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  CRAVING HER LOVE

  First edition. July 30, 2020.

  Copyright © 2020 Hope Paris.

  Written by Hope Paris.

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  Copyright Page

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  Jason

  Melanie

  Melanie

  Jason

  Melanie

  Jason

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  Jason

  I don’t know what to expect as I pull up to the bar. I’m confused. It’s late for a meeting. I’m willing to be accommodating, especially with so much at stake, but this meeting is out of the ordinary, even for me. What can Miguel Salazar want that can’t wait until morning?

  The bar is across the street from my office. I park outside and go in, spotting him immediately by the window. It’s near closing time, so not many people are in the place. And Miguel is the only one wearing a shirt and tie. He is the most overdressed person in the room.

  I head over and slide into the seat across from him.

  “Miguel.”

  I reach across the table for a handshake.

  “Jason.”

  Miguel gives me a slight nod, not offering me his hand. I’m on alert. Miguel is known for his manners, and he shows respect for everyone. Every time we’ve met before, he’s always shaken my hand. Not this time. If anything, he seems to be shying away from it. I lower my hand. Something’s going on, and it has Miguel nervous.

  A waitress comes over and gives me a bright smile. Even with the dark circles under her eyes, her smile is beaming.

  “Can I get you anything, sir?”

  “No, thanks. I’m okay.”

  “Not a problem.” She gives me a nod. “I’ll be behind the counter. Give me a shout if you want anything.”

  “Will do.”

  The young woman walks away. Miguel waits until she is out of earshot before speaking again.

  “Thank you for seeing me at this unsociable hour.”

  “It’s fine.” I shift in my chair and try to get comfortable. I manage a smile. “I’m always willing to accommodate you. You know that.”

  “That’s good.” Miguel pauses. “Your HR manager said you were at the hospital this afternoon. Is everything okay?”

  I debate what to tell him. It’s Melanie’s business and I’m sure she doesn’t want people to know that she has a wayward sister who’s capable of hurting someone badly enough to warrant hospital admission. Miguel doesn’t need to know that, so I choose to keep it brief.

  “My PA got hurt earlier today, and I wanted to get her checked out. She’s fine, just a little sore.” I bite back the wince as I lie. “An attempted mugging.”

  Miguel blinks. Something flashes behind his eyes. Does he disbelieve my explanation?

  “Is your PA the pretty little lady I saw at our meeting the other night?”

  “She wasn’t my PA then, but yes.”

  “I see.” Miguel arches an eyebrow. “I can see why you’d drop everything for her. She’s certainly one you keep on looking at after the first glance.”

  “Are you implying something, Miguel?”

  “No, of course not. I know how professional you are.”

  Was that a sneer in his voice? I sit up. Something is very wrong.

  “I think I’d do the same if it was someone I cared about.”

  I don’t respond. I’m still trying to admit my feelings for Melanie to myself, never mind a potential investor. And as far as I’m aware, Miguel Salazar is going to be the investor. It’s all but signed on the dotted line, but I’m not about to spill secrets I’m not even willing to admit to myself. I fix him with a firm stare.

  “Melanie is very important to me. That’s all I have to say on the matter.”

  Miguel stares at me. Then he sits back.

  “Listen, I didn’t ask you to meet me to discuss a pretty woman. I’ve been thinking about what you’ve offered on the table. And I . . . Well, this is awkward . . .”

  He hesitates. I can read between the lines, though, and what I see makes my heart sink. Oh, no, not this.

  “You’re pulling out?” Miguel’s silence tells me everything. I stare at him. “But you said this was something you approved of. You had a lot of praise for it.”

  “I know I did. But I’m beginning to wonder if I was a little hasty in agreeing to any of this.” Miguel holds up a hand as I start to protest. “It’s not completely called off, Jason, just put on hold while I sort things out.”

  “Sort things out?” I scoff. “What could possibly be wrong? You had no problems when we last discussed it. What’s changed?”

  For a moment, I think that Miguel is about to get up and leave. He looks like he wants to go. As if he’s afraid of me. That has me confused. Why would Miguel be afraid of me? I’m not going to hurt anyone. I’ve never laid my hands on anyone in anger in my life. Surely, Miguel knows that.

  “I’ve heard . . . things about you.” Miguel grimaces. “They’re not complimentary things, either. Quite unsavory, I must say. I want to make sure they’re checked out first before I go any further.”

  “What?” I’m bewildered. “What sort of things? And who’s been saying this? Where are you getting this?”

  “From a source. And they’re very reliable.”

  I bark out a laugh, which makes Miguel look as bewildered as I had a moment ago.

  “From a reliable source, really? Are you kidding me? I’ve never committed a crime in my life, I’ve never been violent even at times when I would’ve been justified, and I’m always upfront about what I’m doing. Yet you believe lies?”

  “I don’t know if they’re lies,” Miguel says evenly. “I have to be sure. I hope you understand that I can’t simply hand over money when I don’t truly know the person.”

  I can’t believe this. I was so close to finding a breakthrough to a cure, a cure that I promised my mother—on her deathbed—I would find, and Miguel Salazar is key in helping me. He knows how important this is for me and what is driving all of this. I even confessed what had happened to my mother and how I didn’t want that to happen again to anyone else. He had been all for it when I put out everything. And now he’s easing back because someone told some lies about me?

  It’s not the first time I’ve been caught in the middle of something, but those times people were trying to drag me through the mud, and it didn’t work. It wouldn’t work this time, either. Now I’m scared that Miguel could disappear and I won’t be able to find anyone like him. He is perfect for this project, which is why I chose him.

  He couldn’t back out on me now. He couldn’t.

  I don�
�t have time for this. I could lose my temper and argue this point, but I’m sure that it will make this situation a lot worse. From the look of it, Miguel seems to have made up his mind. I don’t like that.

  “Okay, fine. Do it.” I tap the table with my finger. “But I want to know where you’re getting your information.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Can’t or won’t?” I snap. “If someone is telling lies about me, I want to know. That’s defamation of character and I want to know the proper person to go after when this is proven to be wrong.”

  “And I promised not to say a word,” Miguel says evenly. “I’m sure you’d do the same if the roles were reversed.”

  “I wouldn’t take off-the-cuff statements seriously.”

  “But there’s a lot on the line here, isn’t there? So we need to be cautious.” Miguel stands up, brushing down his suit pants. “That’s all I wanted to say. I’ll get back to you with my decision on moving forward once I’ve checked this out.”

  I watch him leave, striding out of the coffee house. And I’m left stunned. What the hell had just happened? He really thinks I’m a bad guy? His company would have done a background check on me, plus my media presence clearly shows me to be someone who’s incredibly boring to follow. I haven’t had a scandal in my life—at least not in my adult life—so there isn’t anything juicy on me. What could Miguel have been told to make me look like I was dangerous? Because from the way Miguel was looking at me, someone has said that I’m a dangerous man.

  I’m not dangerous. I know that much. But whoever’s spreading these lies might not agree once I get ahold of them.

  Melanie

  I was planning on going home, but something tells me to stay in Jason’s home. My gut says that Jason will need me when he gets back. My knowledge of business transactions is not as good as Jason’s, but even I know that if an investor wants to speak with you face-to-face at an unsociable hour, something is wrong. Jason is going to come back in a bad mood, and I don’t want him to be alone.

  Face it, girl. You’ve become addicted to him far too quickly. Why don’t you give each other some space.

  I can’t. I just can’t.

  I find the remote control and turn on the TV, flicking through the controls before I settle on a baseball game. Curling up on the couch, I alternate watching the game and checking my phone. Leah texts me and says that Claire is out past her curfew and she can’t get hold of her, and Mom also texts in a panic. I assure Mom to listen to Leah and Claire will come back when she’s ready. Nothing from Claire, but I don’t expect anything. She’s certainly not going to be messaging me, not after the posts she’d put up earlier.

  There are also a lot of messages from friends, some of whom I haven’t spoken to in a long time. They have seen the social media posts and they want to know what’s going on. A few of them comment that they’d known it all along and call me a few choice names. I simply block them and message back the ones who are a little nicer and simply asking questions. I don’t have to answer to any of them, but I want to defend myself and set the record straight.

  Hopefully, Jason’s computer specialist or whoever they were will be able to get rid of these posts. You can’t delete anything completely off the internet, but I will feel better once the posts are gone. At least then I won’t have to respond to comments that I really am a whore and inquiries as to how much I charge.

  I should have cut out a lot of my “friends” some time ago. Friends don’t make comments like that.

  I’m almost falling asleep when I hear the door slam. I jerk myself fully awake and sit up. Jason is in the hallway, running his hands over his face and looking like he’s about to break down—whether into tears or into a rage, I’m not sure, but he doesn’t look happy.

  Putting aside the cushion I was cuddling, I slip off the couch and pad over to him.

  “Jason?”

  Jason looks around, staring in surprise when he sees me.

  “Mel. I thought you’d gone home.”

  “I decided to stay.”

  Jason groans and looks away.

  “I said you were to head home. There’s no need for you to be here.”

  He’s pushing me away now? I’m not one to back down. I square my shoulders and fold my arms.

  “You might think you don’t need me, but from the way you look right now, you clearly need someone with you. I was worried about how you ran out of here, so I thought it would be best that I stayed. If you don’t like it, tough.”

  Jason blinks. Now he’s looking at me like he’s never seen me before. Then his shoulders slump and he looks at the floor. He looks ashamed.

  “I’m sorry, Mel. I didn’t mean to be so harsh. I just . . .”

  “You’re not used to having someone hang around waiting for you?”

  Jason doesn’t respond, but I can tell from the way his cheeks darken that I’ve guessed correctly. I soften. Jason is so used to doing things on his own that he doesn’t know how to rely on someone else to help him out. I put a hand on his arm, feeling the muscles flex under my fingers.

  “What happened? What did Mr. Salazar want at this time of night?”

  “He...” Jason lifts his head and scowls. “He said he’s putting the project on hold. That things have surfaced about me. Bad things.”

  “What?”

  “Yep. That was my reaction. Said it was from a reliable source.” Jason shakes his head. “I know I’m not perfect, but I’ve never done anything that would make anyone concerned about my motivations.”

  “Nobody’s perfect, and I’m sure if you had done something bad, it would have gotten out long before this.” I squeeze his arm. “I’m sure it’s just smoke and they’re making sure that it’s not going to go up in flames.”

  Jason’s mouth twitches.

  “You have such a way with words. And I hope that’s the case. But the way Miguel looked at me . . .” Jason swallows. “I think he believes whatever it is he heard.”

  That doesn’t make sense to me either. From the one interaction I had with Mr. Salazar, he seemed to be a well-rounded, logical person. Now it sounds like he is turning into a completely different person. Whoever had got to him knew just how to pull his strings, make him into a puppet.

  I push the thought away—I refuse to think badly until we know for sure someone’s pulling those strings.

  “I’m sure he didn’t. He’s just being overly cautious.” I press my hand to Jason’s chest. “It’ll pass.”

  Jason grunts. “You’ve got more faith than I have right now.”

  Then his arms go around me and he pulls me against him. I go willingly and he holds me, one hand cradling my head against his chest as he rests his chin on my head. I wrap my arms around his waist and hold him in silence, feeling his heartbeat against my chest. There’s not much else I can say, but I’m not about to pull away from this. It feels good to be held by him. Good to be wanted by this man. And from the way he holds me, I can tell that he needs this more than I do.

  “I’m glad you decided to stay, Mel.” Jason kisses my head and his arms tighten around me. “I did need this.”

  “I thought you would.” I look up at him. “I didn’t want to intrude, but there are times when you need someone to be there for you. I wanted that to be me.”

  Jason’s eyes drift over my face. He looks worn out, almost defeated. He sighs and kisses my forehead.

  “I feel like this is over already. Does that sound awful?”

  “No, it doesn’t, it’s perfectly normal.” I squeeze him around the waist. “You’ll get there. You always do.”

  “You barely know me and you think I’ve got this?”

  I smile.

  “With the money you’ve got, of course. You got to where you are by being focused and determined. You know what you want and you always go out and get it. I know this is under control, even if it feels like you’re flailing around right now.”

  Jason is staring at me. He reaches up and strokes my c
heek.

  “I think I need you around more often. You’re good for my ego.”

  “You don’t need a personal cheerleader.”

  “Maybe I do.” Jason’s eyes are glinting. “I’m sure you’d look good in a cheerleader’s uniform.”

  “Yuck.” I stick my tongue out at him. “I hate cheerleading.”

  “Even the uniforms?” He traces a finger over my jaw and brushes it across my lips. “Because I’d like to see you in that.”

  “Not a chance.”

  “No?” Jason bends his head. “Never say never, Mel.”

  “You’re not going to get me to change my mind, Jason.”

  “Am I not?”

  His face is so close that his mouth is inches from mine. I can feel his breath tickling my skin. I lick my lips.

  “No.”

  “I think I will. Like you said—” He brushes his lips over mine “I know what I want and I go and get it. And you know what I want right now?”

  “What?”

  I don’t know how I’m able to speak when he’s holding me like this, making my heart race and my clit throb. I’m sure he can feel my nipples pressing against his chest.

  “I want you.” Jason sighs and rests his forehead against mine. “I need you, Mel.”

  “You’ve got me.” I cup his face in my hands. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Good.”

  Jason’s kiss is not like before. He’s gentle, practically caressing my mouth with his as he cradles me against his body. I find myself shivering in his arms. With our other kisses, Jason is always taking charge. He doesn’t take prisoners. This time, it’s different. Something’s changed. It’s like he’s seeking permission to kiss me and take what he wants.

  This sweet kiss is as much of a turn-on as the others. I find myself clutching onto Jason, wanting more. I need this as much as he does.

  Jason breaks the kiss, very slowly. Then he steps back and takes my hand.

  “Come with me.”