Chapter 23 Helena
I loved Jessiah’s restaurant from the very first moment I walked in.
Its cozy atmosphere was the opposite of modern, but it was incredibly snug, and I felt at home right away.
That was also partly due to the older couple running the place; they treated me like a regular, and Jessiah like a son.
I thanked them several times for the clothes and the pizza, which looked so good my stomach gave a hearty rumble when I saw it.
But the old man simply waved away my thanks, and he and his wife left us to our table, tucked away in a side nook and shielded from view by anyone on the street.
“Do you want salami and jalapeno, or mushroom and pepper?” inquired Jessiah as he returned from the bar and put a Coke down in front of me.
“They both sound good.” And smelled amazing.
“Well, in that case…” He stood up again, got two extra plates, then pushed both pizzas into the middle between us. “Help yourself.”
I didn’t need to be told twice. I reached for a slice, ignoring the cutlery, and took a bite. The flavors of thin, doughy crust, mozzarella, perfect tomato sauce, and spicy salami unfolded in my mouth, and I couldn’t help giving a sigh of satisfaction.
“This is heaven on earth,” I reported.
“Better than my pasta?” Jessiah joked, running a hand through his blond hair. It had gotten even curlier in the rain, and I liked it more than I cared to admit.
“Of course. I mean, it’s pizza. You know the saying, ‘You can’t make everyone happy; you’re not pizza’? Well, it’s true. Especially when the pizza is as amazing as this.”
“Yeah, Leonora’s the best.”
“For sure.”
I was still shaken to the core, but with every minute I sat there, the shock subsided.
I felt safe around Jessiah, and not just because he’d come to my rescue with Pratt.
He had a way about him that made me feel secure, and yet I saw the opposite in his eyes—rebelliousness, and a desire for freedom.
I wanted to get to the bottom of that contradiction and learn more about Jessiah Coldwell—who he was, what was going through his mind, what he was feeling.
Even if wanting all that was not a good idea.
So, in between bites, I asked: “Why are you doing this?”
“Why am I doing what?”
“Bringing me here, giving me pizza, lending me spare uniforms… why? I haven’t exactly given you any reason to be nice to me.”
Jessiah shrugged. “That has nothing to do with it. You needed help; I was there. End of story.”
“So you’re still mad at me?” I didn’t get the impression he was just then, but I remembered all too well how we’d left things after our last meeting. His snarled It was in no way a pleasure had seared itself into my brain.
He gave an amused snort. “Sounds like it would be a relief to you if I were.”
I shook my head. “No, it wouldn’t. But it would be fair, I think.”
“I promise to be mad at you again as soon as you’ve recovered, if that’s what you really want,” he suggested. “At the moment, I’m finding it a little hard.”
His words made me smile. “What if I told you I’m feeling much better already?”
“I’m afraid you don’t get to make that call.” His green eyes sparkled in a way that made my heart beat a little faster. I quickly reached for another slice of pizza, and we ate in silence until I spoke again.
“I’m sorry… about what I did. I should have just asked you if I could have Valerie’s hoodie.
It didn’t really occur to me.” It was important to me to explain that.
Because it was important to me that he didn’t get the wrong impression of me.
Oh, so you weren’t there to steal Adam’s notebook, then?
I ignored the voice in my head. “Maybe I’ve been living for too long in a world where everyone’s trying to save face, so they find ways to get what they want on the sly. ”
He nodded slowly. “I know what you mean.”
“Really? Seems like you do a pretty good job of avoiding all that, from what I’ve heard.”
“Maybe,” he said with a shrug. It didn’t seem to surprise him that I knew about his past misdemeanors. “But if you’re looking for tips on how to rebel against your parents… I can’t really recommend my methods.”
“I don’t want to rebel against them,” I corrected him. “That wouldn’t feel right to me. I have so much privilege because of them—we have money, and influence, I can go to any college I want, travel anywhere I want. Complaining about being part of my family would feel wrong. Like I was ungrateful.”
Jessiah wrinkled his brow. “You can appreciate your privilege and still disagree with some things your parents do,” he said. “Don’t tell me there’s nothing that pisses you off.”
His directness loosened my tongue faster than my brain could stop it. He might have been a Coldwell, but I was at the end of my tether. And I needed someone to talk to who would understand.
“It’s like I’m just doing PR for them,” I blurted out.
“Since I came home, they have nothing better to do than dress me up in pretty clothes and parade me around society like the perfect daughter. And in the last two weeks, they’ve given me phone numbers for three different guys—sons of their business partners—in the hopes that I’ll date one of them.
There’s a soft launch next weekend at the newly opened Mirage Hotel, and under no circumstances am I to show up there without a date.
Like it’s the nineteenth century and I have to find a suitable husband so my inheritance doesn’t go to some distant cousin.
” I stopped for breath. I’d said it all very fast. But it had done me good.
Jessiah gave me a scrutinizing look. “And are you going to go with one of the guys?”
“Of course not,” I scoffed. You think I want to talk about trust funds, cars, and wild parties in Cabo all night?”
“I don’t know, do you?” he teased, but he seemed happy with my answer. I looked at him.
“Does your mother do that too? Try to palm random girls off on you?” I wiped my fingers on a napkin.
“God, no.” Jessiah laughed out loud. “Trish is well aware there would be no point even trying.”
“Trish?” So he called his mother by her first name. “You don’t call her ‘Mom’?”
Jessiah shook his head. “No, I never have. When I was younger, she was working all the time, and after the divorce, I moved in with my dad. I was a teenager when I went to live with her again, but we didn’t get along at all.
Calling her Trish was part of my rebellion against her, and at some point it stuck.
It would feel weird to call her ‘Mom,’ even more so now. We’re not very close.”
I frowned. “So how come you still go to all those events with her?”
“Well, it’s not to do her a favor, that’s for sure.” He sounded so bleak that I didn’t press any further.
“Well… society certainly seems delighted with you anyway,” I quipped, to lighten the mood. “Considering what went down between you and all those high-class princesses back in the old days, I’m surprised they let you back in.”
He grinned. “Yeah, I wonder about that myself sometimes.”
He looked so pleased with himself somehow that I had to laugh. “Is it true you crashed the chairman’s speech at a charity event for the restoration of some historical ferryboat by having sex with his daughter backstage?”
He was still grinning. “Might be. But I don’t do that sort of thing anymore.”
“What, sex?” I was being deliberately obtuse.
“Sex backstage when people are giving speeches,” he clarified nonchalantly. “I tend to go for other locations these days. More private ones.”
I let out a sigh. “So you got boring.”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “Oh, if only you knew,” he retorted.
He sounded amused, but something else as well; there was an edge to his voice that made me feel a little too hot all of a sudden.
“Sure, sex in public can make things interesting. But let’s be honest, it only gets really good when you can be uninterrupted. ”
As he said it, I couldn’t help but imagine what it would be like to kiss him.
Touch him. To spend the night with him, get lost in him.
My hostility toward Jessiah had vanished, replaced by this insistent hunger.
My throat bobbed and I looked away, afraid he would be able to tell exactly what I was thinking.
It was Jessiah who spoke first. “I’ve never done it in a dark alley, at any rate. You’ve got one on me there.” He was looking at me intently, and the flame inside me fizzled out as my thoughts turned to Pratt again.
“That’s not what we were doing,” I protested. I felt the need to tell him that; I didn’t want him to think I was stupid enough to get involved with a dealer for no reason.
He looked skeptical. “Oh, so you weren’t flirting with him all night, and you didn’t disappear with him at the end of it?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Call me vanilla, but ‘with a knife to my throat’ is not exactly my favorite position.”
“So what was that all about, then, with him?”
“I…” I paused. Should I tell Jessiah about my plan?
My first impulse was a resounding no. I couldn’t let anyone find out about my mission, certainly not anyone with the name Coldwell.
And yet—I didn’t want to lie to him. Not after everything that had happened today.
In the end I said vaguely, “I was trying to get some information out of him.”
“What kind of information?” he fired back.
I thought for a moment, then decided to bend the truth a little. “I heard a rumor that Pratt had been there in the suite with the others, before Valerie and Adam died. I saw him at the Glowfly, and I thought he might tell me something about it.”
Jessiah gasped. “Are you insane? Two people lost their lives and you just… brought that up to him? Guys like Pratt are dangerous, unpredictable—he could have seriously hurt you. Or worse.”