CHAPTER TWELVE: in which he nearly fails- JAMESON part 1

Present day

JAMESON

The Baker’s party was in full swing. As Shelia made a show of air kissing a group of men by the entrance, I slipped away on the pretense of getting her a drink. I doubted she would notice I had left. Shelia liked to be the center of attention wherever she went, and those men would fill that need. If they didn’t, she would find some group or someone who would. When she got bored (or ran out of victims) she’d come and find me. That was how it usually worked.

Never one to worry about entertaining myself, I easily found friends who I liked to hang out with. And after leaving Shelia, I went on the hunt for them, starting outside. The day was perfect for a garden party. The sun was bright, and at four in the afternoon, the September had turned pleasantly cool. I waved to a few people I knew and chitchatted with a couple more. Tate Harvey, one of members I sat with on the board of directors for a tech company, crossed the lawn and called out my name. “Thijssen, you are just the man I was hoping to see.”

We shook hands warmly. “Mr. Thijssen, I’d like you to meet my son, Trevor.” He pushed a nondescript boy with pale skin and black hair forward. The father a rotund man had hair redder than a firetruck and a florid complexion and I vaguely wondered if he had adopted the boy.

Trevor held out a limp hand. “Hello...” he mumbled something, probably a mispronunciation of my last name. I was used to it and let it slide.

“Pleased to meet you, Trevor.” I let go of his slightly clammy hand, smiling inwardly.

I had been the same way at his age, which I guessed to be about thirteen. A shy introvert, I still found it hard to fit in during social gatherings.

“Trevor will go off to college soon, right after he graduates on his eighteenth birthday, a full five months early in December.”

Damn, was I wrong about his age.

“Uh, that is an impressive achievement, Trevor.”

Trevor hung his head and shuffled his feet on the grass.

“Trevor,” his father boomed, “Mr. Thijssen is a solid engineering man. You could learn a lot from him.”

Trevor peeked up at me through his stubby lashes and resumed a slouchy stance.

“Trevor is going to study engineering down in Texas. He got a full-ride scholarship to A&M.”

“That is a wonderful school. I’m sure you will do well.”

Trevor mumbled something which his father understood, but I didn’t. “That’s right, Trevor. This is the man that is on three boards of directors and has won the Draper Award twice in a row. No one is as admirable as he in your field.”

And that was the crux. Neither Trevor nor Mr. Harvey would look at me the same way again if my secret were to come out. The one Shelia was only too happy to spill if I crossed her.

And I would do that... when Vegas came back into my life. She was worth my ruined reputation.

That and a lot more.

____

Eventually, the Harvey’s, and I parted ways. Soon after, I found Axel in the solarium, just off the garden. We shot the breeze for just a second before the venom in my best friend’s voice had me spinning around to see who he was angry with.

“I hate that fat bitch.”

A beautiful, curvy woman at the end of the hallway turned her head this way and that, looking for someone. Her skin was a shade darker than Vegas’s and she wore her long hair straight. The dark strands framed her oval face and the curls at the end clutched her ample breasts like a lover’s hands. The woman Axel shot daggers at wore a dark pink dress, which hugged every curve. She was big. She was beautiful. And she was hot.

If I weren’t so into Vegas ...

“Are you talking about her?” I tipped my head in the woman’s direction.

“Yeah. That’s the bitch.” Axel’s lip curled as if he smelled something rotten. “I can’t stand her fat-ass.”

His words flabbergasted me. Who could hate such a lovely creature?

“Why?” I asked, perplexed.

“You remember the contract I had so much trouble with last year?”

Axel was one of the top contract lawyers in the country. Blessed with riches and good looks, he hadn’t experienced trouble in his career except for once. Around Christmas last year, Axel had to iron out a contract between a defunct testing lab and a cosmetic company. Axel represented the lab pro bono as a favor to a senior partner.

The negotiations should have only taken a couple of weeks, but the owner of the cosmetic company, “Ms. Fat-ass Bitch” as Axel had called her, kept changing the terms.

My partner in crime had to cancel his Christmas trip to Antigua with a swimwear model to iron out the details. The model was so mad; she took off with an Indie 500 driver to a chateau in the French Alps. Axel had bitched and moaned like a lost ghost for months afterward.

“Don’t tell me she’s the cosmetic company owner?” I asked, watching as the woman’s slim fingered hand plucked an appetizer from the tray of a passing server.

Axel’s ice-blue eyes narrowed in disgust and his long arms flexed under his jacket.

“Yep. That bitch forced me to cancel my vacation to Tahiti with ah ...” Axel scratched the blond stubble on his angular jaw, his eyes still hard, “you know ...” he clicked his fingers and tilted his head. “Ah ... what was her name?”

I smothered a snicker. Axel never remembered the details, and it never occurred to me to question why. Once I saw who he was up against, I understood.

She is gorgeous.

“The trip was to Antigua, not Tahiti, and her name was Jasmine,” I said, muffling another laugh behind my teeth.

Axel crossed his arms over his broad chest, his lips curled up in a sneer. “Who gives a fuck?” he growled. “I was going to bang Jasmine six ways to Saturday. That week in Antigua was going to be a stay-in-bed-fest with a gorgeous swimwear model who promised to do many things to my buffed body.” He turned from the woman’s direction, dropped his arms, and raked an angry hand through his unruly blond hair. “But what did I have to do? I had to spend Christmas in cold-ass Chicago with Ms. Fat-ass Bitch who couldn’t decide what she wanted.”

“Stop calling her that, Axel.” Whatever she did, she didn’t deserve that name.

I glanced over at the woman in question. She was bearing down on us and closing fast. “And keep your voice down, she’s headed our way.”

Axel’s face tightened in anger, and his eyes had turned into shards of ice. “I don’t give a fu—”