Page 67 of To Love Jason Thorn

Me: I’m sitting on a beautiful rooftop,surrounded by olive trees and twinkle lights—alone.

Lucy: What do you mean alone?

Me: I don’t know what exactly, but somethingis wrong with Jason. We just sat down, ordered our food and drinks, and hejumped up and left to say hi to a few people.

Lucy: That doesn’t sound too ominous. I’msure he’ll be back.

Me: Well, it is. He’s been acting weird fromthe moment I got into his car. No eye contact, no nothing.

I leaned forward a little to see if I couldspot him. Sure enough, he was standing next to a group of ten or twelve peoplewho were having dinner. A beautiful blonde woman joined the group and insteadof sitting down, she came to stand next to Jason when she saw him. She touchedhis arm, leaned in to whisper something into his ear, and said something funnyenough to make Jason throw back his head and laugh. Then his hand sneaked aroundher waist…and I sat my ass back down.

Perfect.

Remembering I wasn’t out with Jason butwith Jason Thorn didn’t ease my worries. I’d take the other guy any day.

Me: I don’t think I’m feeling well. I wantto come home, Lucy.

Lucy: Hey, it’ll be okay. You are a cat. Apurring, content one. I’m sure he wanted to talk to you about the movie. Didn’tyou say so yourself? If he upsets you, I’ll kick his ass, don’t worry.

There was no way that cat crap would workthis time.

Before I could text back, Jason returned tothe table, muttered an apology, gave me a strange look, and reached for hisdrink again.

Feeling deflated, I played with the edge ofthe table and kept sipping my drink as I tried to focus on the beautiful view.

At some point, he asked a few questionsabout how my new novel was coming along, and I answered all of his questionswith unnecessarily long answers. Eventually though, I gave up trying to engage himin conversation when he started texting with his agent.

Our food came—we had both orderedsalmon—and—surprise, surprise—we ate in silence.

If picking at the poor fish counted aseating, that is.

My phone vibrated twice, but I didn’t checkto see who it was. No matter how many times she texted, I was no cat—especiallynot a purring one. Halfway into our awkward and very disappointing dinner, Igave up on the food too and just leaned back in my seat to gaze at the cityskyline. I hated sulking in general, but sitting across from Jason andsulking…well, it was all kinds of wrong. Even so, there was no way I could actlike I was having the time of my life at that moment either.

“Olive?”

So lost in my own head, I flinched when Iheard Jason’s thick voice.

“Yes?”

He tilted his head and furrowed his brows.“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know. Are you?” I asked back.

He scratched at his stubble. “What do youmean?”

“You’ve barely said a word to me ever sincewe sat down, Jason. Not that you were a chatterbox in the car, but youliterally spoke maybe twenty words to me. Since you were the one who invited meout, I have no idea what’s happening, but I’m going to wait until you finishyour dinner so you can take me home. Better yet, if you can tell someone tocall me a cab…do they even do that here? Anyway, if they do, I can get myselfhome.”

A few tables to our left, a group of peopleroared with laughter, drawing my attention away from Jason. Why couldn’t we belaughing with joy like that? Jason was going to take me to a movie set, themovie set that was being set up for the world I’d created. I was goingto see Isaac’s room, touch the bed where he woke Evie up in the middle of thenight just because he couldn’t wait to kiss her for the first time. I should’vebeen the one laughing my ass off with joy, not sulking in front of a sex god.

He wasn’t my sex god, but I was in hisvicinity, and God had given me eyes for such occasions after all.

I glanced back at Jason and saw histroubled expression.

“Fuck me,” he muttered almost to himself.

I would happily fuck you if that’s yourproblem.

Reaching for his second glass of whiskey,he drank the last bit in one big gulp, pushed his chair back with a loud noise,and came to my side.

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