by Alexis Gold
Her lungs were frozen and she could barely get a breath in. “I… I can’t leave Cross.” She told him shortly.
He chuckled again. “I thought you’d say that; I know how loyal you are, but all the same, please look at my proposal and consider it. You are just the kind of team member that we want here; and you’d be in a position to become one of our leaders here, not just a worker who supports the leaders. You are innovative and sharp, and I like that. I’d like you to join us, and when you get a look at my offer, you may just change your mind. In any case, have a look at it at least, and give it some careful consideration before you respond. Is that a fair request?” he asked hopefully.
She knew that it was, though she could have told him right then that there was no deal in the world that would make her leave Cross Corp.
“I’ll take a look at it, and thank you so much for thinking of me and sending it over. I appreciate the offer and your time, Justin.”
He thanked her and hung up, and she shook her head as she replaced the phone in the cradle. It was true that she did do a lot of work that had been noticed by not only Cross, but by other companies around the city as well, and she was fast becoming a valuable commodity, but she was having the affair of her life with her boss and somehow her career, which had been her first priority since she was old enough to know what she really wanted to do, had taken a backseat to the passion she experienced with Jonathon.
Five minutes later, Justin’s email arrived, and she left it in her inbox, without opening it.
***
Jonathon gave himself a last glance in the mirror and saw that he looked up to par for dinner with his father, Vincent, and Susan, and then he walked into the dining room to join them. He had arrived as late as he could without being rude, after their leisurely visit in the drawing room before dinner, and yet before anyone had been comfortably seated in the dining room.
All of them looked up at him when he entered, and each of them had a motive in their gaze. His father’s was intense. There were unspoken expectations in his eyes and he made it clear that they were to be heeded. Vincent’s gaze was much the same, though his smile was broader than Phillip’s was.
Susan’s gaze was different. Hers was sheer adoration; filled with happiness and longing. Unabashed longing for him, right there in front of their fathers. She went right to him and threaded her arm through his, looking up at him and batting her eyelashes as she gazed dreamily at him. He clenched his jaw and nodded at them.
“Good evening. I hope I haven’t kept anyone waiting.” He said briefly, knowing that he almost had and not caring.
His father leveled his eyes at him, but Vincent walked toward him and held his hand out. “No, not at all, son, not at all. Glad to see you and have you join us tonight. I know Susan has been especially looking forward to this. She’s been so anxious to see you.” He said in a loaded voice.
Jonathon pretended not to catch the strong hint, and shrugged. “Well, father and I are always pleased to see such old family friends here at the homestead.”
Both of the old men chuckled, and Susan grinned up at him as if he was the only person on the planet.
Dinner was announced just then, and a grateful Jonathon walked quickly over to the dining table and pulled Susan’s chair out for her, depositing her into it and taking his expected place at her side, but moving his chair just a bit further away from hers than it had been before he sat in it. She reached for his hand and held it as her eyes stayed on him, and her smile beamed at him. He tried not to look at her too much, not wanting to encourage her at all.
Dinner passed politely, and after what felt like an eternity to Jonathon, it was over and the two old men agreed on cigars and brandy in the library. Just as Jonathon was going to join them, Susan tugged at his arm and smiled up at him.
“Couldn’t we go for a walk in the garden? There’s a lovely moon out tonight. Come with me. I’ve missed you so much.” She cooed at him, batting her green eyes at him. He looked from her to Phillip and Vincent who both turned their backs slightly to him.
Vincent locked his gaze on Jonathon. “You’d better take my little girl for a walk in the garden, if that’s what she wants,” he stated with a firm and unyielding smile.
Jonathon sighed. He knew that there was no way out of it for him. “Of course.” He turned and walked to the garden with Susan at his side, her arm linked through his, her body as close to him as she could get it while he walked a little more swiftly than he needed to.
They reached the garden and he stopped beside the fountain in the courtyard. She turned to stand before him and face him, slipping her arms around his waist and pulling herself close to him. “Isn’t this romantic?” she asked, staring up at him happily. “You know, it could always be like this for us.”
He sighed and put his hands on her shoulders, giving her a little push as he stepped backward, trying to free himself from her grasp, but she held him tighter and lifted herself up onto her toes, bringing her face close to his.
“Wait!” she whispered with a smile. “I want to kiss you.” She said quietly, and then she pressed her lips to his and closed her eyes, kissing him softly and holding him tightly.
He let her kiss him for a moment, but the coolness of it was in such sharp contrast to the fires he felt with Naomi that he could not stand the great difference between the two, and he knew that the last person he wanted to kiss was the one person who was standing before him.
He pushed her away gently and stepped backward. Her kiss had left him uncomfortable and unhappy, and nothing more. “Susan, please don’t do that. I tried to tell you a few weeks ago when you came into the office that it isn’t like this between us any longer, and it isn’t going to be like that between us again. It’s just not. I don’t care for you that way. You must know that. You must understand it. We are friends, and we can keep being friends, but there is no way that there will ever be a romance between us.” He hoped that she understood how serious he was about what he had told her and tried so many times to show her.
She looked pained as she stood there, her eyes filling with sadness and her lower lip extending in a pout. “Jonathon! How can you say something like that?” she took a step toward him and he held his ground.
She reached her hands up to the straps on her dress and slowly slid them off of her shoulders, letting the top of her dress fall away from her breasts, baring them to Jonathon. She smiled at him and reached her hands for his, but he pulled away from her again and turned his eyes from her.
“Susan, what are you doing? Put your dress back on. I don’t want to see you like that. Please!” he told her insistently.
She frowned and rushed to him, wrapping her arms around him again. “Jonathon! You can’t keep pushing me away like this! We’re going to be married, you and me, and I want you to love me like you used to!” she pleaded as she looked up at him and tried to get him to look at her.
He carefully raised his hands to her shoulders, not wanting to inadvertently touch her bare breasts, and he pushed her away from him again. “Susan, it’s not going to happen. Get your clothes back on and let’s go back inside. It’s ridiculous for you to try to seduce me like this. I have told you over and over that it isn’t going to happen between us. I never did love you, I never said that I loved you, and you and I haven’t dated since college, now get it through your head; please! We are not ever going to be together, and we are certainly never going to be married!” he insisted.
She stepped back and shook her head as her green eyes filled with tears and she reached for the straps of her dress and pulled them back up over her pale shoulders. “Jonathon,” she spoke his name like a prayer, “we are going to be married. It’s what I want more than anything, and it’s what our fathers want. It’s expected of us. It’s been expected of us since we were children! You know that. It’s going to happen. You don’t have to love me like I love you; you don’t have to love me right away. It will happen over time, it will grow. I have enough love for the
both of us.” She promised him earnestly.
He shook his head and finally turned it to look at her. “It’s not going to happen. Let it go and find someone else who wants you back. I am not that man. Be honest with yourself and face that reality.”
Seeing the pain in her eyes touched his heart for a moment and he looked at her with sympathy. “Listen, Susan, I’m really sorry, but this just isn’t going to work out the way you want it to. You deserve more. I’m not ever going to give you the love you want or need, and you shouldn’t wait around expecting it to ever happen, because it won’t. Just let it go and move on to someone else. That’s really the best thing that you can do. Honestly. I want that for you, because we are friends. I hope you do find a great love and some happiness, with someone else.” He pressed his lips together as tears rolled down her cheeks and she sniffled her pointed nose.
He sighed and turned away from her, heading back into the house. He went to his own room for a while, not wanting to see Susan or Vincent again that night, and when he saw their car pull away down the long drive, he went down to the study to speak with his father.
Phillip was sitting in a leather bound armchair, the stump of a cigar in the ashtray beside him, and the remnants of his glass of brandy in his hand. The older man raised his eyes to meet his son’s, when Jonathon walked in and closed the door.
“How did it go with Susan tonight?” he asked pointedly.
Jonathon sighed. “It was the same that it always is with her. She wants more from me than I am willing to give her.”
Phillip narrowed his eyes. “You should be willing to give her anything she wants. You’re going to marry her, so you may as well start making her happy now.” He said resolutely.
Jonathon clenched his square jaw and pressed his lips together a moment, keeping the argumentative thoughts in his mind from finding a voice. Instead he drew in a slow deep breath and released it just as slowly as he had drawn it in, before answering his father. “I am not going to be with her. I am not marrying her, and I am not dating her. I don’t want her.”
Phillip stood up and tipped his fat brandy glass back, swallowing the last of the amber booze, and then he set the glass down carefully on the desk and walked silently to the door, reaching for the handle and opening it. He turned and looked over his shoulder at his son, giving him a serious gaze.
“You will marry her.” he said definitively.
Then he walked out and closed the door behind him, leaving his son to stare after him and shake his head.
Chapter8
Jonathon was much more careful with Naomi in the few days following the evening that the Grayson’s came to Cross Mansion for dinner. He continued to make love with her in stolen moments, and their passion grew stronger with every connection they made, but he was much more discreet about it.
She was working up the courage to tell him how she felt about him, and she had almost gotten it worked out, when Andrea showed up unexpectedly at her door Sunday morning following the Grayson dinner at Cross Mansion. Naomi opened the door with a wide smile, which faltered when she saw the expression on Andrea’s face. She invited her best friend into her home and walked into the living room with her to sit down.
“I already know what you are going to say and why you have that look on your face.” Naomi gave a resigned sigh. Her smile was still showing at the corners of her mouth. She pulled a sofa cushion over to her waist and hugged it to her lightly.
Andrea looked at her in surprise. “You do?”
Naomi nodded. “I do. I know that look. You are waiting for me to get things taken care of with Jonathon, just like you told me to. I will. In fact, you’ll be so proud of me! I have been trying to think of how and when I could tell him that I am in love with him, and I’ve figured it out.” She looked at her friend happily as Andrea frowned.
“I’m planning a weekend getaway for us out of town. I found this really great little bed and breakfast, and from what I saw of it online, it looks so romantic! We will be able to spend the whole weekend together with no one to interfere; there’s a hot tub in the room and a little kitchen area if we want to do our own cooking, but there’s a big fancy dining room too, where meals are served. There’s a horse property down the road so if we want to go horseback riding we can… it’ll be perfect. I was thinking I would wait until we were settled in and he didn’t have his mind on work, and then I would take his hands in mine and tell him that I am in love with him.”
Andrea shook her head. “You think I’m here because I am going to get on your case for not telling him that you’re in love with him already?”
Naomi blinked out of her reverie and looked over at Andrea. “Yes, of course.” She answered as if it couldn’t be any other reason.
Andrea sighed and sadness filled her eyes. “No, honey. That’s not why I’m here.”
“Well, why are you here then? I mean, I’m glad to see you, but obviously you came here to talk with me. What’s up?” she asked hesitantly. The look on Andrea’s face was one that made Naomi’s stomach clench in unease.
Leaning over, Andrea reached her hand into the massive shoulder bag she carried in with her and she fished out a folded newspaper. Holding it in her hand a moment as she raised her eyes to Naomi’s, she sighed and handed the paper over.
“Read the Society page,” she said softly.
Naomi’s brow knitted in confusion. “The Society page? Why would I want to read that?” she asked, taking the newspaper and opening it up.
“Because your lover is a billionaire.” Andrea answered her softly. “I wish you didn’t have to know this, but I’m glad that I’m the one who is telling you, and I’m so glad that you are finding out here in the comfort of your own home.”
Naomi’s eyes widened as she looked down at the Society page. There on the top left corner was a large photograph of Jonathon and Susan Grayson, and Naomi could see that it was an old photograph; they both looked much younger in it. The headline beside the photograph read, ‘The King Finds His Queen.'
The article that followed under the suggestive headline detailed how Jonathon Cross and Susan Grayson had become engaged over the the last week, and how their families would be united; two business magnates combining beds, homes, and eventually, businesses. The speculation on just the business aspect of such a merger was unprecedented.
Andrea watched her with wary eyes, and reached for a box of tissue, holding it at the ready.
Naomi shook her head as her heart almost stopped beating in her chest and her eyes flooded and blurred her vision. She couldn’t make it all the way through the article. “That can’t be….” She trailed off quietly and Andrea yanked a tissue out of the box and held it out for Naomi. “There’s just no way. He can’t stand her. There’s no way he would marry her.”
“Are you sure about that? Is that just what he told you so he could get into your pants or do you actually know that?” Andrea pulled two more tissues from the box and handed them to Naomi, as Naomi wiped at her face with the first tissue.
“I’m pretty sure!” Naomi said, choking on her own words. “I mean, I don’t think he was lying to me.”
“When have you seen them together?” Andrea asked, eyeing her carefully.
Naomi held the tissue to her eyes as her throat burned and her chest tightened. She sniffed and coughed and took a deep breath. “I saw them at the function at his home. She came up to us and practically dragged him away from me. They went to talk to their fathers.” She answered.
Andrea nodded. “Yeah, so she dragged him away. Then did he ever go back to you at the party after she did that?”
Naomi shook her head. “No. He didn’t. He stayed with her and then I left. I wasn’t there much longer after she took him off like she did.”
Andrea nodded again. “Then wasn’t there the time at the office?” she pressed.
“Yeah, there was the day she came to the office and went right in like she owned the place. I caught her in his arms, and she was trying to kiss him
. At least, that’s what he said; that she was trying to kiss him.” She said it quietly, her mind going back over the horrible moment that day when she saw them together. “I saw him push her away when he saw me come in.”
Andrea leaned forward and put her elbows on her knees. “You believe him?” she asked pointedly.
Naomi nodded. “I did… I guess… I guess that I do. He’s not a liar, Andrea. He told me he can’t stand her and he doesn’t want to be with her. He told me that she keeps pushing him to be with her.”
She stared at the newspaper in her hand and the lengthy article about the two of them being engaged. She shook her head. “It can’t be true. I have to talk with him about this. I have to find out what’s going on.” She said as pain twisted her heart. “What if it’s not true?” she asked, finally looking up at Andrea.
“What if it is true?” Andrea asked her in return.
Everything in Naomi came to a sudden halt. What if it was true, she wondered. What if Jonathon really was engaged to Susan Grayson? What would happen to her and Jonathon? They couldn’t very well keep up their affair. She had known that it would come to an end, but she had no idea it would come so fast. She thought that she might have more time to be with him, to continue their affair, and to love the man with her body that she loved with her heart.
Looking back down at the newspaper and the image of a younger couple, she had to guess that it must be true, but something about it just seemed off. Why wouldn’t the image of them be newer? Why would he tell Naomi that he had no interest in Susan and then get engaged to her?
She looked up at Andrea and lifted her chin bravely. “Thank you so much for bringing this to me. You were right about it being easier to see here at my home, rather than finding out about it somewhere else, some other way. I’m going to talk with him about it tomorrow when I get to work and see what he says.” She was sure that there had to be some kind of answer somewhere; something that made some sort of sense.
