Chapter Two

Jasmine spotted Derek across the room, and fire and ice waged war within her. How dare he walk around as if he owned the place? She knew the kinder, gentler side of him, but that boy was long gone. He probably never really existed beyond her girlish imagination.

The man she’d spotted tonight wasn’t the boy who had taken her virginity and promised her forever. She wished she could forget that summer so many years ago when she’d waited at the abandoned church all day, waited and waited, hoping something had happened to make him late. As the sun had faded from the sky, she’d finally had to admit he wasn’t coming. It had all been lies.

Just as her father had said, Derek had told her all he needed to get her to have sex with him. Once he’d added her to his list of conquests, he’d been finished with her. The remembered pain was almost too much to bear, even ten years later.

She watched him turning and walking from the room. He was by far the sexiest man at the party, with his custom tuxedo and piercing blue eyes. Although he sat in an office all day, his body betrayed no hint of softness. Her heart fluttered as she dwelled again on those long summer nights of touching and tasting those hard muscles.

Derek disappeared around the corner just as he’d disappeared that summer ten years before. Back then, she’d believed in fairy tales and magic.

No more.

Jasmine had grown up very wealthy in a small town outside of Seattle, Washington. Her father owned a multimillion-dollar medical-equipment company, and she’d always had more than most people could ever hope for.

Her mother had died while giving birth to her, and her father never remarried. He dated a lot of women, but none of them really acknowledged her existence, so she didn’t grow attached to any of them. Sometimes, Jasmine had thought it would be nice to have a woman help her pick out a dress or teach her how to do her hair. But the staff, at least, always spoiled her a bit, which she knew irritated her father.

She’d seen Derek in school from the time she was young, but she got to know him only the summer before her senior year in high school. His family was dirt poor, but he was always determined to make a success out of his life and turn things around. He ended up helping her with math, and soon they were fast friends. She’d loved his hunger and motivation and the way he never talked down about anyone. She thought he was every one of her fairy-tale heroes come to life.

Soon, she found she was spending every waking moment with him. When her father found out she was dating a boy from the poor side of town, he’d been furious and demanded that she end the relationship. It was the first time in her life her father told her she couldn’t have something she wanted. It also was the first time she’d defied him.

She’d continued to see Derek behind her father’s back. She loved that Derek seemed to like her for who she was and not for her money. He wouldn’t let her spend money on him — ever. He worked hard for a construction company, which would frustrate her at times because she wanted him to be with her and not at a job. He’d laugh at her frustration, but he always made it up to her on the weekends.

“Jasmine?”

Jasmine turned to find that she’d completely tuned out of the conversation. Normally, she was the epitome of cool — making sure to schmooze with her father’s investors. That was her job at these functions.

More than once she’d had to fend off the advances of some dirty old man. It was a source of contention between her father and her — just one of many.

She wouldn’t sell her soul to the devil, even if the devil was dressed in a hand-tailored business suit. Money had its uses, and she certainly needed a lot more than she had, but she wasn’t for sale, not at any price.

“I’m sorry. I have a slight headache tonight and it’s made me lose focus,” she answered sweetly to the sixty-year-old who was leering at her. She had to fight the shiver threatening to travel down her spine at the lust in his eyes.

“I was just telling your father that I would love to have the two of you up to my lake house sometime real soon.”

No way in hell! That is what she wanted to say.

“That sounds like a very pleasant weekend. Make sure you have my father notify me of when,” she answered instead, already planning a convenient illness.

The man beamed at her; his hand came up to rest on her upper arm, and then his finger trailed downward.

“Excuse me. I need some medicine for this annoying headache,” she said, discreetly extracting herself from the man’s slimy grip and walking away. She was on the verge of being sick. How many more of these functions would she have to attend before she’d had enough?

Seeing Derek tonight had been too much. Wasn’t time supposed to heal all wounds? In her case, ten years obviously hadn’t been enough time. Seeing her first love — the only man she’d ever loved — was just too much.

It was time to leave.

Tomorrow would be a better day. That had become her motto for the last decade. One of these days, maybe it would.

As she walked from the party, Jasmine thought back to the day that her innocence had been stolen from her, the day that she’d realized she couldn’t trust her heart, and she certainly couldn’t trust men…