Page 26 of Forbidden Desires

Paula’s smile seemed to brighten even more. “Oh. What a beautiful name.” She looked over the desk, clicked her tongue and turned her attention back to me. “Ring, Mr. Maxim?”

Shit.I had almost forgot.

At least the rings were in my jacket pocket, where I’d put them earlier. I had a set made after a visit where my mother specifically hyper-fixated on the fact that neither myself nor the woman I had brought at the time—my supposed wife—worerings. It had been a point of blasphemy for my mother who was all about decorum and tradition, and I hadn’t been able to get around her scrutiny the entire visit. She had enough faculties at the time to question if I had been trying to trick her, and the only thing that had assuaged my mother’s dismayed demeanor was informing her that we were planning on getting new rings for an anniversary that didn’t exist. Now, she loved looking at them each time I came.

I pulled the set out of my pocket, slipping my band onto my finger easily before looking down to Jasmine. She had not spoken much since we’d arrived. I couldn’t tell if it was nerves, or if she could tell thatIwas filled with anxiety and that was throwing our balance off. I wasn’t usually like this. I was always calm, collected, and sane. That was how my parents had raised me to be. The fact that it was so easy to put a crack in the façade…

Jasmine held her left hand out toward me. She’d dressed in a pretty, but modest floral dress for the occasion, and she smiled up at me, her head tilted to the side, her hair falling over her shoulder in soft waves. “Well? Shouldn’t you properly ring your wife, Mr. Maxim?” she teased.

I let out a puff of a laugh. Wasn’t it supposed to be the other way around? Me grounding her? Giving her guidance? Making her feel calm and reassured?

Is this what mutual exchange felt like? That effortless melding…

I mentally shook the fanciful thought from my head. I gently took her hand, slipping the wedding band on her finger first, and then its partner, the would-be engagement ring. They were impressive sets, beautiful white gold, the engagement ring a brilliant, glittering diamond set elegantly into the center with a twining band of smaller diamonds surrounding the larger stone. The rings fit perfectly. Slid on without resistance and the designsuited her slender fingers, too. Almost as if it had been designed specifically for her.

The thought made my chest tighten, made me feel things like pride and possession and a whole host of other emotions that were completely foreign to me.

When I realized that I was staring too long, I cleared my throat and laced my fingers with hers. Not because it was for show, but because I genuinely wanted to hold her hand in mine.

I lifted my gaze back up to hers and exhaled a deep breath. “Well, let’s go see Mother and Father.”

I guidedJasmine toward my parent’s apartment. At this point, I knew the layout of the facility like it were my own apartment. I had spent months before deciding on this place, looking over floor plans, perusing testimonials, reading professional feedback on the facility’s amenities, its quality-of-life implementations, and actually visiting several times just so that I was reassured this was a reputable, safe establishment my parents would eventually call their home. I’d come here enough in the last five years that it was almost second nature even if I couldn’t be here every day.

Everything was warm toned. There were browns, deep reds, burnt oranges, in the color scheme. I had expected white when I first began looking into extended care facilities. White, on white, on more white. Clinical, sanitized, and detached, like a hospital or those elderly homes that people hear horror stories about that abuse their patients and leave them to fend for themselves more often than not, which had always been my greatest fear for them.

I’d committed all of this to memory. The layout, the colors, how happy and cared for the patients we passed looked. I didthis every single time I came here, because if I didn’t it always felt wrong, in a way. More wrong than it did in general when I really allowed myself to consider that I could leave of my own free will, and they could not.

“Eric,” came Jasmine’s soft voice.

I once again pulled myself out of my unsolicited thoughts and looked down at her, slowing my pace. We were in the wide hall. Their hall. “Yes?” I asked, hearing the gruffness in my voice.

“Relax,” she said, giving my hand a squeeze.

“I am relaxed.”

She gave me a deadpan look, along with a soft scoff as she stopped walking, halting us entirely before we reached my parents’ door. “You arenotrelaxed. You’ve been stiff and tense ever since we moved away from the receptionist desk.”

I both hated, and liked, how perceptive she was. Hated it because she too easily saw that weakness in me. Liked it because I’d been on my own for so long that I couldn’t remember the last time anyone cared enough aboutmeto make sure I was truly okay—and meant it.

She guided us over to the side, just out of the way of the walking path. Her hand slid from mine and she reached up, brushing her fingers along my cheek in a way that made my heartbeat fall back to a regular rhythm, instead of racing erratically in my chest as we neared my parents’ apartment.

“Whatever is on your mind,wegot this,” she whispered, so only I could hear, her beautiful eyes shining with genuine sincerity. “I said I would help you with your parents, didn’t I? So, relax. You’re not alone, Eric.”

You’re not alone, Eric.I eased out a long breath. Coming from her, those words did something to me inside, made me feel calmer, more stable somehow.

Without warning, she leaned up, softly pressing her lips to mine. We hadn’t so much as fooled around the night before;the last twenty-four plus hours had been devoid of any sexual contact, even in the basic sense. But now, her mouth on mine was electric. A spark that snapped me to focus on her, on her words, on her true and honorable intentions when so many before her had treated this situation as an unpleasant, but necessary job to gain a paycheck.

From the depths of my soul, I knew that wasn’t the case with Jasmine. I also realized I hadn’t brought her here just for the sake of keeping up the façade to my parents that I had barricaded myself into. I had brought her here because to some extent I knew that I would need her support and I hoped—no, Iknewafter our few months together—that Jasmine would be able to give it to me.

My fingers slipped into her silky, unbound hair, pulling her closer as I deepened our kiss. There was a hunger in me that I could not explain and was not wholly sexual. I just wanted to be closer to her. I wanted to taste her, and smell her, feel her warmth on my skin and…fuck if I knew how to handle all these new and unfamiliar emotions.

With a soft, nearly imperceptible groan, I pulled away before things got intense. Or, more intense than they already felt.

“We got this,” I repeated to her, the words sounding almost silly coming from my mouth, but the sentiment was all the same.

She smiled and nodded. “We got this.”

Feeling more centered, we finished walking to the end of the hall, hand in hand, where my parents’ apartment was located. Their door was red, and for some reason had a Christmas wreath hung on the outside. It must have been my mother’s doing. Possibly, she was in the early Christmas spirit, or, more likely, she thought that it was high time for Christmas to be here already since that was her favorite time of the year.

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