I did to you the last time we saw each other.”
“I’m not going to waste my time asking why you did that. But I’m not going to just throw you out of here either. Like I said, you can stay the night, and you’ll be taken care of tomorrow. I suggest you get out of town as soon as you can. I’ll figure out what to do about Jackson.”
Jasmine knew that was her cue to leave the room. After sharing one last look with Ethan, she slowly turned away from him and left the large room. Out in the hallway, Harold waited for her, anxious to take her to a guest room where she would be safe for the first time in a while.
The last thing she saw was Ethan sitting on the couch next to Monica, embracing her, and not saying a word as she began to sob against his chest. Harold closed the living room door and motioned for Jasmine to follow him upstairs. She was no longer invited to take part in certain aspects of Ethan’s world.
After a long, sleepless night in one of Ethan’s guest bedrooms, Jasmine was escorted home by security guards given strict instructions to not let anyone from Jackson Lyle’s payroll near their charge. The ride home was long and quiet, and when Jasmine stepped through the front door, she encountered a cat who hadn’t been fed in about four days. He was not impressed.
As soon as Blackbeard was taken care of, Jasmine sat on her couch and looked at the security guard standing near her door. They were instructed to watch over her until she had packed a few things and was ready to leave. That morning, Ethan talked to her long enough to tell her that she was to come over to his office to collect the last of her things before being driven to the airport. He had offered to cover her plane ticket to her parents’ house.
First things were first. Since it was too last minute to take the cat with her, Jasmine went to Juan and Selena’s place to ask them to look after her things while she was gone for a while. They asked her what was going on, but she was not privy to tell them.
Two bags packed, Jasmine held the cat for a little while before throwing on jeans and a T-shirt. She was leaving most of the designer dresses behind. She wouldn’t need them out in the countryside where her parents lived on a self-sustaining farm. I still don’t know what I’m going to tell them.
The car took her downtown to the Jackson-Cole building. Security followed her up in the elevator to the executive office, where Nadia nearly dropped the phone on her shoulder when she saw Jasmine come through the door.
“Ethan said he wanted to see me,” she told the receptionist.
Nadia pointed to the doors to Ethan’s office, her eyes never leaving Jasmine’s. “He’s available. You sure he asked for you?”
Jasmine couldn’t be bothered to come up with the snarky comeback Nadia searched for. “Yeah, he did. I’m going back there.” She pointed to the security guards behind her. “Keep these guys, would you?” No answer came before Jasmine helped herself into Ethan’s office.
He was sitting at his desk, dressed cleanly in one of his fine Italian suits. A far cry from the sweaty and bloody guy in sweats the night before. Now it was Jasmine’s turn to be dressed down in her commoner clothes. Ethan promptly looked up at her, frowning.
“I see you survived the night,” he said. “And your cat.”
Jasmine didn’t know if she was supposed to laugh or not. “I’m sorry. For everything.”
“You should be.” Ethan leaned back in his seat, hands folded over his abdomen. “You created quite the mess for me to clean up. I can’t say I was impressed. You know how much damage control I had to do? I think I have most of the board believing that was bullshit now, since it helps that I said you were clearly off your rocker.”
“Like I said, I apologize.”
A creak echoed in the room as Ethan leaned forward again, his hand pulling out his checkbook and one of his fancy pens from the top drawer of his desk. When he flipped it open and began scrawling something, Jasmine couldn’t help but take a step forward.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
He glanced at her, sparing her no affection. “Giving you what you are owed. If you are to make a clean get away from here, you will need some funds.”
“But we didn’t even finish up the contract.”
“No. You made damn well sure of that.” Ethan finished writing, tore out the check, and handed it toward Jasmine. “I’m not giving you the funds we agreed upon in the beginning.”
I suppose that’s fair. Even though Jasmine screwed everything up, she still gave Ethan a few months of fun. But at the same time she wasn’t expecting anything grand. Not even a grand. She wouldn’t be surprised if Ethan was giving her $500 to feed the cat for a few years.
So when she took the check out of his hands and looked down at it, she had to stop and remember how many zeros were in a million again.
Six. Six zeros. Okay, so maybe their time together was worth a million. But that wasn’t a one in front of the number. That was something else entirely. A four.
Four million dollars.
Jasmine snapped her head up, staring wide-eyed at Ethan as he coolly went back to work. “This isn’t the number we agreed upon at all,” she said. “You gave me an extra million? And I didn’t even finish the contract?”
He didn’t say anything. Ethan turned to his computer, typed something into it, and pretended that she wasn’t there.
“Oh my God.” Jasmine needed to take this check to the bank right away. “Why would you do this? Do you feel bad for me because of what your business partner did? Answer me!”
She didn’t get an answer. Jasmine stood there for another minute, clutching the check to her chest. This man was willing to give her millions of his own funds, and she had tried to drag his name through the mud. Even after Jasmine turned and shuffled toward the door, she couldn’t help but think there was something more to the check than that.
The sounds of typing peppered her ears as she stood in front of the closed doors to Ethan’s office. She stood there, studying the handles, realizing that this would be the last time she ever saw them. How many times had she come in and out of that room, sometimes just to work, and sometimes to feel him be with her? How many times?
She could feel his eyes on her. It gave her the courage to turn and catch him look
ing away. “That’s it?” Jasmine lowered her hands, the check at her side. “You’re just going to let me go like that? Not going to say anything? Not going to stop me?”
Although he tried to continue to ignore her, Ethan flinched just enough to tell her that she had gotten to him.
“Ethan Adam Cole, get your ass out of that chair to come say it to my face. That you don’t love me.”
Jasmine didn’t know where this anger came from. Just one minute ago she was willing to leave the office, money or no money. Funny, the whole reason she got herself into this situation to begin with was because of the money. Now here she was, standing in the middle of his office with four million in her hand, and wanting nothing more than to look at him one last time.
Finally, Ethan pushed away from his desk and stood, although his gravitas did not change. Slowly he stepped forward and around his desk, each fall of his foot thumping ominously against the floor. They happened to match the beating of Jasmine’s heart.
“I don’t love you.”
The words entered Jasmine’s ear, but her brain could not diffuse them. It was like he was saying that he didn’t love her or something. Preposterous. Jasmine had felt the love he denied for so long now. And a man who didn’t love her would have not come to her rescue so adamantly like Ethan did. He could be angry at her. He could be so angry and fed up that he didn’t want to even see her right now. But to say that he didn’t love her? Jasmine couldn’t believe that.
“Well, I love you, and now you’re going to have to deal with that.” Power surged through Jasmine’s arms as she lifted the check and tore it in half. Under Ethan’s watchful gaze, flecks of paper hit the floor, and Jasmine ran into his arms.
He didn’t embrace her back. Not at first. But after Jasmine squeezed him so hard she thought she would hurt him, Ethan finally clamped his arms around her, his nose digging into the crook of her neck and breathing into her hair, Jasmine held back a sob of happiness. Now she just wanted to hear him finally say it.
“I love you,” he whispered into her ear. “I’ve loved you for so long now.”
“I know.” His scent rejuvenated her senses as she inhaled his cologne and his essence beneath it. “But you didn’t have to be such a dick about it.”
“You’re right. I should have been honest. I was wrong to hold back my feelings.”
“You’re an idiot.” Jasmine looked up into his face. “You never held back your feelings from me. You showed them to me in other ways. But I needed to hear it from your own mouth. That you love me.”
“I do. I love you so much. Don’t go out that door.”
Jasmine didn’t intend to go anywhere at the moment. She was too content to stay wrapped up in Ethan’s arms, where she was not only safe, but loved as well. The only time she backed away from him at all was to lean her head toward his and invite a kiss.
Of course, this being Ethan Cole, she didn’t just get a peck on the lips. She got a kiss that changed her whole world in one second.
After being apart for so long, crushed by their own emotions for one another, it was no wonder that Ethan was quick to scoop Jasmine up in his arms and take her over to the couch on the side of the room. The same couch where they had sex countless times — but none of those times compared to now, infused with the love that they had been denying each other for so long.
Jasmine never thought that she would feel Ethan on top of her again. But here she was, her body digging into the couch as her former boss smothered her until she could barely breathe. His mouth was not only on hers, but on her cheek, next to her ear, on her throat, and pressing against the thick cotton of her sweatshirt. It felt like being back in paradise. The place that Jasmine had only visited a time or two, and she was never sure it really happened. Even with Ethan there to guide her through the gates.
Is this what love really feels like? Crippling, yet satisfying. Intense, yet soothing. Every time Jasmine’s heart raced at the prospect of Ethan finally confessing his love to her, she was simultaneously brought back to earth, where he gazed into her eyes, whispering, “I never thought the day would come when someone made me feel this way again. It just had to be you, didn’t it?”
“What do you mean by that?” Jasmine ran her fingers against his cheek, enticed by how smooth it was. “Am I somehow not good enough at the end of the day?”
“Far from it.” Ethan kissed her neck, his lips tugging on her skin while the rest of his body overcame her. “I just mean it had to be a woman who will give me a run for my money for the rest of my life.”
“The rest of my life.” Jasmine wasn’t the type of woman who got giddy over every little thing, but she figured that wasn’t every little thing. Quite the opposite. It was a very big thing, and Ethan had done quite a few big things already. When he offered to kiss her again, Jasmine was more than happy to welcome him into her world.
Strange, yet liberating, to finally make love without the constraints of trying to hide their feelings from each other. This was the first time they left their hearts open, bare, unafraid to tell the other that this was more than just sex. Jasmine had felt it before when they made love. During those times she questioned it – wondered if Ethan was merely playing with her heart while she tried to guard it from breaking. Now I know he really does love me. Was there anything better than to feel his love press into her, his heart more open with her than it had been with anyone else before? He chose her, whether he intended to or not. Fate, the cosmos… who cared? Whatever made this possible… whatever brought Ethan and Jasmine to be in the same place that fateful day… it was almost enough to make Jasmine believe in that pesky thing called destiny.
“I love you,” she said between kisses, as her old sweatshirt pushed up and Ethan worshipped what she kept beneath. “Do you still love me?” She wanted to hear him say it, just one more time.
His breath felt forced against her breasts. “I just said it ten minutes ago, didn’t I?’
She playfully tugged on his hair. “Wrong answer.”
“I mean yes. Yes, I do love you.” He kissed her lips, tenderly, although his hand felt anything but tender as it yanked on her jeans and coaxed her legs around his waist.
Perhaps when she looked back on this moment years from now, she would laugh to think that the pinnacle of their affectionate expressions happened on a leather couch with their clothes barely off. Ethan was inside her as she still clung to his Italian jacket and began to sweat beneath her sweatshirt. Yet she couldn’t dwell on that. Jasmine was too caught up in how wonderful it felt to have no barriers between them. Never before had she made love to someone she openly, well, loved. To confess to him, to hear him finally confess to her, to say fuck it to their insecurities and take a chance on this silly love thing... “Wow,” Jasmine whispered, her head pushing against the arm of the sofa as the love of her life thrust inside her. Wow, indeed. This truly was the closest a man and a woman in love could possibly get, their hearts opened and their bodies conjoined as one.
Lest Jasmine think that he only confessed to her to have a moment like this again, Ethan broke through the fog of sexual relief and said into her hear, “You’re more gorgeous right now than ever.” Really? In her cheap jeans and older, cheaper sweatshirt? Now that was love!
Jasmine threw herself into their motions, her hair spilling over the edge of the couch as this man who stole her heart as if he had every right to brought her to a unique ecstasy. She had known orgasmic reverie before – certainly Ethan was good at bringing that out. But this was different. This wasn’t just physical. Sure, her toes curled in her shoes, and her fingers dug into his shoulders, but every part of her body was in tune with this moment. Mostly her chest, which tightened and released a flood of love through her body.
She had never appreciated the way he moaned into her ear like she did then, thrilled to feel him connect with her like that. The warmth he gave her was beyond anything she could have ever asked of him.
“No, don’t,” Jasmin
e said, as Ethan made a vain attempt to move away from her. Even though her legs were sore, and even though the arm of the couch pushed into the back of her head at an awkward angle, she couldn’t stand the thought of him being anywhere than connected with her. “I’m not done with you yet.”
Before he could ask what she meant by that, Jasmine pulled his head down and kissed him, her tongue languidly mingling with his as they savored this moment. Jasmine knew they would never achieve this level of fresh intimacy again. From now on, they would know that they loved each other. Yes, it would create a different kind of beauty, but for now she wanted to know this one as well was possible.
Sadly they could not stay that way forever. Ethan claimed that he needed to move so help his calves, and finally Jasmine relented, sitting up with him and wishing they could have that moment again and again.
