Read Online The Billion Dollar Contract: Proposals by Cynthia Dane - Free Book Online

assuredly and clearly did not want Jasmine to challenge him.
    He asked her a few more questions, all of them ranging from her favorite color to one of her fondest memories. The answers she gave were short, sweet, and simple. As these conversations went on, however, she began to shake, and within time her red skirt became bunched up in the sweaty palms of her hands. Every so often Ethan would look at this, and not say anything other than to ask her another question about her and her life.
    Finally, he set aside his empty champagne glass and asked her point blank, “Are you nervous around me, Miss Bliss?”
    Jasmine did not know how to respond. She did not want to lie and say that she wasn’t nervous, but she also did not want to appear weak. So she didn’t say anything at all.
    “I won’t ask why you’re nervous. I won’t pretend I don’t know why. But I want you to know I don’t expect anything out of you that you wouldn’t be willing to give yourself. You’re welcome to leave this place whenever it feels right to you.”
    Jasmine didn’t want to give this man cookies for saying exactly what he should have. I can’t deny that it makes me feel better. Still, it would not sate her nerves. “Thank you.” An odd thing to say, but she wanted him to know that she appreciated him being a decent man in this moment.
    Ethan stood up, shook out his sleeves, and turned in the other direction. “I need to make a quick call. While I’m gone, feel free to do whatever you want. I won’t be offended if you leave.” He pulled out his cell phone and went into another room, quietly closing the door behind him.
    So here Jasmine was, trying to decide what she was going to do in this situation. When she decided to go on this date with Ethan, she had no idea how it was going to turn out. She was ready to walk out whenever she wanted. After all, it didn’t matter how much money he threw at her, if he seemed like a sleazebag she was going to leave. Jasmine had long reconciled that she definitely had a price, but wasn’t going to put up her mental or physical health against that wall.
    Do I want him? Do I like him? Those thoughts swam in her head for the better length of a minute. No matter how many times she played out the situation in her mind, nothing could have prepared her for the actual reality. She was in Ethan Cole’s penthouse, and there was only one real reason he had invited her there.
    Jasmine got off the couch and tried to distract herself with what was on the walls. They were simple scenery paintings, depicting a normal rural and rustic life from an age long gone by. There were also paintings of flowers, and at first Jasmine thought them strange to be hanging in a businessman’s home. Perhaps they were hung up there by his last “girlfriend,” and he never bothered to take them down again. They were colorful, vibrant, and perhaps even radiant when not viewed by a woman who was about to lose her mind.
    Said mind was definitely lost when a pair of arms attempted to wrap around her. Jasmine jumped and squawked in fright, her elbows pushing against the man behind her.
    If Ethan was offended, he did not let it show. Perhaps he knew that this would be the reaction he got. But before Jasmine could accuse him of something nefarious, she saw a string of gold hanging from his right hand. “I’m sorry for startling you.” Ethan held up the gold chain. But it wasn’t just a gold chain: dangling from the center, pulled by gravity, was a teardrop red ruby. Jasmine gasped for many reasons, but mostly because she knew that was meant for her. “I wanted to give you something, yet I didn’t think this through. Please, turn around.”
    Jasmine did as he asked, turning to that floral painting and pulling her hair off to the side. What am I doing? Accepting such a thing from a stranger? On a first date! What kind of woman was Jasmine setting herself up to be if this was how she now conducted her business relationships? There was