by Cynthia Dane
She finally let him approach her. “I could never resent you. You’re the woman I love. If someone says something…”
“You’ll never hear it,” Jasmine cut in. “They’re careful around you. Sometimes I think they want me to…” She couldn’t finish that thought. “Maybe there are women out there who can put up with it. Maybe they can grow from it and become better, stronger people. I’m not one of them. I don’t care if it makes me sound weak. I shouldn’t be expected to put up with all the senseless bullshit simply because I didn’t go to Winchester Academy or Harvard or Princeton. Or because my parents aren’t mega-rich assholes who founded some company or whatever. Or because I’m not a celebrity who can be admired for her artistic merits or ability to be so hot the sun burns before her. Maybe you don’t care, Ethan, but the world does.” Her voice lowered. “You’re a good man, and I love you, but you really need someone other than me to be your wife. Either someone who can handle that pressure better than I can, or one of those women who is somewhat decent.” Too bad Kathryn Alison is already spoken for. Jasmine had never forgotten the wisecrack made at Monica’s bachelorette party. “You’d be better off trying to woo Adrienne again. Even if her image is going down too.”
As if on cue, the passenger side door of Ethan’s Lamborghini opened and closed.
“What are you doing here?” The shock at seeing someone like Adrienne in this sort of situation… what the fuck? Had she been hiding in Ethan’s dark car this whole time? “Come to rub this in my face?”
Adrienne took a step back the moment she approached Jasmine. “Why would I rub any of this in your face?”
“It’s also none of your business.” Jasmine was so tired. Tired of Adrienne, tired of Ethan, tired of the drama surrounding them all.
“Maybe you should go,” Ethan said to Adrienne. He took out his car keys and tried to give them to her. “Take my car back. Jasmine and I will take hers.”
“What is she doing here to begin with? Already replacing me, Ethan?”
“Jasmine!” His roar made both her and Adrienne shake in surprise. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but you’re talking insanity. Why in the world would I want to be with Adrienne when we don’t even care about each other like that anymore? It’s just business!”
That’s what I used to tell myself all the time. That’s what she used to think about Ethan. Nothing but business. She didn’t want to get attached to him, to resent him for using her for sex. She knew it was different now, but… “Did you know that someone purposely told the paper that you were marrying Adrienne so I might get cut out of the picture? As a prank? I don’t know…”
“Who the fuck did that?”
“I would love to know that too.” Adrienne put her hands on her hips. “Because ever since that damning article, I’ve been cleaning up my own messes too!”
“Oh, I heard all about your messes too!” Jasmine was pacing again. “Like how everyone knows about you going to gay bars and making a fool out of yourself!” To be fair, Jasmine only found out about that a little while ago. She was probably one of the last to know.
Adrienne paled to the point she looked like the moon trying to crowd out a sunny day. “That’s not true!”
“Come off it, Adrienne.” Ethan sighed, shoving his car keys in his pocket. “We all know.”
Her hands went to her face. Even her red lips were paling.
“What are you so ashamed of? People who give a shit about what you do in your personal life aren’t worth your time anyway.”
Both Adrienne and Jasmine exploded at him.
“Easy for you to say! You’re a manly-heterosexual-man!”
“Don’t tell either of us we don’t have anything to worry about!”
“Isn’t this like you? You really don’t understand!”
“Fuck off!”
Ethan didn’t say anything. He looked away, quietly seething.
Adrienne grunted in sheer frustration before turning to Jasmine. “I swear to God, Jasmine,” she groaned, “if you dump this man a day before his wedding, I will personally haunt you myself! All Ethan does is talk about you! Jasmine, Jasmine, Jasmine! Holy fucking shit, if I even entertained a single thought about trying to steal him back for myself, I would’ve given up a long time ago! I would have no chance! And I’m not about to watch you break his heart, both as someone who cares about him and as his business partner! We don’t need that shit!”
Jasmine furrowed her brows.
“Everyone who is anyone has skeletons in their closet! Most people don’t care, that much Ethan is right about! For fuck’s sake, him marrying his personal assistant is far from the worst thing anyone could come up with, regardless of the other details. I promise you both will move on from that within a few years.”
“Just like people will move on from you being a raging bisexual,” Ethan mumbled. “It’s 2016. If you can be in charge of a Fortune 500 company, then you can fuck the First Wife for all anyone really cares.”
“Shut up, Ethan! There you go again trying to tell me what I should or should not be worried about!” Adrienne’s finger was practically up his nose. The image would’ve greatly amused Jasmine if she weren’t fuming out of her own. “What’s it like being a man? What’s it like getting to do whatever you want, and the worst people can say is, ‘Oh, how about that, he’s doing exactly what we expect a man like us to do?’ Because I will never know that. Jasmine will never know that. Your fiancée, the woman you never stop singing the fucking praises of, is standing right here telling you that she wants to leave you because the pressure is too much. You know what? That pressure is never going to go away. She will wake up every day with the heavy burden of being Mrs. Ethan Fucking Cole, and all you can say is, oh well, who cares? Do you even listen to us, or do you think our pretty faces are amusement enough?”
“I would never!”
“Then prove it! Jasmine has been begging for you to protect her ever since you proposed to her! What kind of shit-poor husband would you be if you let her be gnawed on by wolves for the rest of her life? Stand the fuck up for her!” Adrienne laughed so callously that Jasmine was almost afraid she would get in a car and drive it off a cliff. Or bump one of them off the cliff. “I am so glad I dumped you, Ethan Cole. I thought I was getting rid of you because you were too manly, and now I see you weren’t manly enough!”
Jasmine had never seen such silent rage on Ethan’s face before. She had seen him fly into physical rages, particularly when someone was about to harm her, but this was different. This was Adrienne punching him right in the scrotum. Nobody comes after his masculinity… Wasn’t that the crux of the problem? That nobody had challenged what it meant for him to be a man? People could gripe about his upbringing, his weird fascination with mushrooms, the fact he hated going to functions, whatever, but they would never challenge who he was as a man. He had proven that to the cosmos above when he did the manliest thing of all: build up his own empire and leave a trail of broken-hearted princesses in his wake.
Now here was one of those princesses – perhaps two of them – tearing him down from the inside. Because who else would know how to get to him so well?
“That was a low blow,” he finally said.
“You deserve it. It’s about time someone knocked you down a fucking peg or two.” Adrienne turned her hard gaze toward Jasmine. “You want to know why I’m here right now? Because I was worried about you. We both were. I offered to come looking for you with Ethan. I even postponed my meeting later to come find your ungrateful ass.”
“Ungrateful?”
“You heard me.” Adrienne snorted. “You don’t get to come at him and me without hearing some of it for yourself. I understand that you’re under a lot of pressure, but you need to understand how lucky you are. This man would do anything for you. You think I’m jealous? I am jealous. I’m jealous that I don’t have someone who thinks the sun shines so graciously on my ass. How nice that would be! I’m a lot older than you, Jasmine. Maybe not in the re
alm of the world, but socially, I am approaching crone age. I turned down Ethan’s proposal because I knew he wasn’t the one. Maybe I’ll never find the one! Most days I don’t care. Then I see the way he treats you, and deep down I wonder if I made a huge mistake all those years ago. You really are Cinderella, you know that? This man went around trying that stupid collar on any woman who would take up the challenge. It so happened it fit perfectly on you, and now he wants to make you his princess – no, his queen. You may very well decide that it won’t work out later on. But I implore you, Jasmine, do not make hasty or rash decisions right now. Put off signing any legal documents if you have to, but you need to have that wedding tomorrow. Not just to save all of our faces in front of hundreds of influential people, but to make sure a breakup is what you two really want.”
“I don’t want that.” Ethan stepped forward, taking Jasmine’s hand. “She’s right. I don’t want to admit it, but Adrienne is right. I haven’t been the man you need me to be. I thought I was. I thought what you needed was a provider, a man who would make all those dreams come true and give you what kids like us used to dream of. Big houses, servants, extensive travel… I guess I thought you would be forever enthralled with shopping and fine dining. I never thought you would have such a hard time with the cruelty of the people around us, that you would need me to protect you from them like I protected you from more heinous people.” Ethan braved putting his hand on Jasmine’s shoulder. “She’s also right about you. There is always going to be someone out there who wants to tear you down. Marrying me might make you a target, Jasmine, but I will jump in front of any bullets that come your way.”
Adrienne laughed behind him. “You better put that in your vows, asshole.”
Both Jasmine and Ethan ignored her. “I don’t want to lose you,” Jasmine said, crying again.
“I don’t want to lose you either. I love you, Jasmine. You’re the only woman I want to marry. If it’s not you, then it’s no one. When I imagine Mrs. Cole, I see you. I want you in my home, in my bed, in my cars, in my office, in my arms. I want the whole world to see how beautiful and kind you are. I will never look down on you for your parents or your friends who stay by your side. Other people might, but I will never. If those other people give you shit? You tell me. If nothing else, I want to understand. So I can better educate those people about what you mean to me, and why you deserve their respect. It may be tenuous respect, but they will at least pretend. And…” he stood back, struggling to keep a straight face, “if it’s still too hard, if we can’t make it work… well, that’s not an option. I don’t know about you, Miss Bliss, but I am going to my wedding tomorrow, and you better be there glowing like the most beautiful bride to ever grace this damned earth. I’d rather not look like a fool marrying myself. Adrienne might be drunk enough to stand in for the bride and hope nobody notices.”
“I heard that.”
Ethan went down on one knee, his hand clenched tightly around Jasmine’s. His finger brushed against her engagement ring. Somewhere in the depths of her belongings, Adrienne was holding on to their wedding rings already. I can’t believe she would be the one to give us our rings. The world was a strange place.
“Jasmine Bliss,” he said, his face so serious that she almost wanted to laugh, “I don’t care how weird your parents are, how many friends you make, or what you decide to do with my money and your time. You are not a liability. You are a good person, and I would not marry someone I didn’t think was a good match for me. I love you. Let me prove my devotion to you by making you my wife. I will never hide you. I will never be embarrassed to call you mine. If you want to run the show at home, I’ll let you. If you want to let other people do it for you, that’s fine too. I want you to be happy and comfortable. Your happiness expands upon mine. If I can’t make you happy, then I have failed, both as a man and as your husband… and I am not a man accustomed to failure, as I’m sure you have noticed. I will do anything to keep failure from happening.”
Jasmine held her breath.
“Marry me, Jasmine. Whether it’s tomorrow or ten years from now, promise me that you’ll always be by my side. I don’t want to keep on going if you’re not there sharing everything with me.”
I don’t deserve this man. How unfortunate was it that Jasmine thought of that first? “I love you, Ethan. I desperately want to marry you and call you my husband. I doubt I could ever do any better.”
“Don’t you dare say but.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Then what?”
For the second time in her life, Jasmine looked deep into Ethan’s eyes while he proposed to her. Earnest. Determined. Gorgeous. Jasmine pushed his few bangs away from his forehead and cupped her hand around his cheek. “You’re going to get your pants dirty if you keep kneeling on the ground.”
“I’m not getting up until you tell me yes.”
“Promise me one thing, Ethan.”
“I’ll promise you this whole mountain if it gets that ring on your finger.”
“You’ll always love me as much as you do right now.”
“Jasmine,” he said, exasperated, “I don’t think I could properly function if I started to love you less. The hole in my heart would be too big.”
The world was blurring. Tears? Again? “What if my parents embarrass us? What if we can’t have kids? What if you lose investors and business because of me?”
“Then they’ve done what every set of parents in the history of the world has done. Then we adopt. Then I find other investors who aren’t so fucking petty. Now I want you to promise me something, Jasmine.”
“What?”
“That no matter what, whether I stay a billionaire or lose all my money next week, you’ll stay with me forever. I can brave anything if you’re with me.” He kissed her fist, now clenched between both of his hands.
“I’ll always be with you… if you’ll have me…” She could only whisper it. To say it any louder might tempt the will of fate.
Ethan stood up. “Who else is there?” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Her?”
“Can’t you two kiss and make up without involving me?”
They did kiss, Ethan wrapping Jasmine in his arms as if he were afraid to let go of her. He doesn’t want me to run away. He wants me here, with him. The heat of his body, the power of his strength, and the force of his kiss all told Jasmine one thing: that she was loved, and perhaps that was enough to get her through anything.
***
Ethan drove up to the manor, Jasmine in the passenger seat and Adrienne driving the Dodge Viper behind them. They expected a healthy amount of cars in their driveway, but they did not expect a black SUV beating them there by about three minutes.
“Look at this debacle,” Adam Cole mumbled, eschewing the help of the driver who brought him there from the airport. Both Ethan and Jasmine hopped out of the Lamborghini as soon as they recognized him. “No wonder I never came here before. I’m already annoyed by all the excess.”
“I was hoping I wasn’t the only one who thought that way,” Saul, barely dressed in a cotton shirt and shorts, said as he came down the front steps. “These kids and their money.”
The two men shook hands before heading inside, neither of them acknowledging their children’s presence, even though daughter and son were getting married in fewer than twenty-four hours.
Chapter 18
Jasmine was up before anyone else in her wing of the manor. How could she sleep? She got four hours, at best. Was there ever a bride who actually slept through the night before her wedding? Not without a healthy dose of sleeping pills. Jasmine had a feeling she would have plenty of adrenaline to get her through the day.
Nevertheless, Belinda was quick to bring her a large cup of coffee and a breakfast that was hearty enough to give her strength but hopefully not enough to expand her stomach for a few hours. “Happy wedding day!” she said, smiling as broadly as the windows she then threw open.
Little by little the rest of
Jasmine’s entourage awoke. Luna was the first non-servant to burst into the room, commenting on the good weather and all sorts of good omens she divined from her tea and Tarot cards ten minutes ago. This was, of course, after a naked meditation on the walkway her daughter was to be married on in a few hours. More than one of Jenny’s helpers shrieked in surprise.
Jasmine was not in a huge hurry to get up, since Raul wasn’t due to style her for another forty-five minutes. However, as soon as she heard a faraway door slam open, she knew she was in trouble.
“Hey, you!” Selena burst into the master suite, Nadia trailing behind her. They came up to Jasmine’s bed, where she lay on her side facing her mother as they talked about who was coming later that day – there was so much security detail that Harold quipped they hosted more bodyguards than actual guests. Because, yes, guests were already starting to arrive, particularly those who traveled from far away.
Now there was Selena, then Nadia, and Jasmine could tell that things were about to get underway.
“We’re here, half of us are queer, and you’re gonna get used to it.” Selena leaped on the large bed and nearly rolled onto Jasmine, squishing the bride before she even had the chance to put on her wedding dress.
When the fervor died down enough, Jasmine offered them coffee or iced tea, depending on how much caffeine they wanted. Naturally, everyone wanted as much caffeine as possible. It was a big day, and Selena, although the maid of honor, had it in her head that her main mission was to bag her own billionaire. She didn’t even care if he was married.
