Chapter 9
CHAPTER 9
HUDSON
A s Alison drives out of the garage, she leaves me with a warning.
“She’s distracting you,” she says. “This Juliette girl. I see the way you look at her. She’s bold and daring and stands up to you. She’s going to mess with your head, and I don’t want that. I need you totally focused here, Hudson. This is the eve of the time of our lives. Don’t mess it up.”
She has a point. Juliette has definitely found a way to creep under my skin. I didn’t intend for that to happen, but she’s done it so swiftly and so precisely that it terrifies me. Yet, I like it. This is why I must see Jasmine before the party tonight. I walk into the apartment building, into the elevator, and up into the hallway. I stop at the familiar door and knock twice.
When the door opens, Jasmine is dressed in a short blue gown, which bares to me all the glory of her long legs. I can’t get past how exquisite Jasmine always looks.
“I knew I’d see you before the time, you said,” she says and steps aside so I can walk in. I’m welcomed by the sweet smell of her potpourri and potted flowers and the hiss of Slinker, who waltzes over to me, takes a look at me with his tired cat eyes, and then walks over to a corner of the room, returning to eating his toy.
“Looks like he missed me,” I say.
“He doesn’t remember you. He came to check if you have treats.”
“Oh. I guess we have something in common, then. We both want treats.”
Jasmine chuckles as she walks to her kitchen. “Do you want something to drink?” she asks me.
“Yeah. Water.”
She hands me a bottle of water and throws Slinkers a cookie.
“You’re here for the dinner party, right?”
“Yes,” I tell her as I take my seat, and she joins me on the couch. She stretches her long legs over my thighs. “I think I might finally be able to convince Frank to let me go.”
“Frank never lets anything go,” she says with a chuckle. You’re here for the distraction. To put your mind at peace.”
“You know me too well, Jasmine,” I tell her as I pull her closer. I bite down gently on her lips before kissing her.
Jasmine surrenders herself to me. The sweet taste of her lips, the soft flesh, and her tongue set me ablaze. Wanting more, I pull her even closer and get her to sit on my lap, my fingers finding her bare thighs. She pulls her thighs apart to give me access. I reach for her, for her warmth calling to me, but I just can’t bring myself to go on. I stop and look up at her, feeling less than myself. She isn’t the reason I’m in this bind. Only one person can free me of this sexual torment, and she isn’t in this room right now. I don’t know how long I can keep myself from touching Juliette. I lied to her when I said she isn’t my type. The mere sight of her, her smell, sets my skin ablaze. She makes me feel wanton desire unlike any I have ever had before. It was unexplainable.
Jasmine takes the hint and pulls herself away from me. She settles on the chair, smiling.
“This is strange,” Jasmine comments and stands up. She walks to her kitchen and returns with another treat for Slinkers.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I say, feeling pouty. It has never happened to me before. I am so shocked by it I don’t know how to react. No woman has ever had such control over me that I am physically unable to get pleasure from another. My skin burns for her. My need for her is so out of control that all I can think about is ramming my dick into her. Endlessly. Brutally. I want to fuck her so hard she knows I am mad at her for taking this sort of an asinine hold on me.
Fuck!
“That serious huh? So, we won’t talk about her now. Let’s talk about Frank.”
“What about him?” I ask, the mention of the name rousing anger in me.
“What will you do?” she asks me.
“I have a plan,” I tell her.
“What is it?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“You think I’ll tell the enemy?”
“Why do you girls keep insisting he’s the enemy?” I ask. “Even Alison calls him the enemy.”
“He wants to take what you own. He is your enemy, and you’re fighting him with all you’ve got.”
“He doesn’t seem perturbed.”
“Oh, he is,” she tells me, smiling. Then she takes a drink from the bottle.
“He is?” I ask, interested. “Tell me, what does he say?”
“Oh, so you want me to spill secrets, but you won’t tell me anything.”
I shrug.
“How about this?” Jasmine asks. “I’ll tell you what he says if you tell who she is.”
“She? What are you talking about?”
“The woman who has you all wound up?” Jasmine says. “I see it in your eyes. You came here looking for relief because you can’t find it in her. Strange. I have never seen you pine for someone so hard before, not even me.”
“I am not pining for her,” I say rather defensively.
The evidence contrary to that is tucked into my trousers, deep dissatisfaction and a throbbing hard cock.
“Keep telling yourself that, but I know what I see. What’s her name?”
“Juliette,” I confess.
“Grand name. I used to know a Juliette. An old lady who makes music. She’s in New Orleans now, happy as a bird. Will Juliette make you happy, Hudson?”
“Happy?” I ask with a cynical chuckle. “She’s a pain my ass.”
“Maybe she’s a pain because you’re hindering what could really be. She’s supposed to bring you happiness, but I know you, Hudson, you believe and act like you don’t deserve happiness but maybe you do.”
“This isn’t about happiness,” I tell her. “It’s about a girl who I’ll be rid of in seven days, and all things will be back to what they used to be.”
“Maybe that makes you sad. The return to the normalcy when she leaves.”
I scoff. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“It isn’t my embrace you longed for when you came here. It isn’t my touch you hungered for; I know you, Hudson; I’ve been with you enough times to know when you’re distracted.”
“Of course, I’m distracted. Your lover wants to take my company.”
“Not that kind of distraction,” she says. “This kind.” She reaches for my chest, and I pull her closer to kiss her. She pulls herself away. “I let that happen first because I had a yearning for you myself. That yearning isn’t satisfied because someone else has you distracted, and I won’t let myself be the distraction to that distraction.”
“You’re not the distraction,” I lie.
“You say that like you really want to believe it. I don’t know who this Juliette is. I don’t know how you met her and what she’s done to you. But maybe, in all of this storm, what you really deserve is the sense of calm she’ll bring you—the peace, the pleasure, the joy.”
Peace, calm, joy…those aren’t words I’d associate with Juliette. She makes me angry so much, always ready to tackle me, never backing down, always fighting. I don’t need that in my life. She is here because she is a necessity, no more.
“Tell me what Frank says about me.”
Jasmine shrugs.
“He thinks you’re more trouble than he bargained for. Going into this, he was convinced it’d be over quickly, but you’ve held on for longer than he had estimated. So now, he has to devise a new strategy to fight you.”
“What’s the strategy?” I ask.
“If I knew, I wouldn’t tell you. I’d be betraying Frank’s trust.”
“You’re fucking me. You’re betraying his trust already.”
“Frank and I, what we have is simple enough. He wants to own me, and I am not to be owned. He knows that, and being with me means he has accepted that. I made that clear to him.”
“But you won’t tell me what the strategy is?”
“Sincerely, I don’t know it. If I did, though, I wouldn’t tell you. I, however, do not want you to lose your company. I know it’s the one thing you’ve ever truly come to love. If you lose it, you lose yourself. So, I’ll let you in on one little secret. Frank is worried. He has money issues himself. I don’t know the source, but it is significant, and he doesn’t want to play a waiting game with you. He wants it done and done fast. He can’t lose. Because if he does, he loses all the status that comes with being Frank Dubois. Playing a waiting game with you, however, means he’ll win, but it’ll be a victory that comes at a great cost. He’s caught in a bind, Hudson.”
Money problems. A Frank with a money problem isn’t one that I would have ever envisaged. While it is good for me, it still doesn’t make this battle any easier. I can already tell how the dinner party will go. Frank wants me to marry his daughter. That is this new strategy. He met with Rakeem to make him pull whatever support he intended to give me so I would have no choice but to marry his daughter, and with that, he’ll pull a consolidation. If I marry her and break her heart in the future, he’d have solved his money issues, and then he’d be able to fight me till I’m dust.
No matter what, I can’t agree to marry Phillipa, and this ruse between Juliette and me, we need to make it work, make it absolutely believable. This is the only way now.
“Thank you,” I tell Jasmine.
“You men make wars over stupid things,” she says, leaning over to kiss me. I let her kiss me. “You should leave now. Frank is coming here.”
What if I remain here and let him find me. Maybe that will solve all of our problems. We’ll fight it out and be done with it.
“Don’t entertain silly thoughts,” says Jasmine, like she can read my mind. “You can’t be here when he arrives.”
“It’d be nice to actually kick his butt you know.”
“That’ll achieve nothing,” Jasmine points out and I know she’s right. I leave her apartment, still feeling aroused. Once again, as I did yesterday, I’d have to seek relief by my own hand.