A frown creased her brow. She moaned and turned on her side away from him, drawing her legs up to scrunch herself into a protective ball. She hadn't opened her eyes, wasn't aware of his presence, and Collins suddenly felt like a voyeur to deeply private grief. Yet it might also be physical pain. 'Jasmine' he called urgently. 'Should I get a nurse or doctor?' Her head whipped around on the pillow. Startled eyes. Puzzlement. 'You're still here?' she asked, surprised. 'Are you okay?' he replied instead. She sighed and carefully shifted her body to face him. 'I'll cope with it. Collins, You don't have to stay and nursemaid me.' 'I brought you to L.A., Jasmine.' 'I made the choice. I don't hold you or blame you for anything. And you've been more than generous, fixing all this for me. I'm sorry...' 'Don't apologise. I'm the one who should be apologising.' She looked bewildered. 'What for?' 'Because I...' He gestured an appeal for some stay of judgment as he struggled for wor
She took a deep breath and released it in a shuddering sigh. 'You know what I mean. You can have my things sent here from the hotel. I'll get to the airport by myself. There's no need.,.' 'You want me to say goodbye now?' he asked. Her gaze wavered from his. 'You probably should be meeting with other people...' 'Don't make my decisions for me, Jasmine. I know what I want to do, and I understand if you want to get rid of me now. I don't blame you if that's what you want. If you'd prefer not to see me anymore, say so. Otherwise I'll be back to visit you tonight. And tomorrow. If you must go home, I intend to make sure you're fit enough to fly out before you do and I'll accompany you to the airport and see you into the care of the flight attendants.' She stared at him, not understanding his motivation. Which was fair enough, because he didn't understand it himself. All he knew—and knew with absolute certainly—was he needed time to sort this inner turmoil through before any final l
'Jasmine, we can have other children,' he pressed, as though that was the ultimate persuasion. She instantly recoiled from it—mentally, emotionally and physically— her stomach cramping over the empty space that had been left by the miscarriage. This wasn't right. His mind was somehow stuck on their lost child. This proposal could be nothing more than an aberrational moment that would be regretted within hours or days. 'No...' She had to choke the word out. Her throat had tightened up. Her chest, too. She shook her head vehemently to get the message across. 'You wanted a baby,' he argued. 'You wanted me to be the father. So let's do it properly. Get married. Set up a home...' 'Stop! Please... stop!' she said. Her mind was spinning. He was offering the biggest temptation of all. Her heart was thumping a wild yes to it, not caring why it was being offered, responding instinctively to the things she'd yearned to hear—married to Collins Templeton , having a family... He frowned at her
She didn't care that he could well afford to look after his wife and family. Not all the money in the world could buy her into that situation. So she told herself in a rage of pain and pride as she made herself march towards the designated departure gate. Yet every step of the way, her body was begging for Collins to follow her, stop her, convince her she was wrong, heal the hurts and make everything better so she could believe a marriage between them could and would work. But he didn't come after her. Didn't stop her. She joined the line of passengers boarding the aeroplane. She was so tense and tremulous she dropped her ticket when it was her turn to put it through the processing machine. Every second was an agony of waiting for a shout or a hand to clamp on her shoulder. But nothing stopped her from entering the boarding tunnel. No call came for her to disembark before the flight took off. Once the big jet started rolling down the tarmac. Jasmine sagged into a huge black h
So he was deeply affected by the loss of their child. It didn't mean he loved her. The empty seat was just an empty seat. It couldn't be concluded that he couldn’t bear to be with anyone else. There was no point in tormenting herself with such thoughts. If he'd loved her, everything would have been different. Jasmine kept telling herself this, day after day, week after week. She worked hard at her job, avoided meeting Favour in person, held endless one-sided conversations with her goldfish who listened sympathetically to her emotional outpourings and her best attempts at logical reasoning. In this regard, Rhett and Scarlet were her perfect companions. She told herself she was managing okay...until the parcel came. It was a box—a box sent from London—and the sender's name was Collins Templeton. -------- Collins felt uncharacteristically tense as he belted himself into his seat for take off on the long flight from London to Sydney. He'd failed with Jasmine last time—had deserved to
All he could do at this point was to pray that she would give him a chance. By 2pm. He knew something was up and he had to call her. He called twice before she finally picked up and he swallowed hard at the sound of her voice. 'Hello' she said. Her voice was soft and low, and Collins felt his heart tighten. Was she alright? 'Yeah, hello' he said, 'Jasmine... It's me. Collins' 'I know that' came her reply. 'I have your number' He almost smiled at her reply. For some reason, he thought she didn't have it anymore. And with the way he had behaved, she had every reason to want to cut him off. 'Did you get my message, Jasmine' he asked, forcing out the question. There was a pause. 'Hello' he said. 'Can you hear me, Jasmine?' 'Yes I can hear you... And I did get your message' Jasmine replied. There was another pause before she added. 'But I won't be coming' Collins shut his eyes and held his phone tighter, as if the gesture would somehow make her understand just how much
THREE WEEKS LATER Jasmine stared at her phone which was ringing for the fourth time that evening and sighed. It was Favour, and she knew that her sister wasn't going to stop calling her until she picked the call. Heaven knew that she loved her sister and was willing to do anything for her, but sometimes Favour was just too much to handle, and this period, all she wanted was some time to herself, but Favour just wasn't going to allow that to happen. Her sister always thought that all of her problems existed because she was lonely and needed a man, but that wasn't true. Okay... Maybe it was a little bit true, but honestly sometimes it was just about work and right now, she really didn't want any man. Not that she was even attracted to anyone, because she wasn't. Not since Collins. Who had tried many times to reach her since that day she'd turned down his offer to meet him at the garden. He hadn't reached out for a week now, and Jasmine didn't know if she should be happy or sad about i
It was a twenty minutes drive to Favour and Leonard's house, and Jasmine realized that she was actually looking forward to seeing her sister. All things aside, she had actually missed Favour. She had missed their talks and laughter and she honestly wished Favour had known about her the pregnancy and miscarriage. Maybe if she hadn't been so secretive about it in the first place, she wouldn't have had to go through all of that pain on her own. Tonight was not about that, she reminded herself, and pushed the bad thoughts away. Tonight she would forget about everything else and just be happy with her sister. Jasmine parked her car in the drive way, grabbed the bottle of wine she'd bought and got out of the car. The wine was just gonna be for her and Leonard since Favour couldn't drink. She had also bought these cute overalls for the baby that she was sure Favour would absolutely love. She hadn't been a good sister lately, and she wanted to make it up to Favour. When she knocked on the
He pressed a finger to her lips. “Shh. I don’t want to hear that word cross your lips. It’s me who is sorry. I was an ass. I said despicable things to you.” Her eyes widened, and she felt the ridiculous urge to cry again, as if she hadn’t done enough of that in the last few days. “First, I want to talk about this,” he said as he drew out the dreaded newspaper clipping from his pocket. She froze, her stomach seizing with dread. “Don’t look like that. I don’t believe a word of it. But it’s obviously an important part of your past. It hurt you and it’s affected a good portion of our relationship. I want you to tell me what really happened.” Her lips trembled and she twisted her hands nervously in her lap. “I got out of college, intending to rule the world. I loved it…I loved my job. I was in a big, busy city, and I was away from home, away from my family. At the time that was important to me. I was stupid.” “I think we all go through the desperate need to get away from our family,”
It was written in the guise of an article announcing the deal brokered between Packard Enterprises and Golden Gates promotions. It detailed her job history, colorful as it was, to the present and hinted broadly about there being a relationship between her and Timothy. Nothing was left to the imagination. Everything she’d worked so hard to overcome had been splashed in excruciating detail. She should be angry. Furious even. But what she felt was…..resignation. She looked up into the worried eyes of Bryce as the realization hit her. It would always be something. Timothy was right to be angry that she’d placed more importance on what others thought of her than she did what he thought of her. As long as the people she loved knew the truth, it shouldn’t matter what some stranger thought. Evan believed in her and her abilities. She had the backing of her agency. She had people who loved her unconditionally. Timothy evidently didn’t care who knew they were involved, so why should she? For
Love was such a messy emotion. It was bound to be inconvenient. You sure couldn’t put it on a schedule and love never played by the rules. He liked rules. And schedules.. Ah, hell, he was absolutely in love with her. It was why he was sitting here in such a terrible mood that his usually easygoing office staff wouldn’t come near him for fear of being decapitated. He looked again at the article, and his chest utterly caved in. Chloe. God, he’d been such an idiot. A complete and utter, madly-in-love moron. He’d reacted just like a petulant child, furious that his favorite toy was being taken away. In this case, Chloe had wanted to put their relationship on hold and all he could see was that she was pushing him away, and sacred that she'd leave him again, he had panicked. He’d been a total ass. She needed him. Needed his support. And he’d told her to take a hike. Worse, he’d arrogantly told her not to bother changing her mind and come crawling back. He winced. Holy hell in a bucket
She sighed. “I’m in love with him. And now he hates me.” All four men’s mouths rounded into Os. There was marked silence, and she regretted having blurted out that fact. Love was girly stuff, and none of the men looked like they had a clue what to say or do next. “Look, I appreciate you guys. I love you all to pieces. I don’t know what I would do without you. I don’t expect you to fix this for me. I’m not a little girl anymore. I’ll figure out something. I just needed a place to lick my wounds and regroup.” Peter frowned. “Now, you wait just one damn minute. You’re family, Chloe. I don’t care how old or how big you are.” Even Darell scowled and nodded his agreement. Bryce merely squeezed her hand and told her bluntly to shut up. “You can always come to us when you need us and we'll be here for you,” Darell said in his soft, gravelly voice. “That doesn't and will never change. We love you and we’ll always be here for you to come running to. You got that?” “Yeah, I do.” “Now com
"Maybe you did… or maybe not," Chloe replied. "I think I did the same with Timothy, and I understand how you feel. But you and Tina are soul mates. You have been married for years. You have been been through so much together, and I believe that if any couple can pull through this, then the both of you can… just like you did before" "How is that supposed to happen when she won't even let me see her or speak to her? She fucking hates me" "I don't think she does. As a woman, I understand her perfectly. You screwed up, don't pressure her into forgiving you. That will only make her resent you even more. Give her some space. The truth is that you can't make her forgive you, so what you have to do now is stay away… even if it's for a while and let her decide if she wants you back" "And if she doesn't?" Evan asked, dreading the reply. "Then you have to live with it. It's hard, but it's the consequences of your actions. That's life…" Evan felt dejected and stared at the closed door for
There was a wary look in his eye that warned her this wouldn’t be easy. But then he didn’t give a damn about what people thought. He wasn’t ruled by the opinions of others. As she had so many times before, she wished she could be like him. Instead of answering him, she rummaged in her bag for the stupid gossip rag and then she thrust it at him as if it was self-explanatory. And it was in a way. He glanced over the paper and then looked back up at her. “So? What’s the problem?” he asked. She knew he’d react that way. Positively knew it, and it drove her crazy. She wanted to scream and rail at him, but she’d come across as some hysterical banshee, and then he’d never take her concerns seriously. “That’s not all,” she said stiffly. “It’s all over the Internet. An advertising community site has it on their blog along with some snotty little line about how I got the account after the announcement of you signing with golden gates.” He looked blankly at her. “I fail to see what the big
With a sigh, she explained the whole sorry tale about her her history with Timothy, their reunion and their trip to the beach house. She left out the mushy details she’d shared with Ann. Evan was, after all, A. her boss and B. a man. He didn’t need to know that she’d stupidly fallen in love with a man she’d be working with for a long time to come. It made things entirely too messy. What if they broke up? Would Evan feel weird about continuing the relationship with Packard enterprises or would he take his business elsewhere? There were a million reasons why she should have never ever gotten involved with Timothy , and yet, she hadn’t heeded any of the warning signs. “I overheard what Ann said about how it shouldn’t matter to me how you got the account. I won’t lie. It doesn’t. Furthermore, it’s none of my business unless you broke the law or did something to damage the reputation of Golden Gates. I don’t think this qualifies. My concern is for you. I know how devastated you were by w
Chloe and Timothy returned from their trip as a couple, but he had to go back to his home and so did she. After a Sunday of fielding curious questions from Bryce and his brothers about where she had been the past week, Chloe was relieved to go into work on Monday. She wasn’t ready to admit to them that she and Timothy were anything more than business associates. She loved them for their undying loyalty and their absolute faith in her. But for some reason she was reluctant to confess to a relationship with Timothy. She was late, thanks to a traffic snarl that lasted an entire hour and an already late start from her apartment. By the time she made it off the elevator, it was closing in on noon, and her mood was in the toilet. When she saw Caroline, she knew something was wrong. The usually cheerful receptionist eyed Chloe with something that looked suspiciously like pity, and she refused to hold her gaze for long. Not even wanting to know what that was all about, Chloe bypassed her us
Evan Reese opened the front door of his house and headed straight to the kitchen. His wife, Christina stood at a table, frosting a cake. She looked up in surprise to see her husband and dropped the piping bag. "You are back, " she said. "Is something wrong? Did you forget something?" Evan shook his head. "No… I mean… yes." He scratched his head and then buried his face in his hands and sighed deeply, which made Christina even more concerned. She immediately washed her hands in the sink and came towards him, but when she reached out to touch him, he pulled away. "Please don't. Not right now please." said Evan. He was afraid that if he let her touch him, he would change his mind about doing the right thing. He wanted to keep his marriage, but he knew that secrets like this were of no use. They usually ended up coming to light, and he feared that the damage it might cause would be even worse. It was best to rip out the bad aid and face the consequences of his actions. "Tina, there'