by Peak, Renna
He grinned against my lips. “What?”
I suppressed my giggle. “Nothing.”
He gave my neck a quick peck before returning his lips to mine. He pulled away for a moment, keeping his lips impossibly close. He pulled back ever so slightly and rested his forehead against mine. “I'd better give you something to smile about, then.”
17
Sleep must have found me at some point during the night because the alarm clock jarred me awake when it went off. I closed my eyes and smiled, allowing myself to enjoy the sated feeling one more time. I felt something I hadn't felt in a long time. Happiness. It was amazing and made me feel so full. This time, I had no regrets. This time, it hadn't been a mistake.
Brandon had already gone to work on whatever it was he was doing before meeting with his business associate. I refused to allow myself to feel jealous. Pink condoms or not, I knew he had chosen me. He left a note on the desk asking me to join him in the restaurant downstairs for breakfast.
I showered and dried my hair. I was thankful that morning that my locks cooperated and slid into a loose bun at the nape of my neck. I applied my makeup with as much care as I could then pulled out my power suit from the closet. It was a steel gray Armani jacket and skirt that my mother had purchased for me when I graduated from business school. It was by far the nicest outfit that I owned.
I slipped on a white silk button-up blouse and pulled my jacket on over it. I admired how it was all tailored to my body. I pulled on the rest of my clothes and slipped on my kitten heels. No stilettos to kill myself this time. I looked about as good as I ever had in my life and I knew it. I felt the confidence in my pores, and last night hadn't made me feel less confident at all. If anything, it had made me feel more confident, better about everything. I never thought it would happen, but I thought at that moment that I might be able to move on from my past. Melissa would be proud.
My body hummed with excitement, not just because of my meeting but because of how amazing I felt. Brandon had done that to me. Goosebumps ran down my arms when I thought about what we had just done a few hours before. I had to put it on the shelf for now. I would eat breakfast with him and put him out of my head for the rest of the day. Until that night, anyway.
I knew I was going to kill it that day. I knew I would make Baxter & Bishop proud and it would make my dad proud, too. Today was the beginning of my business career. If it went well, I'd have a lot of doors opened to me and I knew I was ready for it. My presentation rocked and there was no way Tomojii would be able to do anything but sign over every bit of their marketing business to me.
I gave myself my final pep talk in the mirror and headed for the elevator. The hairs on my arms stood on end and I tingled with excitement.
Eating breakfast with Brandon would get my mind off the presentation for a few minutes. I was sure he'd have words of encouragement for me to settle the queasy nervousness in my stomach, too. If not encouragement, he would be able to take my mind off of business in any number of other ways.
I grabbed my purse and slid my laptop into my briefcase. I made sure the thumb drive with my power point presentation was in my pocket and headed for the elevator with my bags. I stepped out into the lobby and was almost blinded by the sunlight coming through the glass windows. I could smell bacon coming from the restaurant near the lobby and I heard my stomach rumble to life. I realized then that I hadn't eaten in almost a full day, except for the bite of curry and the few bites of ice cream. I was definitely going to be eating something to quiet the grumbling before heading out to my meeting.
I saw Brandon across the lobby talking to a tall, dark-haired man who had his back turned to me. They both wore tailored black suits that had been custom fitted to their bodies. Brandon's physique was impressive—I could see that even through his suit. I noticed the curve of his chest muscles under his jacket and I felt the heat rise in my face as I remembered feeling his body pressed against mine last night. It didn't matter how my presentation went that day—I would still have him again that night. I wanted to run my fingers through his dark curls and to feel him against my body. I couldn’t get enough of him—he was like a drug.
I was hungry. Hungry for breakfast, but even more hungry for him. I began walking across the lobby and was halfway to him when he looked up and saw me. His wicked grin told me he wanted me, too. His gaze bore into me and I saw only him. I gave him my own version of a wicked grin and crossed the lobby to the two men.
"Jenna?"
It seemed like it happened in slow motion. That voice. I knew that voice. I turned to look at the tall man standing next to Brandon. It felt like it took years to turn to that voice, but I wanted time to stand still so I wouldn’t have to do it. I couldn't stop myself from turning to him, even though I had no desire to see who that voice belonged to. I couldn't stop myself from looking at him.
I heard a crash and my brain registered somewhere that my briefcase had hit the floor. My legs went weak, threatening to buckle beneath me and I could hear my heart thrashing in my ears.
I looked up at him then. His dark eyes locked with mine and my throat closed. I couldn't breathe. My lungs were two fireballs in my chest and I couldn't force air into them even though I tried—I was sure I was gasping for air because I couldn't get a single breath in through my tight throat. It felt like there was a chain around my neck and it was growing tighter and tighter. My death was the only thing was going to stop it. And I wanted to die at that moment. I wanted nothing more than for death to come and find me, swallow me whole so I would never have to think about this moment ever again.
It wasn't possible, but this time it was no hallucination.
It was Daniel.
MISTAKEN 2 is available now.
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Mistaken 2
The Mistaken Series - Part Two
1
Daniel, my ex fiancé, stood before me, a man I thought had been dead for well over a year.
It felt like every ounce of air was sucked from my body and the feeling of a noose around my neck kept me from taking any more. If there had been a bit of food in my stomach, I was sure I would have vomited all over the man.
His smile lit up his entire face. "God, I can't believe it's you, Jenna." The man that looked exactly like Daniel took a step toward me.
I took a step back, more from instinct than anything. It was a hallucination. It had to be. My subconscious was making me feel guilty for what I had done with Brandon and my brain had invented this to punish me. Maybe moving on without Daniel hadn't been such a great idea.
His eyes scanned me from head to toe and returned to meet my gaze. "You changed your hair." His eyes crinkled and his lips turned up into a sweet smile.
I took in his smile—that dimple on his right cheek that I always loved so much. I took another step back. Words wouldn't come to me. It wasn't him. It couldn't be.
"Jenna, I wanted to tell you before. I did. Things were just so…" He took another step toward me.
"No." My voice was hoarse, only a whisper. I took another step backward. I had to keep the distance between us—there was no way I was letting this person, whoever he was, get any closer to me.
He took another step toward me and reached out for me. I flinched away from his touch.
"Jenna, we should sit down. I know this is a lot to take in." He made a motion with his hands toward a different part of the lobby.
My lips trembled, but my brain was beginning to make a connection with the rest of my body again. I shook my head. "No, no. This isn't real." My eyes turned to the desk where Brandon was still standing. His eyes were going between the two of us like he was watching a ping pong match. I wanted to ask him if he could see this man, too, but it was pretty clear by his reaction that he could.
The man who looked like Daniel turned back to look at Brandon and then returned his gaze to me. "That's Brandon. He helped me put this together."
I wanted to run. Every
fiber of my being screamed at me to run—run as fast and as far as my legs could carry me. But I was frozen in place. I couldn't run—I couldn't even move. This was wrong. Everything about it was wrong.
"There's a lot to explain, Jenna. We should go sit down." He motioned again to one of the sitting areas in the lobby behind me.
My eyes returned to Brandon, who had turned away from me. I saw his hands clenching the granite counter top of the desk and his upper body bent toward the counter like he'd just been sucker punched in the gut.
"Jenna, let's sit." He had somehow come to stand in front of me and he put his hand on my shoulder.
The pressure of his hand seared into my skin through my jacket. He was so close that I could smell his cologne. It was the same—the same as it had always been. The memory of smelling his pillow after he'd died bored a hole into my thoughts. I used to smell his pillow every night before I went to sleep—it was the only thing I had that still smelled like him. My brain screamed at me that this wasn't real—that there was no way this could be real.
He put his other hand on my other shoulder and turned me toward the sitting area. He gave me a gentle shove to get my feet moving. I was like a zombie, locked in place and unable to make my body move on its own. I turned my head again to look at Brandon. I just wanted to make eye contact with him. I needed to make a connection with something I knew for sure was real. He wasn't at the counter. My eyes scanned the lobby for him, but he was gone. Daniel's hands were pushing me forward and my feet were moving despite my inability to make them move on my own.
"Sit." He stopped me in front of one of the plush red chairs in the seating area. He turned me back to face him. "Sit."
If terror hadn't been coursing through my veins, I would have been offended at being spoken to like a dog. In that moment, I wasn't able to register that I should have even been offended. I did as he commanded and I sat down.
He took a seat in an identical chair across from me and pulled it closer. His knees were almost touching mine.
I could see him, but it was like I was looking through him. I still couldn't process how this was even possible. My mouth hung open and I felt nothing but a quiet desperation to get my brain to function again. It was like something wasn't connecting right—like my head had been removed from the rest of my body.
"Jenna, I know this is shocking for you, but I can't tell you how happy I am to see you again."
Shocking for me. Yes—shocking was an understatement. I somehow made words come from my mouth. "You're dead. This isn't real." I thought if I said it enough times, the apparition that appeared to be Daniel would vanish into the air. It had to.
He reached out for my hand and somehow managed to take it into his, even though I'm sure I tried to pull it away. Both of his hands squeezed mine. "You can feel my hands, right? I'm completely real."
Words tumbled from my mouth without any real thought. "I'm hallucinating again. This isn't real. This is just me trying to cope. It isn't real." My desperation was palpable. Why was I hallucinating?
I felt him squeeze my hands again. "Jenna, listen to me. I know it's shocking, but I'm real. I didn't die."
My eyes snapped to his. "You did die. I saw your coffin go in the ground." Reality was the answer. Confront the hallucination and tell it you know it isn't real.
"I wasn't in the coffin, Jenna. I'm sitting here in front of you." He turned and scanned the lobby. "I should have introduced you to Brandon. He could help explain this better."
"Brandon," I repeated. Oh my God. Brandon.
2
What had I done? I had just spent the night with Brandon and my fiancé was now sitting in front of me, not dead at all. How was that even possible? At least when Daniel said Brandon's name, I snapped out of my haze a little.
"Jenna, I know this is really shocking. Can you just let me explain?" The pleading in his eyes almost brought tears to mine.
"How are you real? You died. I saw the pictures of the car after the accident. It wasn't survivable. That’s what the police said—it wasn’t survivable." I could feel my heart racing in my chest and beating like a drum in my ears. I was sure anyone passing by could hear it, too.
"You're right, it wasn't survivable. But I wasn't in the car." His gaze bore into mine like he wanted me to see what had happened that night.
My eyes drifted to a painting on the wall. I felt like I was engrossed in it, but I didn't even really see it. I couldn't look at him, either.
"Things were so hard—things were going so wrong. I tried to tell you. The election—I was so far behind in the polls. There was no way I was going to be elected. Your dad—I wasn't going to be able to fulfill the one year plan, let alone the five year plan." Daniel rolled his eyes. "He would have taken you away from me." He squeezed my hand with his again.
I snapped my gaze back to his and yanked my hand away. "What in the hell are you talking about?"
"You know exactly what I'm talking about. He would have ended us when I lost." I saw the tears in his eyes.
"There were nine months left before the election, Daniel. They hadn't even had the primary, yet." I shook my head. "You're telling me you faked your death so you wouldn't disappoint my father?" I shook my head. "You faked your death so that we wouldn't have to break up? Even though that's really the ultimate break up?"
"It sounds bad when you put it like that."
My eyes widened. "Faking your death isn't bad if I don't put it like that?"
He leaned back in his chair and let go of my hand. "You don't understand. We would have been done when I lost. He would have made sure of it."
I shook my head. "And we're not done now? You've been dead for over a year, Daniel."
"I couldn't lose you, Jenna. I was going to take you with me. That was the plan. It was supposed to be both of us that night."
I leaned in toward him and my voice lowered to a hushed whisper. "What are you talking about? You were going to fake my death, too?" I had to be dreaming this. Daniel wasn't this stupid. I knew he wasn't.
He took a deep breath and let it out in a long sigh. "You're oversimplifying it, Jenna. We could have run away together that night. I didn't want any more one year plans or five year plans. I just wanted to be with you."
I knew what he was saying about the one and five year plans. My father had been doing it to me since I was a kid. I always had to have a mid-range and long term plan of what I was going to do with my life, starting from about age seven. It had made for an interesting childhood, to say the least. "You could have just dropped out of the race. You didn't know what was going to happen in the primary, either. And poll numbers…"
He shook his head. "That political life is his thing—it was never mine. I just wanted to be with you. I was willing to do whatever he wanted me to do so that I could have his blessing. I loved you, Jenna. I still do."
How was this even happening? Just when I had accepted things—when I had moved on with my life, he decided to come back into it. Damned complications—and this? This was beyond being a complication.
He continued. "I've made a new life here. We can make a life here together. I built a house for you, Jenna. You have to come down and see it before you make a decision."
I shook my head and my hands clutched at the soft sides of the chair. "I'm not going anywhere with you, Daniel. I don't know what you hoped to accomplish by accosting me this way. I have a meeting this morning, and I need to get going."
"There's no meeting, Jenna. My friend Brandon owns Tomojii and he set this whole thing up."
I felt like he had punched me in the stomach. The extreme nausea took hold of me again and I would have puked if I had eaten anything. "What?" This had to be a joke. A sick, twisted, disgusting joke.
"There's no marketing deal with Tomojii. He paid off a guy at your company and got him to get you over here. I spent a lot of money to get you here, Jenna. It was the only way."
It wasn't the only way. He could have shown up on my doorstep any time before last n
ight and I would have gone with him without hesitation.
The realization that Brandon had to have known who I was like a slap across my face. I hadn't seen it before that very moment. There was no way he didn't know who I was. He'd slept with me, knowing I belonged to Daniel, knowing that I would never be his. It had to be some kind of sick game to him.
I took a deep breath and tried to cover the feeling of betrayal that the two men had given me as a dark gift that morning. "So now what? You want me to stay here with you? You have my fake death planned?" I dug my fingernails into the sides of the chair.
He tilted his head and I sensed I had pushed a button I shouldn't have. "I've made a life for us here. I built you a house. You should see it before you say no." There was an edge to his voice that told me I needed to back off from the accusations.
I shook my head. "I don't want to see it, Daniel."
He continued without acknowledging me. "It's on the ocean, just like you always wanted. There's a glass wall in the living room that overlooks the ocean and I put a grand piano right in front of it."
"You aren't supposed to put pianos in front of windows." It just popped out of my mouth.
He swept his gaze across my face but didn't acknowledge me again. "You can play all day and look out over the waves. We can fill our house with music and children, just like you always wanted. It can be just like we always wanted, Jenna. Like both of us wanted."
He reached out for my hand, but I kept them both on the chair, holding onto the sides for dear life. He had some fantasy life all planned out for me, but hadn't consulted me about it at all. Not only hadn't he consulted me, he'd faked his death—his suicide—and had left me holding the bag. He'd left me with shame and guilt, terrified of allowing myself anything else in my life that I might lose. And he'd left me with the hallucinations and the constant worry that I was losing my grip on reality. I still wasn't a hundred percent sure that this wasn't a hallucination, though if it had been a hallucination, it would have been a much more intense one than I'd ever had before. No, I felt like I was losing my sanity every time I thought I saw him in a crowd. This had to be real; he was sitting right in front of me.
