The Contract: Sunshine

by McCarver, Shiree

  Leslie ignored his request and looked up at the sky. “Who are you speaking to?” Her pale face flushed with anger. “Have you gone completely insane? I have been waiting in there almost twenty minutes for you to return. They will be closing soon.”

  “Please, go back inside.” He shoved his hands in his trouser pockets to keep hidden the “tell sign” of cracking his thumb knuckles against his forefingers.

  Yoon saw Sunshine’s eyes gaze from one bulging pocket to the other. Her eyebrows lifting in awareness and he figured she guessed his secret. No matter how many times he tried to prevent expressing agitation, his was a reflex action that haunted him since his boyhood.

  Where is she, Young Yoon? It’s a lie, isn’t it? Are you ready to tell me the truth? You fabricated this fiancée didn’t you?” Leslie continued in a loud shrilled voice. “I’m calling your mother right now and confirming one of the wedding dates she gave me.” She stuck her hand in her walnut Coach Ashley Leather satchel handbag rustling around for her cell phone. “Damn,” she cursed softly. “I must have left it on the table in the restaurant.”

  “Enough already!” Yoon’s face was one of open disbelief as he stared at Leslie. “How many times do I have to tell you I’m marrying someone else? If you call my mother now, you will make a fool out of yourself when I deny it later!”

  “Do you work here?” Leslie turned and looked at Sunshine, acknowledging her presence for the first time. “Go and get my phone from the fourth booth down on the right as you walk through the main entrance.” She offered up ten dollar bill. “Make it quick, please.”

  Shit. Yoon cursed under his breath.

  “And leave you here alone with my fiancé to discuss wedding plans? I...don’t...think...so.” Sunshine stepped closer to Yoon and slid her arm through the loop of his.

  POP! Went his knuckle.

  Sunshine tugged on his arm until it lifted out of his pocket and as if she had done it a hundred times before, her hand slid along the bottom of his jacket sleeve until he felt her dry cool palm pressed into the sweaty heat of his own palm.

  Easily her soft long fingers with small oval shaped tipped fingernails painted black with exceptions of artfully applied white tips linked between the spaces of his fingers as if they were shaped to just accommodate the shape of her fingers grasped his hand. It felt oddly surreal. Yoon wouldn’t dare try to question it or explain it.

  The corners of his lips tugged up into a grateful smile as he looked down into her brown eyes.

  Leslie’s body stiffened in shock. “You are his fiancée?”

  “Honey, this is Leslie Lee,” Yoon interrupted with an introduction. “Her father and my father were close childhood friends.”

  Leslie tilted her head studying Sunshine as if she were something alien. “You cannot possibly be thinking of marrying this woman, Young Yoon,” Leslie finally said after a moment of complete silence.

  “Mmm, I have a feeling we aren’t going to be friends, Miss Lee,” Sunshine shook her head. “Her round tipped short nose was so high in the air with such marked snobbery he was almost starting to believe her story about being an heiress—almost but not quite.

  “Actually I imagine us as...friends, Miss Dupree,” Leslie smiled, her tone softened.

  He saw Sunshine’s nose drop a notch. She was as stunned by this sudden about face as he was.

  “You do?” Sunshine asked.

  “Of course,” Leslie’s grin grew wider.

  “Um,” Sunshine licked her lips. She glanced up briefly at Yoon as if she was hoping to draw some idea of how to respond.

  With his face remaining passive, he felt her nails bite into the back of his hand. He chomped down on his back teeth to ward off the stinging sensation crawling up his arm.

  “That...that would be nice,” Sunshine was saying and returned her smile. “I guess.” Her nails eased from his hand.

  “We can be friends as long as you give your word that you will stay away from Yoon.” Leslie crossed her arms over her chest, bracing most her weight on one hip.

  “Leslie,” Yoon scowled. “You have no right to tell Sunshine or any other woman to stay away from me,” he spoke briskly.

  “I do have a right,” Leslie countered. “You are already promised to me and you have been for as long as I can remember.”

  He felt Sunshine’s nails again threatening to bite into his flesh.

  “If you will excuse us Leslie, Sunshine and I must be going. As I explained earlier, I have a meeting this evening. A driver has been called to take you home.” He released Sunshine’s hand to place his palm on the small of her back with his fingers wiggling as the half-moon impressions she’d left on the back of his hand continued to burn. With applied pressure, he urged her to move towards the entrance to Piccolo Bellissima.

  Leslie stepped in front of them bringing their quick escape to an abrupt halt.

  “Enough for tonight Leslie,” Yoon scowled. “Don’t shame your family’s good name and embarrass yourself any further.”

  “You are the one shaming your family’s good name by being seen publicly with her.” Leslie gave a bemused chuckle. “I’m just warning you that if you must have a distraction, you do so discreetly. What if someone associated with your father at the embassy was to drive by and see you two together?”

  Yoon studied the tense lines of Sunshine’s back as she stepped a breath away from Leslie’s face and her hands balled into fists by her side. Her tone was coolly disapproving, yet a bit sad as she spoke.

  “You don’t take rejection well Miss Lee and I’m sorry I have to be here to witness your downfall.” Sunshine shook her head adding with a tsking of her tongue, “Manqué de savoir-vivre fait de vous un alésage.”

  Yoon smiled as Sunshine spoke flawlessly in French. Of course hearing her say, “Lack of good breeding makes you a bore,” to Leslie sounded more omnipotent when spoken in French.

  He started to pat her on the top of her head like the “good little girl” she was turning out to be. But there was nothing fatherly or brotherly about what he was feeling for her at that moment. He was actually aroused at her show of possessiveness over him even if it was all a lie. Yoon was wishing that the one night she had asked for earlier had been a sincere request.

  “You think you’ve won him?” Leslie sneered. “You will end up like me. Waiting. I thought finally after years of wondering when he was going to give our parents an official date, that is what this evening was about or I would not have come here just to be humiliated by the both of you.”

  “I won’t be accountable for an arrangement I never agreed to, Leslie. I’ve told you this several times before,” Yoon spoke up. His tone softened now that he didn’t feel so cornered anymore. “I’ve apologized several times for my parents leading you and your family to believe otherwise. But you know I have done this before even if you haven’t and frankly I refuse to be forced into another unhappy arranged marriage,” Yoon reasoned once more.

  Leslie turned her glare on Yoon. He noticed the skepticism that lingered there. “I fear you are the one in denial,” she continued her argument. “Your first wife didn’t have romantic feelings towards you, but I do. Tell me; when for obvious reasons your family is dead set against you and this woman, what will you do?” She turned her black stare on Sunshine. “No personal offense to you, Miss Dupree.”

  “Yet, somehow I keep feeling offended,” Sunshine muttered.

  Yoon felt a pang of regret and murmured, “I apologize for bringing you into this mess, Sunshine. If I knew Leslie was going to continue to make this more difficult than it has to be, I would have not bothered you.”

  Sunshine offered a wry smile. “Now that I have met her for myself, I understand better why you were desperate for my help.”

  Leslie sniffed indignantly. “Mat-jjahng tteo? You want to fight? Huh? Young Yoon Mei! You truly want to fight my family on this matter? You know what could happen.”

  “Pogihae. Give it up already,” Yoon sighed, tiredness creeping int
o his voice. “Go and get your mobile phone. The driver is waiting for you.”

  “Okay, for now,” Leslie agreed with a nod. “I’m sorry to meet you under these circumstances Miss Dupree.” She smoothed her chin length hair behind one ear. “Yoon is too much of a gentleman to tell you in the end he will do what is expected of him. He will not disappoint his father, Ambassador Young, anymore than he already has.”

  “The only reason I am here tonight, Leslie, is because I was appeasing my mother. If it is true that you are the one that I was meant to marry...why has my mother arranged for me to dine with several other potential marriageable Korean women?”

  “That has to be a lie,” Leslie cried out. Tears pooled in her dark eyes. “Admittedly, I was just a child and you were a man of twenty when we first met but I fell in love with you from the beginning and my father assured me that one day if I was patient you would be mine.”

  “Your father never should have given you hope where there was no basis for it, Leslie,” Yoon’s voice grew soft with empathy.

  “When you married a few years later I thought...I thought I would die,” Leslie cried. “Years later when she divorced you, I thought finally it’s our time and I would make you so happy. Then you relocated to America.” All pride aside, she pleaded, “Please, Young Yoon, don’t do this to me. I promise I will be a good wife. You will see.”

  “I don’t want to marry you, Leslie.” His palms spread wide beseeching some form of understanding from the weeping woman. Yoon wasn’t a complete cad. He understood her tears, but it was better to be hurt now than years from now once she realized she’d made a mistake.

  “Stop saying that,” Leslie sniffled.

  “Don’t you see how unfair you’re being to yourself?” Yoon continued to reason. “Don’t you want more from your marriage? I have had the type of marriage that you’re asking of me and believe me, if both parties aren’t agreeable, you’ll just make each other miserable.”

  Getting nowhere with Yoon, Leslie turned her attention to Sunshine once again. “Miss Dupree, if you don’t wish to end up disappointed...walk away from Yoon right now. I’m sorry it isn’t my intent to hurt you, but Yoon isn’t being completely honest with you. He has to know about the agreement between our parents. How could he not have known I’ve waited for him all this time? How much time have you invested in this relationship?”

  “Leslie...” Sunshine’s face softened. “I—” she began. Then she looked over at Yoon frowning. He could see she was torn between the lie and the truth. “The truth is...” She stalled. “Actually—” she started again.

  Then she broke off again.

  “What is it?” Leslie asked. Her red-rimmed eyes looked at Sunshine’s face.

  Yoon released an inward groan. Leslie’s tears had gotten to Sunshine. She was going to spill the truth. Who would have thought someone capable of running out on their restaurant bill would have an attack of conscious?

  Yoon had had enough. One second more and he would be back to square one with Leslie and looking like a complete heel for asking a woman he didn’t know to lie to a woman he’s known most of her life. There would never be anything romantic between them; she was more like a younger sister and the thought of being intimate with her only sickened him.

  Maneuvering a startled Sunshine in his arms, Yoon cupped her chin with his free hand and tilted her heart shaped face up to meet his before pressing his lips to the fullness of hers in a kiss. He stared at her intently willing her not to pull away from him and to go along with the farce.

  To his surprise, her sleepy deep-set eyes fluttered before drooping closed and he felt her mouth soften beneath his. A kiss that started out as Yoon’s desperate attempt to keep Sunshine quiet turned into something unexpectedly stimulating.

  After Yoon’s realization he was definitely being kissed back, he was no longer concerned over who was watching; why he was kissing this complete stranger; or where they were kissing. Nor could he remember in the thirty something years of his life ever experiencing public displays of affection.

  The feel of her mouth as it moved under his sent an unexpected stirring of heat through his body.

  Sunshine’s mouth felt as luscious as it looked. Her lips were thick and soft. Her taste was peppermint, chocolate and sweet. Most likely the lingering effects of the foil wrapped Andes chocolate candy mints that were supplied in crystal candy dishes of the restaurant’s bathrooms.

  “Yah!” He vaguely heard Leslie shriek and sob. “Yoon!”

  He didn’t know how long the kiss lasted, but as far as he was concerned, it was over too soon. There had to be a crevice of sweet chocolate mint he hadn’t found yet. Yes indeed. He needed more search and discovery time with the “Pretend Heiress.”

  Reluctantly he moved his hands to Sunshine’s shoulders and set her back from him. She swooned against him and he smiled smugly with the satisfaction that he hadn’t been the only one surprised by the chemistry of that kiss. He wrapped one arm about her shoulders and tucked her securely into his side.

  “Leslie, I thought you were leaving.”

  “Wait a minute,” Sunshine surprised him by saying.

  “Err...Sunshine...don’t--”

  Sunshine moved to stand in front of him again and his arm dropped away from her shoulder. Her face was turned up to his and she was looking him in the eyes. A puckered frown had settled over the bridge of her nose and her stare seemed a bit feverish under her currently flushed brown skin.

  “Kiss me again,” she demanded.

  “No!” Leslie yelled, taking a step forward and stopping abruptly when Yoon pulled the waiting Sunshine flush against his body once again and lowered his dark head to do her bidding.

  She was even more generous and accepting of him the second time around.

  Somewhere in the muddled access of his mind he heard Leslie in a full outcry before her klickety clack heels hit against stone as she ran away from the kissing couple.

  A door slammed and a motor roared. He was the first to break the kiss with Sunshine and all he could think to say while he reasoned himself back to reality is, “I think she forgot to get her phone off the table,” he murmured softly down into the woman’s face.

  “Huh?” Sunshine blinked once. Twice. Then a shutter of blinks and then he could see her reality setting back in.

  The glazed adoring look was gone and a look of contempt took its place. He didn’t know if she was angry at him for initiating the kiss or herself for wanting to do it again. Either way he felt lighter knowing he had gotten his point across to Leslie.

  “Thank you for helping me,” Yoon murmured. Clearing his throat, he abruptly released her this time and put a respectable distance between them.

  “Yeah...uh...well...that woman definitely was a tough nut to crack,” Sunshine commented. Her eyes were cast downward as she unnecessarily fussed to straighten out the jacket of the suit she wore. Nervously, her thin fingers picked particles of unseen lint balls from the pleated pants.

  Yoon surmised. “I see I need to pay my mother a visit and get to the bottom of this misunderstanding between Leslie and me.”

  “This is so unreal.” He heard the woman standing beside him mutter in disbelief.

  “Yeah, that kiss was...”

  “Not the kiss.” She scowled up at him. “I’m talking about the fact that our mothers are trying to arrange marriages for us! This is America, damn it! How archaic is it for marriage arrangements to still exist in twenty-eleven?”

  “I wouldn’t expect you to understand,” Yoon said a bit more abrasively than he intended. But this was a debate he has had numerous times before since relocating to the States. “You aren’t Korean.” He found himself saying as if that explained it all. “This is something that not only occurs but for the foremost we are duty bound to accept.”

  “No, I’m not Korean and I not presuming I understand the reasons for what your mother has done to you by setting up this dinner with Leslie. However, I am very clear on my mother’s moti
ves.” Sunshine’s tone became bitter as she confessed. “My mother is greedy. More than fearing growing old alone she fears growing old alone and poor.”

  “My mother’s biggest fear is I have been so influenced by living here in America that if I choose to marry again, the woman will not be Korean born,” Yoon commiserated. “As far as she’s concerned, if her daughter-in-law is foreign, she is completely unfitting for someone with our family’s status.”

  Having Leslie point out the obvious to him had only infuriated him to something rash and out of character as to open up his personal business to complete strangers.

  Agitated all over again, Yoon pondered how his parents completely ignored his wishes and set up another marriage match without his knowledge.

  True he had disappointed his father in his youth when he refused to follow in his political footsteps and focused on business instead. He had been the obedient son when he wedded the first time and look how that turned out.

  If Yoon hadn’t been so immersed in his own thoughts he would have noticed the woman he was kissing heatedly mere moments ago wasn’t feeling as amicable as she was when he held her in his arms.

  “Unfitting?” He heard Sunshine say and turned his head to look over at her standing by his side.

  She’s not looking happy for a woman that just earned a free meal, a thousand dollars and that one night stand if she seriously wanted it. That kiss was one for the records. But he was no idiot. He simply said, “Eh?”

  “I thought I had a mom with issues, but yours definitely got some serious snobbery issues,” she elaborated.

  “Now wait a minute!” Yoon felt rightfully offended.

  “You tell your mother Yoon Young that believe it or not, as perfect as she may think you are...you can’t kiss worth a damn.” She huffed. “Un-fitting, if you’re not a Korean woman? What kind of nonsense is that! I can’t believe you would repeat such a thing and in such colorful company.” She turned on her heels and started walking away from him”