Morning came sooner than expected for Jesalyn. Seven thirty in the morning was two and a half hours later than she usually woke up. Unless there were extenuating circumstances like the night Nate proposed to her. The memory came to her mind as vividly as she was reliving it. It was the first time that she ever reacted like a normal woman. Not that she was not a woman by the fate of gender, but Jesalyn was more one of the guys than girly. Yes, she could put on makeup and a dress and slay it, but she was more prone to throw on jeans and a t-shirt to do untraditional un-lady-like stuff. That night, however, she cried as he kneeled in front of her with the engagement ring with his family and hers present at the bar where they first kissed. The long night of unbridled, passionate lovemaking afterward caused them to almost miss their flight back to D.C. for a fundraising gala.
She smiled a genuine smile; her eyes gleamed with joyful tears. Her heart soared for that precious moment, even though she knew in her mind that he was gone. “I’ll always love you, Nate,” she whispered sadly as she looked at the ceiling in reverence to her lost lover.
Her mind floated back through time again this time to the memory of that first kiss. Jes bit her lower lip and giggled aloud at the thought. She impulsively kissed him on his birthday at The Back Nine Bar. Jesalyn had carried a crush on him for over a year. Kris had known about it for almost as long. Nathan was Kris’s best friend and teammate, as they had met at BUD’s during their SEAL training. Besides Jes not knowing how to communicate her feelings about Nathan, the only complication was he had a girlfriend named Lauren Michaels.
In her mind, Lauren was everything Jesalyn was not as a woman. The tall, sexy redhead turned heads everywhere she went. Her alabaster skin added to her ethereal beauty, and she had a sultry grace as she moved through a room. When she first met Nathan, Jesalyn was eighteen and in full embrace of the Marine lifestyle. Everything Jes did centered on discipline, honor, and commitment. Jes moved as though she was room clearing or assaulting an objective.
Lauren had always made Jes feel inadequate without even really trying. In juxtaposition to Lauren’s tall, thin yet curvaceous frame, Jesalyn, at the time, was slightly bulkier than she was now and a lot more ripped. Jesalyn had to compete with men who were always going to be naturally physically stronger than her. To compensate, Jes was constantly in the gym when not on duty, doing high-intensity strength training and cardio. In her mind, Nathan could have never found Jes attractive in any visual sense. She was simply a man with boobs.
Nathan, Kristopher, and her were thick as thieves, though. They coordinated leave time to do some crazy shit. Whether it was speeding down highways standing on the seats of their motorcycles or trying to out-drink each other before eventually getting into a bar fight, they lived life to the fullest; together.
There were comically awkward moments, too. Like the time Nathan had got thrown into her in a said bar fight, and they ended up on the floor, her on top of him. He had commented how the neon lights made her blue eyes sparkle and her returning comment as much as this was an interesting position got cut off as she blushed, bit her lower lip, and made some insane muffled squeal like a deranged Muppet before grabbing a beer bottle a smashing over a fallen attacker’s head to knock him out before getting up to take on another female.
Jesalyn had planned to attend Nathan’s birthday. It is what they did, celebrating milestones and accomplishments together. Kris had been repeatedly calling Jes out for her reticence on not telling Nathan how she felt about him for a few months prior at that point. With sage-like advice, Kris had a way of delivering it like their father, he told her, ′You miss a hundred percent of the shots you don’t take.′ She argued that if she told Nate how she felt, it would change the dynamic of their friendship and that, coupled with the fact Nate was in a relationship with Lauren, would be explosively damaging beyond repair. Kris, try as he did, couldn’t argue the facts. Lauren was insanely possessive of‘Her Man’.
Jes was confident that his friendship was all she could have and that could be enough. Though through other conversations with Kris, she realized she could at least try to balance her life as a Marine and a woman. She slimmed down. It was daunting, but the reward would reveal itself two months later at the birthday party. She showed up to the party in a black dress with her hair done up and after receiving a crash course on how to apply makeup without looking like a whore.
Little did she or Kris know that Nathan had broken up with Lauren two weeks before over her, constantly trying to manipulate his life in a direction he did not want to take. The look on his face when he saw her was priceless, though. Even though she still had an athletic tone to her body, she had slimmed down to a more feminine form. It was odd for her to embrace being an attractive woman as she never saw herself as one, but that night his look made her feel attractive, which oddly sparked confidence in her she never had that just radiated.
For the very first time, she saw that like Lauren she could move through a room with a dancer’s grace, even in two-inch stilettos, and make heads turn with desire for her. Through his now awkward fumbling compliments and multiple shots of Patron, he had let it slip that he was not with Lauren anymore and the reasons.
Lauren had manipulated Nate into financing several online businesses of hers. Initially, they were successful in providing substantial dividends, but Lauren did not have enough discipline or drive to keep them going. Well, she did have them for one of the businesses. Online sex camming. After denying her request to join her in a few sessions she went off the deep end. She drained his bank account he foolishly added her to and drove off supposedly to Hollywood to become a model. In the 2011 Hyundai Veloster, she had managed to con him into cosigning for.
There he was on his birthday. None of his trademarked over-the-top positive attitude. No money and was in debt over his head. Jesalyn could not believe that Lauren had treated him like that. He deserved better. What he didn’t deserve most was to be depressed on his birthday. With Kris’s words echoing in the back of her head, she took her shot. Jesalyn told himthat all birthday boys deserved to be kissed on their birthday as she drew him in by the front of his shirt and then she planted a soul-searing kiss on his lips. The kiss was fueled more by her passion and desire than the tequila she tasted on his lips. It represented in the one kiss everything she was. Her hopes, fears, dreams, and frailties were all transmitted in the gesture. Jesalyn was taking a dangerous gamble with her heart for the first time and leaving her brain out of the equation. The reward was the immediate reciprocation of his affection as he wrapped his left arm around her waist as slid his right hand up her left cheek to the back of her head to draw her closer to him. For a moment in time, the world stood frozen in time. That moment, two hearts became one to make a complete soul as the passion grew from nervous excitement as their body heat rose together threatening to erupt into a blaze; then it was gone for the next moment as Lauren brought them back from that place, screaming at the top of her lungs.
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Lauren made the mistake of charging and trying to swing at her. Jesalyn easily countered it with a block and countered with a left to Lauren’s jaw. The tall redhead was unconscious before she hit the floor. Unfortunately, she fell into a few people on the way down. In Texas, that’s all it takes to start an all-out bar fight. Kris had disappeared in the crowd presumably to hit on one of the scantily clad buxom waitresses. Nate grabbed her along with a full bottle of Patron and guided her through the chaos. They ended up in the hayloft of the barn on his parent’s cattle farm. Jesalyn’s body quivered delightfully recalling the wild lovemaking and chuckled at the thought of looking down at Kris from the loft when he found them.
The doorbell rang, and the sound ripped her from the past to the here and now. Jesalyn wiped her eyes. Frustrated at the intrusion, she quickly grabbed her comfortable Superhero High School sweatshirt with the picture of her favorite anime character, Kitty Noire, on it, and a hair tie and moved to go to the front door. Mumbling, “Who in the world could be here?” as she put on the sweatshirt and put her hair up in a sloppy bun.
She looked out the peephole to see three men. Who the actual fuck are you all? All three dressed smartly in suits, but one man stood out, seemed he liked himself to be in the nines for some sort of presentation at a corporate meeting. Jes’ instinct kicked into high gear as she quickly assessed that the tall bulky Asian man with jet black hair and the slimmer, yet equally intimidating-looking brown-haired Caucasian man were security types and armed. She stepped back toward the right wall to move a small jade-colored owl figurine to a certain spot on the custom self she mounted last night. The bottom portion dropped to reveal her loaded FN 509 compact with RDS, and weapon-mounted tactical light. She slipped it behind her back in the waistband of the white workout shorts she had slept in as she moved back to the door. As it rang again, and then a loud knocking accompanied this time.
Jes took a deep breath and opened the door. She moved backward with the door’s arc to give herself enough space to draw, aim, and fire from retention if needed. The big Asian guy looked at her incredulously, annoyed as she spoke with irritation. “Exactly who are you and why the hell are you banging on the door like a baboon?”
Edgerton Cain chuckled from behind his bodyguard. “If you please, Charles,” he ushered the man to step aside as he moved forward to face Jesalyn. “My name, dear girl, is Edgerton Cain.” he introduced himself. “I was in the neighborhood and decided I’d stop by to welcome you to Nowhere,” he added as he flashed his trademarked handsome smile.
In the neighborhood? Internally, Jes groaned. She knew who he was. No one could help but know who HE was. You could not turn on the television or get on social media without seeing some meticulously photoshopped picture of him. Edgerton Cain the playboy, philanthropist, and now the head of a Fortune 500 company. Her internal alarms were going off, mainly because the Cheshire wide grin of a powerful man never means well.
Jesalyn played for effect and waved once in a semi-circle with her left hand. “Ok, I consider myself welcomed. Have a lovely day,” she said with a sarcastic tone and went to shut the door. Then Chuck had different ideas as he stopped the door with his hand and moved quickly to encroach on Jesalyn moving past his boss. The wide-eyed look of surprise as she brought her handgun out and pointed at him was priceless. He stopped on a dime and raised his hands. “Well now, Chuck. Now that your brain has fully engaged, what say you to backing up slowly out the door?” Jesalyn commented with a grave tone and a determined look.
It took Edgerton aback at how quickly Miss Masters responded to Charles’ actions. “Charles, please do as Miss Masters asks and take Rodney to the car,” he responded with practiced authority, trying to defuse a potentially unpleasant situation. He could not immediately think of any way the media could spin this in his favor.
“Yeah Chuck, take Rod and go to the car,” Jes stated in a mocking tone, added to it with an insulting shooing gesture with her free hand. “Go on. Go. Go. Be a good boy and go.”
“Miss Masters, please accept my humble apologies for my employees’ actions,” Edgerton spoke with intent to soothe his way into her good graces, as he slowly took a step toward her.
Jes put up her free hand to stop Edgerton. “No can do, Eddie,” she stated. “You come to my home with the baboon twins as a flex of your power. Talk to me in a demeaning fashion and expect me to do what? Just brush it off,” she added with a shake of her head, “No. Just no.”
“Demeaning, my dear girl, how?” he realized his faux pas that Jesalyn’s sour look and the confirmed ′see what I mean’ hand motion toward him just as he said it, “I am really sorry. I forget that I...” he was saying when she raised her hand to interrupt him.
Jes sighed. “You really must enjoy digging holes,” she frustratingly commented,” I know who you are. Edgerton Cain, the wealthy fourth eldest son of Montgomery Cain and his third wife, the award-winning actress Natalie White. You received your business degree from Harvard Business College. Dated multiple models and starlets. Many exploded into their various careers after dating or being engaged to you. At last report, they calculated your net worth in the trillions,” Jes recited a synopsis of his life.
“You move, act, and flex so people notice you because those who want your favor cater to your narcissism endlessly, but it battles with the inferiority complex given to you by your disciplined, but heartless father. Your need for your mother’s love has made you reckless in your romantic life because no woman can tend to your needs to the fantasy level you elevated them to. Your only concern for people is what they can give to you. If they have something you want, you take it with no regard to others’ needs, because you’re Edgerton Cain and nobody needs it more than you,” she finished her profile of him.
He stared at her with a mix of annoyance and stunned bewilderment. No one has talked to him the way she has done or is as dead accurate, ever. This woman is not someone whom he has ever encountered before. Miss Masters is fearless, it seems, and highly intelligent. The combination he admires in male adversaries, not attractive women he would choose to bed. Even in her current ragamuffin state, she was very enticingly attractive to him. It was in these moments Edgerton would try to say something witty and retreat to contrive a plan to take care of the situation, but he is now something he has never been in the presence of anyone save his father. Speechless.
“You’re trying to make me believe you altruistically came here to welcome me. To let me know, the ‘Great’ Edgerton Cain has chosen little ole me to smile favor upon. Look around Mr. Cain,” she motioned her outstretched hand in a small arc,” You’re not the type of man to be ‘In the Neighborhood’ and I neither want nor to have a desire to attain your favor, especially since you speak so condescendingly. Your wealth or supposed superiority is of no interest to me at all. I value hard work, discipline, honor, and commitment. Those are the measure of real men and women who are worth far more than gold and trinkets of your favor. Now, if you please take yourself and see your way off my property. Good day,” Jes stated with a calm flat tone, then she closed the door abruptly in his face.
All Edgerton could do was turn and walk away, stunned.
