Wife for Hire

Chapter 19

(Karmen) 

    Jason had invited me to a fancy dinner tonight and to be honest I was a little nervous. We hadn’t really talked much except for small commentary over breakfast and dinner, but other than that it felt like he had been avoiding me like the plague. I was starting to worry that he was going to tell me that he was letting me out of the contract early and while generally anyone would be happy about that kind of thing, I was dreading our time ending. I had talked to Maxine about it and she told me not to stress until I have concrete information, but that was damn near impossible. 
    I walked over to my mirror and looked at my dress again. I had decided on a silk burgundy strapless dress and black heels with my black peacoat to go over it. An uneventful Thanksgiving had passed not too long ago and the weather was finally hitting that winter category. My hair was pushed over to one side and I had my black clutch purse in my hand. I looked myself over in the mirror again and nodded in approval, before heading downstairs. Jason was standing at the bottom of the steps when I walked out and whistled his approval. I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t fight the uneasy feeling in my stomach. 
    “You look wonderful.” He said as he extended his elbow to me. I took it and he led us out to the car. 
    The restaurant wasn’t a long drive, but with the silence that was filling the car, it felt like it took forever. When we finally arrived a valet driver came over and took the key from Jason and we both went inside. Jason stopped and told the hostess what our reservation was and she led us to one of the private rooms in the back. What was with the Aldridge men and restaurants with private rooms? Once inside we sat down and looked over our menus. 
    “Jason, what is with you picking restaurants with private rooms and foreign menus?” He laughed and shook his head. 
    “Usually when my dad and I would go out for dinner, he would choose private rooms instead of sitting with other people. That’s usually where a lot of business meetings happen, so I think it became a habit for the both of us.” I nodded, understanding. It made sense, I just wasn’t used to that kind of thing. 
    “Well, we’re going to have to do the same thing as last time, I can’t read this, so you order me something magical.” He laughed, but nodded. I closed my own menu and tried really hard not to focus on what was possibly going to happen to me tonight. He seemed to have loosened up a bit, since our crying session earlier this week. 
    The waiter came back and took our orders and left just as quickly as he came. I stirred the ice in my water cup trying my best not to fidget or feel too awkward. 
    “Are you nervous?” Jason asked. I shrugged on the outside, but on the inside, I was definitely nervous. What was I supposed to say?  He hadn’t talked to me for half a week and now he was inviting me to fancy dinners? 
    “Well, I’ll cut straight to the point. It’s about our contract.” I sucked in a breath and held it there, waiting for the blow. He was going to ask for a divorce, I just knew it. Before he could further explain the waiter was bringing back our food. I sighed, he couldn't have had better timing. I looked over my plate and smiled, Jason had gotten us the exact same thing, whatever it was. 
    “Karmen I-” I cut him off. I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t bear to hear him tell me he wanted a divorce, so I stuffed my mouth and his mouth with food and that’s basically how the entire night went. Whenever he tried to talk to me about the contract, I would change the subject and whenever I had nothing to talk about I stuffed our mouths. 
    The drive home was a long awkward one thanks to me. I turned the radio up so loud that there couldn’t be any conversation and the plan was when we got home, I would just run upstairs and lock my door.
    Once we made it inside, I started my trek upstairs, but stopped when Jason grabbed my arm and pulled me into the living room and sat me on the couch. I looked between him and the doorway. There was no way I was going to be able to escape now and look sane. 
    “Karmen what’s going on? You’ve been acting weird all night.” I shook my head. Me? Acting weird? No way! 
    “What do you mean Jason? I thought I was being pretty normal.” He raised an eyebrow as if to say, are you kidding me right now? I know I was acting weird and he didn’t understand, but the thing is I know I can easily be replaced, now that his dad has let him off the hook, he doesn’t have to worry about me anymore. 
    “So you don’t think you’ve been acting weird at all tonight?” I shook my head and he sighed. 
    “Then I’ll finish what i’ve been trying to say for the last hour. It’s about our contract, I tweaked it a bit. “ 
    “I don’t want a divorce.” I said at the same time that he had said he tweaked our contract. 
    “What? Why would we get a divorce?” He asked, confused. I looked away from him, unable to meet his eyes. 
    “Well you’ve been avoiding me a lot this week and then you took me out to a fancy dinner when you usually cook and you brought up the contract after not talking about it for a really long time.” I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, but I could feel him looking at me. He started laughing. At first it was just amused laughter and then it turned into belly busting laughter. I looked at him confused. 
    “What? What’s so funny?” He wiped a tear from his eye and took a deep breath trying to calm down. 
    “You’re just so cute Karebear.” I blushed. What was he calling me cute for? I had been acting hella weird all night. 
    “You went through all of that so I wouldn’t tell you I wanted a divorce?” I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, I was so embarrassed. I should have just let him talk and I could have avoided dying from embarrassment. I stood to leave, but he grabbed my arm. 
    “Karmen, please hear me out.” I nodded and sat back down and listened to him as he explained the changes that he made to the contract. He took out the most annoying one of all; the one where I had to do whatever he said and added that on top of my 3 million that I would be provided a house and a new car, he also added that he would take care of my mom’s hospital bills and have her moved to a new, better facility. 
    “That way, both you and your mom can have a nice set up when all of this is over.” I stared at the piece of paper and cried. He went through all of this for me? He didn’t have to do any of this, I was totally fine with the last one. 
    “Karebear, why are you crying?” He asked, pulling me into a hug. I didn’t know how to express how much this meant to me. He included me and my mom in the contract, making sure we were taken care of when all of this was said and done. I just felt so touched. He tilted my chin up so I could look at him. 
    “If you don’t like it I can change it.” He whispered. We were so close that I could feel his breath against my lips. I shook my head. 
    “No, it’s perfect.” I whispered back. He looked at my lips and then at my eyes, as if he was asking a silent question. I blinked once and when I opened my eyes again his lips were on mine. It only lasted a second, by the time I had registered what had happened he was already on the other side of the couch. 
    “Uh sorry, I don’t know why I did that.” He said, not looking at me. I tried to swallow my disappointment. 
    “I-it’s okay. It was probably all of the emotions and me crying. It’s fine we can just forget about it.” I stood to go upstairs to my room, but he grabbed my arm and pulled me to him. We were both standing now and he had this determined look in his eyes. The palm of his hand rested against my cheek as he pulled me closer and then his lips were on mine again, but this time, it wasn’t a quick brush of the lips, it felt like he was devouring me. His hand moved from my face to wrap around my waist pulling me closer. My hand fisted into his shirt as I kissed him back, just as hungry as he was for more. His tongue ran across my bottom lip and I opened to give him access, I moaned into his mouth as our tongues collided. He gently bit my bottom lip as he pulled away from me and finally took a step back. We stood there for a moment, breathless and staring at each other, I bit my lip.  Before I could even ask him what that was or what it meant he smirked. 
    “There. A kiss to forget about.” And with that he went upstairs, leaving me weak kneed and breathless. I collapsed on the couch tracing my lips with my fingers, too bad that kiss won’t  be forgotten. 

(Jason) 

    I laid in bed, my arm covering my eyes, I couldn’t get that kiss out of my mind. The feeling of her body pressed against mine and the way she tasted...I had to stop. I don’t know what had come over me, but when I kissed her the first time, if you could even call that a kiss, I could tell that it hadn’t even registered in her mind yet. Hell, I wasn’t even sure I had done it and then I found myself apologizing for something that couldn’t even be classified as a kiss and when she mentioned forgetting about it... I don’t know what came over me. I just knew that the first kiss wasn’t even worth forgetting. Too bad now, I can’t stop thinking about it. 
    I sat up and groaned. What had I been thinking? For six months I have been good, I hadn’t thought about sex....as much and while I did find Karmen attractive it was easy not to think about her that way because I always thought that she would never be into me that way, but now... now I wasn’t so sure about that. I climbed out of bed and went downstairs to get some water. I turned to go into the kitchen and found Karmen standing there eating ice cream, in her usual shorts and camisole with no bra. If this was an anime, I’d have a nose bleed by now. 
    “I thought you were going to bed?” She asked. She wasn’t eating her usual bowl, she was eating a cone this time and everytime she went to lick some, I just about lost it. 
    “I-I was, I just came for some w-water.” I turned to the sink so she couldn’t see how much I was enjoying seeing her and grabbed a cup. I turned the faucet on and filled my cup before chugging the water. I did this a good three times, before I was calm enough to turn around, which didn’t last long, because ice cream had managed to drip on her chest and she was wiping it off, bringing more attention to her cleavage. I turned back to the sink and drank even more water, before muttering a quick good night and running upstairs to my room. Why in the hell had I kissed her? It was driving me crazy, like yes I enjoyed it, but now it was just plain torture. Who knew if I would ever be able to do it again, she was probably trying to forget about it now, if she hadn’t already. 
    Two hours later and I still couldn’t sleep so I decided to take a cold shower. Once I could finally relax and try to get some sleep, she came knocking on my door. I groaned again. I just couldn’t get any kind of peace. I walked over and she was standing in the doorway, hugging a pillow to her chest. 
    “I had a dream about ‘it’, can I sleep in here?” She said glancing behind her every twenty seconds. I sighed, that damn clown, they just had to make him that scary. I was mentally banging my head against the wall, I couldn’t send her away, especially after seeing how scared she was last time. I moved to the side and she came running inside and jumped in my bed. I closed my door and walked to my side of the bed and grabbed a pillow and one of the blankets before making myself a pallet on the ground. She sat up. 
    “Um, Jason?” I looked over at her. 
    “Yeah?” I said, trying not to be too irritated with myself, she needed me right now and I had to provide. I just wished she hadn’t needed me in this particular way right now. 
    She had asked me to sleep with her, like in the bed with her and for once I had wished the gates of hell would open and swallow me whole. This was my karma. I just had to go and make it worse for myself. There was no amount of pillows in the world that I could put between us that would make me forget she was there. Not to mention how sexy her sleepy voice sounded. I was dying over here. Maybe I could go get more water. I shifted around slowly so that I could climb out of bed, but the moment I moved she sat up. 
    “Where are you going?” She whispered. I jumped after nearly shitting myself and put a hand up to my heart. 
    “Nowhere, I was just gonna get some water. She sat up even further this time and stood. 
    “Okay, I’ll come too.” I shook my head, right she was scared of being alone, of course she would want to come with. I sighed. 
    “It’s fine. I changed my mind, come on and go to sleep.” She nodded and we both got back in the bed. 
    “Jason?” 
    “Yeah?” 
    “Will you hold my hand?” I sighed, defeated. I was just going to have to suffer. 
    “Of course, Karebear.” And I did. 

She completely destroyed the pillow wall that I had managed to build between us and was currently laying on my chest. I was trying my best to not think about what was touching me where, but I couldn’t not think about either. Her leg was draped across mine and she was hugging my arm meaning that my arm was trapped between both of her breasts, not that that’s a bad place to be, I was just trying my best not to think about what I wanted and to think about what she would want. I took deep calming breaths and closed my eyes, I could make it until morning.