by Hannah Ford
“I don’t see what any of this has to do with me,” he told her.
“You scoffed at people like me. You said that we’re losers because some of us couldn’t handle the constant humiliation and harassment. As if you even had a clue what it was like for anyone.”
Jake shook his head and walked back to the bar. “Raven, you’re tired. It’s been a long day—“
She followed him. “No, I’m not letting you brush me off this time.”
He turned around. “Stop following me. I’ve had enough,” he said, the vein pulsing again. His eyes were haunted, glaring at her with intensity that she didn’t even understand.
“Oh, you’ve had enough? You feeling bullied, poor little wittle Jake?” she said, her sarcasm even more cutting now.
“It’s not my fault that those things happened to you,” Jake said. “It’s terrible that you were bullied, but that’s got nothing to do with me.”
“Yes it does, Jake. You don’t think you bullied me into being your escort? I did everything I could to get out of it, but you and your powerful friends forced me into this. You’re still nothing but a bully, and I’m glad—I’m glad you’re getting hurt now.” The more she said these things to him, the angrier she seemed to get. Raven tried to give each word maximum impact, seeing how it hurt him as she flung her accusations.
Jake’s jaw twitched and his eyes seemed to get suddenly glossy, as if a film had come over them. “Well if it makes you feel good, then that makes me happy,” he said.
“Liar.”
“It’s true, though.” He smiled, as if it had only just occurred to him. “I mean, everything you just said is true, and I know it.” He shook his head, laughing more. “I am all of those things. I’m a bully, I hurt people, I take advantage. And I deserve what’s happening to me right now. I deserve for the truth to come out, all of it. I’ve always known that someday this would happen and I’d lose all of this.”
Raven was taken aback. She hadn’t expected this reaction. His anger she could handle. His defensiveness, his trying to charm her. But this raw display of emotion wasn’t part of the plan, and she didn’t know what to do. “Why are you like this?” she said. “Why are you all of those things you just said about yourself?”
Jake turned away from her, put his hands on the bar. She could see the muscles in his back locking, and then her gaze moved inadvertently down to his ass, the way it looked, and she suddenly imagined herself walking over and holding him from behind, feeling his back, moving her hands around to his chest and stomach.
The thought had come out of nowhere, and it was out of place, knocking her even more off balance.
“Nobody knows anything about me,” Jake said, still not looking at her. “Nobody realizes that I hate the music I perform, that I don’t even like the movies I’m in. This whole thing is one big lie, Raven. Who I am is not the guy people see on TV, not the man giving funny interviews on Good Morning America. I’m someone else entirely, and the person I am is not anything good.”
There was a lot of pain in his voice, more than she knew what to do with. She felt some of her anger beginning to drain. She realized that her anger was mostly about her own past. Yes, his comments in that video clip had hurt her, they’d stung. But after the way he’d taken care of her and Skylar today, the things she’d said to him just weren’t fair.
“You’re not a horrible person,” she said finally.
He turned around again and looked at her. “You don’t know a damn thing about who I am. What you said about me before was all true.”
“I think I saw a little bit of who you are tonight,” she said, walking closer to him. His back was pressed against the bar now, and he folded his arms. “Today was just more show,” he said. “More of me being Jake Novak, the great protector and defender of life.” He grimaced. “That wasn’t really me.”
“I think maybe it was you, and maybe that scares you more than if you’re just this awful guy you like to think of yourself as being.”
“Raven,” he said, looking away. “Don’t do this.”
She came closer to him, wanting desperately to touch him now. She walked right up to him. “Jake,” she whispered. “Look at me. Please.”
He finally met her gaze and there were tears in his eyes, still unshed. “Raven, I can’t. I can’t give you anything.”
“But you already did. You gave me so much, today. And I repaid you by attacking you. It wasn’t fair.”
“You know,” he said, his voice choked, but a bit of laughter coming through. “You know, when I first met you, I remember thinking to myself that maybe I could just ask you out, just treat you right—not do all of this shit that I ended up doing to you.”
“Why didn’t you just ask me out then?”
“Because I knew that I’d only hurt you worse, Raven. The darkness inside of me is never going to go away. You should really stay away from me.”
She reached out to touch his face, and he grabbed her hand before she could.
“Jake, what if you just tried for one second?” she asked him.
His hand gripped her wrist. “Raven, this is not going to work. I have too much hate inside of me.”
“Why?”
He shook his head. “I can’t go there. I just—I can’t.”
“That’s okay,” she said, thinking of how she hadn’t told him everything either. There were things in life that were too dark and frightening to look at straight on. Sometimes it was better not to shine the light too brightly. She’d learned that the hard way.
“But you could still let me touch you,” she said, reaching out with her other hand, the one he wasn’t grabbing.
He grabbed that one as well. Now he had both of her wrists. His eyes looked into hers, and she saw all of the pain right on the surface, but she didn’t look away from it. She met it, and as she did, she saw something transform in his eyes.
The pain seemed to fade to the background, and now there was a hunger there, a burning desire, and his bare chest was heaving. “Raven,” he whispered. “You should go before…before something happens. I can’t stop myself.”
“I don’t want you to stop.”
Her bathrobe was slipping open, as the belt loosened around her middle. Jake pushed himself against her, and she was naked beneath the robe, her bare skin was being touched by his bare skin.
His legs intertwined with hers, his body against hers, hot and solid and strong. He pushed his head against hers, so that his lips were just an inch from her lips. His hands stopped gripping her wrists and instead they gripped her robe on either side, pulling it apart.
“Jake,” she whispered, a shuddering breath.
Her nipples were stiff, between her legs was moist and ready. She was so hot and turned on by him and she didn’t even understand how things had changed so quickly. One moment she’d been furious and lashing out, cutting him with her words—and the next she was dying for his kiss, dying to feel his hands all over her bare skin.
“Raven, please,” he said. “We shouldn’t do this.”
“Why not?” she asked. “I’m not afraid of you.”
“That’s a mistake,” he told her.
She put her hands on his chest and slid them down to his stomach. Then she slid one hand down further, clutching his hardness, wanting to stroke him, to take it out and slide it into her mouth, even though she’d never done that before.
“Don’t,” Jake said.
“You’re so hard,” she said, her own voice husky with needing him.
And then he spun her around so that she was facing away from him, and her hands clutched the edge of the bar. Jake pressed himself against her backside. His one hand slid inside her robe and grabbed her breasts, pinching her nipples just hard enough to make her cry out with sharp pleasure.
His other hand slid inside her bathrobe lower down, between her legs. She’d been wanting that, waiting for it. She hadn’t even realized how badly.
The moment his fingers touched the very edge of he
r slit, she cried out and then she was coming, coming, coming.
Her entire body shuddered. He’d hardly even done anything to her, but his hands were like magic. Everything Jake did was like perfection. And then he was tearing her robe off her shoulders entirely, leaving her completely nude.
She heard him adjusting his boxers and didn’t know quite what he was doing until she felt his hard cock pressing between her buttocks, and his hips were pushing into hers. He’d taken his cock out of his shorts and now it was just lying against her ass, stiff and hard.
Raven didn’t know what he was going to do next.
She wanted him inside of her more than anything. A voice in her said that this was wrong, she’d vowed not to sleep with him.
You said not for money. This isn’t for money. This doesn’t count.
Or did it? She wasn’t sure anymore what counted and what didn’t.
Jake slid his cock up and down, and it was warm and hot and hard. Her pussy vibrated with pleasure. “I want you inside me,” she told him.
And then his fingers were rubbing outside her slit, rubbing her folds, hitting her clit, stimulating her as he rubbed his shaft against her backside. His other hand grabbed her breasts and his mouth was on her neck.
“Fuck, Raven,” he growled.
“I’m coming again,” she called out to him. “Oh God, Jake, I’m coming.”
He swore again, and then she was bucking, coming hard against his fingertips and she felt him spurting all over her back.
They stayed in that position, both of them breathing heavily, stuck like glue against one another. Jake was laughing and so was she. She turned her head to the side and glanced back at him.
“What’s wrong with us?” he asked her.
“Nothing,” she told him.
* * *
Raven didn’t know how she’d found herself here.
Lying in bed with Jake Novak, in an incredible hotel room at the Ritz, naked together in this gorgeous bed, with Jake’s body holding hers, arms wrapped around her, hearing him breathe softly and deeply in the night.
How did I get here?
She didn’t know the answer to that—she only knew she didn’t want to be anywhere else.
Things had definitely changed between them. For Jake to invite her to come into his bed, for him to hold her like this—she knew that it was a very big deal for him.
It was a big deal for her, too.
He hadn’t kissed her on the lips yet, although it seemed he’d been so close so many times, and she wanted him to as much as she wanted any of the other things he’d done. She still couldn’t believe that he’d been so close to her, pressed himself into her like that, and even thinking back on it, she felt the familiar stirrings between her legs.
She was aroused all over again just lying in this bed with his arms wrapped around her. She pushed herself back against him, trying to feel him again, feel his cock against her.
The night wrapped around her, and it was silent and warm and beautiful.
Raven didn’t know what was coming next, but she didn’t care. Right here and now was enough for forever.
* * *
Morning came too soon, and when it came, things changed again.
Jake sat up in bed, and his phone was ringing and ringing.
Raven opened her bleary eyes, caught sight of Jake’s back as he sat on the edge of the bed with the phone against his ear.
“Yeah…” he sighed deeply, coughed a few times. “I know, Kurt. Kurt, I know. I’m going to deal with this. Yes, I’m coming back in a few hours.”
There was a long, long pause.
Jake turned his head and glanced at Raven, and for some reason she was scared to show him she was awake, so she closed her eyes and pretended to still be asleep.
“If we lose sponsors, we lose them,” Jake said. “If I go bankrupt, I go bankrupt, Kurt. What do you want me to say?”
Another long pause.
“I’ll do all the interviews you want when I get back. Book the biggest one. I don’t care who. Fucking Diane Sawyer. Does she want to do it?”
More silence.
“Kurt, Kurt. Calm down, buddy,” Jake said. “Just calm the hell down. I just woke up and I’ve got to get out of here and to the helicopter. I’ll be back in a couple hours and then you can let me have it with both barrels. Just chill out until I get there.”
Raven’s stomach tightened and her chest seemed like it was full of lead.
After he got off the phone, Jake sat on the edge of the bed and his head was hanging. “Christ,” she heard him whisper. “Christ,” he said again, and his shoulders were hunched.
“Jake,” she whispered, sitting up. “Is everything okay?”
He sat up straighter, then, turning to look at her. “Huh?”
“Is everything all right?”
“Not really,” he told her, and then he stood up. “Look, I’ve got to jump in the shower really quickly. I’m going to head back to Boston.”
“Okay,” she said, feeling suddenly nervous.
His voice was changed, cold and hard.
“You should stay here with Skylar,” he said. “I’ll book you both for an extra couple of days until she gets results. You can charge everything you need to the room and I’ll cover it.”
“Jake,” Raven said, wanting to talk about what was happening with the scandal. She’d heard and read enough to know it was bad and probably only getting worse.
“Listen, I really have to get moving,” Jake said. “Stay in bed, get some sleep.”
And then he was moving to the bathroom and the door was shutting.
Get some sleep? She thought. That was about as ridiculous a thought as telling her to eat a big meal right about then. She had no appetite and she wasn’t tired.
She was scared.
While Jake was in the shower, she put on her bathrobe and went to her own hotel room. And then she also got in the shower, making sure to be fast, just a quick wash and rinse, towel dry, and then climbed back into her clothes that she’d worn the previous day.
It wasn’t ideal, but once again she had no change of clothes.
She was worried about Jake and what was happening with this scandal. The talk of bankruptcy and losing sponsors—it was frightening to hear. He seemed on the brink of something and she wanted to be there for him the way he’d been for her.
She’d gotten back into her dress and then just as she was putting on her heels, there was a knock on her door.
She went and opened it, and smiled when she saw Jake there, freshly showered himself, but his eyes were so tired and red still.
“Hey,” she said. “What’s up?”
Jake stood awkwardly in the hallway. “Listen,” he said, not able to meet her gaze, his eyes looking everywhere but directly at her. “I was thinking about it in the shower and I want to let you out of your contract.”
“Huh?” she said, stunned. “Wait. What do you mean, Jake?”
“It’s not right, Raven. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t have that kind of situation in my life and it’s not fair to you either. I never should’ve manipulated you into doing any of that stuff. I’m so sorry.”
“Wait a minute,” she said. “Just—just wait a second—“
“I’m going to make it up to you, though,” Jake said, still not looking at her. “I’ll pay you the full thirty grand, and like I said, I’ll book these rooms for you and Skylar.”
Raven should have felt relief and happiness, but she didn’t. Instead, she felt terrible.
“I don’t understand why,” was all she said.
“I told you, I realized it’s not right,” Jake replied. “I’ve got to get serious about changing my life, and this isn’t about bad publicity or the stuff that came out last night from my past. This is about me doing the right thing. I’ll make sure Max Mendez and Club Alpha leave you alone. Nobody will bother you ever again, Raven.”
“Jake, wait a second.”
He stopped and looked at h
er for a moment. “Raven, I have to go. I’m…I’m…” he seemed about to say more, but then he ran a hand through his hair, turned and walked away from her.
She stood there with the door open, stunned and wanting to cry.
Why are you upset, you silly girl? He just gave you thirty thousand dollars and your freedom!
But it didn’t feel like a victory. It felt like a huge loss.
They’d just been starting to break through, Jake was letting down his walls and then he’d gone and dug a moat between them.
Now he was leaving and she’d never see him again. Raven wasn’t sure if she should be angry, hurt, or what. She stood there, her thoughts on fire, trying to make sense of everything.
I know I could have helped him, she thought.
Maybe that’s what was so sad, she realized. Jake was like her polar opposite, and together they somehow fit, they somehow had each other’s missing pieces.
Just like that, a light went off inside her mind—a flash of inspiration. She knew then that there was something she had to tell Jake.
And then she was running down the hallway, and she caught up to Jake as he stood at the elevators. When he saw her, his expression grew cold again.
“Raven,” he said, “I can’t talk right now.”
“I don’t want you to talk,” she said. “I want you to listen to me.”
He stared at her uncomprehendingly. “Fine, say what you want to say.”
“It’s good that you’re firing me, because I don’t want to work for you,” she told him.
“Okay, great,” he said, his voice impatient.
“And you can’t have me as your employee because I’m going to be your girlfriend.”
“What?”
“You’re in trouble, Jake,” she said. “Don’t bother telling me everything’s okay because it’s not. You’re in danger of losing everything you’ve built because of that video, but I might be the one person who can help to repair the damage.”
Jake’s eyes narrowed. “How do you plan to do that?”
She smiled. “It just so happens that I’m one of those people you made fun of in your video. When I was in high school I was bullied so bad that I attempted suicide.”
