“He makes me feel special.”
“You are special, Mila.” Lauren picks up one of the dresses off the rack. “This one will fit you like a glove. We might have to wiggle you into it, but you’re going to look gorgeous.” Her eyes flick to me and then back to the dress she’s holding up. Something must occur to her because I can tell she’s having a light bulb moment. Maybe she’s recalling a good place to take a picture with me in that dress.
“What?” I finally ask when she doesn’t speak for a long moment.
“He’s not using protection, is he? I joked about it that first night, but you never really responded.” I swallow hard, knowing there is no way I can lie to her. I have the absolute worst poker face, and she’ll see right through me. How the heck did we get from talking about the dress to this? My face must answer her question. “He’s trying to trap you.”
“Trap me? I thought he was kidnapping me.” She’s got theories coming from every direction.
“He wants to knock you up so you’ll be stuck with him forever.” I scrunch my nose, not sure I’m buying her line of thinking. But he hasn’t used a condom once. There hasn’t even been a mention of one, and he knows I’m not on anything. I’ve been so wrapped up in everything happening in the whirlwind, I haven’t thought that deeply about it. “Every time someone tries to serve you liquor, he pushes it away quickly.”
“Well, I’m clumsy enough without drinking.”
“You can’t help yourself. You have an excuse for everything when it comes to him.” Her eyes soften. “You don’t really like this man; you're in love with him, aren’t you?”
“I can’t be. It’s too soon.” I want to say I think I am but that sounds crazy, but all of this is crazy really.
“Then you better start making him wrap it up.” She gives me a pointed look. I don’t love the idea of something between Jay and me when we’re together. Sounds wrong. “Not to mention that there are other things he could give you besides a baby.”
That not only had my mouth dropping open but my stomach turning as well. “He said he’s never seen out with women. That I’m different.”
“Oh, Mila, that might be true. He might not be seen out with them, but that doesn’t mean he’s not seeing them in other places. Private places he can clearly get on a whim.” She motions around us. “He has the means to make sure his personal affairs remain private.”
Out of everything and all the reasoning Lauren has tried to make me see, that's the only thing that sways me. Jealousy lights up inside me in a way I’ve never felt before. Now I’m starting to see why people call it the green-eyed monster. Because it’s rearing its ugly head at the moment, and I have no control over it.
“I’ll be right back.” I turn, stomping from the room. I fling the door open to go find Jay. It seems there is more to talk about. I don’t make it a step out of Lauren’s room and I’m tripping over my own feet because I was in such a hurry. I brace myself to hit the ground, but it never comes. Two strong arms wrap around me, and the next thing I know I’m cradled in Jay’s arms.
“Got you.” He smirks. I glare back at him.
“Just the man I was looking for.”
“Get ‘em, girl,” Lauren shouts. I guess he never really left. He only stationed himself outside the room.
“I better be the only man you’re looking for.” There is a warning to his words.
“We need to talk,” I say firmly. I even lift my chin in defiance, which is kind of hard to pull off when you’re cradled in someone’s arms.
Something flashes in Jay’s eyes. At least I think it did. It’s gone as quickly as it was there. Fear? Is he afraid of me? Lauren says Jay is the one that has kidnapped me, but maybe it’s me that’s kidnapped him—only in a different kind of way.
eighteen
JAY
Never before have four words struck such terror in me. The tone, the confrontational glint in her eye, the words are all packaged together in such a way that I want to bind her to my bed, naked and isolated. She will know only my touch, my voice, my hand. My embrace of her tightens.
“Let’s talk then but in our room.”
“We have a room?” Her eyebrows go up.
“It’s the main suite here, and you’re the main woman and I’m the main man, so yes.” I walk down the long corridor toward the wing of the house opposite of Lauren’s suite.
“You look mad.”
“I’m not.” I’m plotting. I wonder if I’ll need to dispose of Lauren. She’s a bad influence on Mila, like a snake in my garden. I took care of the external threat by erasing the problem in a way that everyone in the network would know not to mess with mine, but I had ignored the more dangerous problem in my own home.