Burn for You
“I’ll give you a million dollars.”
He obviously thought that was a good direction to take this conversation, but I felt like he’d just punched me right in the gut.
It was painfully obvious now that he wasn’t joking. He was serious as a heart attack. He’d walked into my restaurant and announced we were getting married—not asked, announced—and then told me how much he was paying me to do it.
The man thought he could buy me. He thought I was for sale.
He thought I was a whore.
Heat flooded my face. In a raw, shaking voice, I said, “How dare you.”
“I know you need the money—”
That’s all he got out because I stepped up and slapped him across the face.
The crack of my open palm hitting his cheek seemed unnaturally loud. But maybe face slaps were always that loud. I had no idea, because I’d never done it before.
His head snapped around. He lifted a hand to his cheek and stared at me with his lips slightly parted, his eyes dazed. Bewildered, he asked, “What the hell did you do that for?”
What an idiot.
I hissed, “I’m not a whore, Jackson Boudreaux. Whatever your opinion is of me, I’m setting you straight right here and now. You can’t buy me.”
“I don’t think you’re a whore! Jesus Christ, hold on a minute—”
“No, you hold on, you rich, dumb, arrogant ass! I took the catering job because I needed the money, yes, but not for myself, and not so I could get sold into prostitution later on!”
“What the fucking hell—”
“You should be ashamed of yourself! What would your mother say if she could see you right now, offering money to a girl to sleep with you?”
“Holy fuck, Bianca!”
“Stop cursing at me!”
He took two steps toward me and shouted right back, “I never said anything about sleeping with me! I’m talking about marriage!”
We stood nose to nose, glaring murder at each other, breathing hard, our hands clenched to fists.
“Oh, I see,” I said through gritted teeth. “You’re gay. You need a beard.”
Jackson closed his eyes and muttered an oath under his breath. “No. I am not gay.” He opened his eyes. “And you know it, because that kiss we had was hotter than the sidewalk in July.”
We continued to glare at each other. I said, “Your metaphors need work.”
“Excuse me. Hotter than a billy goat with a blowtorch.”
“That doesn’t even make sense. And comparing a lady’s kiss to anything to do with a goat is just bad manners.”
His eyes glimmered with laughter, but his face stayed straight. “You’re right. I’ll try it again. That kiss was hotter than a housewife reading Fifty Shades of Grey at the Magic Mike premiere.”
My lips twitched. “Better,” I said, and turned my back on him, folded my arms over my chest, and blew out a hard, frustrated breath.
He let me settle for a minute, then walked slowly around and stood in front of me. “Obviously I came at this in the wrong way—”
“You think?”
He sighed. “Can I just get a word in edgewise, please? Let me say my piece, and then you can send me on my way. Deal?”
He was standing in the exact right position for me to give him a good, swift kick in the balls, but now my curiosity was getting the better of me, so I gave him a surly look and a shrug.
“Thank you,” he said. “Okay. A little backstory. I have a trust. It’s . . . big.”
I rolled my eyes.
Jackson sighed again. “As I was saying, I have a big trust. And no, that’s not a metaphor. I found out today that to keep my trust and inherit my fortune once my father dies, I need to either work for the family company or get married. By my thirty-fifth birthday.” His look turned sheepish. “Which is next month.”
I made a face. “So go work for the company, dummy!”
He didn’t appear to appreciate being called a dummy, but he restrained himself from whatever smart remark he wanted to say and instead said, “I can’t. I’ll never go back to Kentucky. Never.”
“Why not?”
He looked away. That muscle in his jaw started jumping. “There’s nothing for me there but ghosts.”
His voice was tight, his spine was stiff, and he looked miserable at just the mention of Kentucky. I looked down at his wrist, hunting for the semicolon tattoo, and caught a glimpse of it in the shadows.
If he was trying to get me to feel sorry for him . . . it was working a little.
“Uh-huh,” I said. “So marry some debutante and have your two point five perfect babies and live happily ever after with your country club membership and your polo ponies. I’m sorry, but I don’t see the problem here.”
Jackson turned his head and looked at me. The expression in his eyes stole my breath.
He said, “The problem is that you’re the only woman I’ve liked in a long time.”
He let that sink in, then added, “And I don’t want to be poor. I’d be exceedingly bad at it. For one thing, I’m not nice enough.”
“How ridiculous. Not all poor people are nice.”
He frowned. “Really? Every poor person I’ve ever met has been extremely nice to me. Well . . . except you.”
I threw my hands up. “God, you’re hopeless. They’re nice to you because you’re rich! They want your money!”
“Oh.” He looked disappointed. “I thought only rich people were like that.”
I stared at him in amazement. “You’re right. You couldn’t be poor. You have no idea what real life is like.”
“Exactly!” he said. “So you understand my predicament!”
“What I understand is that I have a restaurant full of guests and I’m standing in a dark alley talking to a delusional rich man about his imaginary problems. You need a bride, run an ad in the paper. You’d have five thousand responses the first day.”
“I told you. You’re the only woman I’ve liked in a long time. I don’t like strangers. I don’t trust people. Women in particular.”
Whew, I wasn’t touching that one with a ten-foot pole. “You just told me I wasn’t nice to you. Why would you like me?”
His eyes started to burn. “You’re honest. And real. And you don’t care about my money—”
“Ha! So you offer me a million dollars of it?”
“I wasn’t finished. You don’t care about my money, and you’re kind, and responsible, and you’re not afraid to call me on my shit, and you’re so fucking beautiful it sometimes hurts to look at you, like I’m gazing into the sun and could go blind if I stare too long.”
He stopped talking abruptly, as if he’d shocked himself with what came out of his mouth.
He wasn’t the only one.
Beautiful. He called me beautiful. That right there was worth more than the money he’d offered.
In a spectacular display of intelligence, I said, “Oh.”
He shifted his weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other. He looked at the ground. He squinted up at the stars sparkling in the night sky. Finally when he couldn’t find anywhere else to look, he glanced gingerly sideways at me, like maybe he was expecting another smack across his face.
I closed my eyes and counted to ten. Then I said, “Let me get this straight. You want me to marry you.”