Page 107 of What Happens in Paradise

I swallowed hard. Why didn’t I like the direction this conversation was taking?

Hazel swivelled her computer screen around to face me and Alejandro and when I saw the video, my stomach plummeted a thousand metres below the earth.

Alejandro dragged his hands down his face.

The footage didn’t just show the sunset.

It was a video of me.

With Alejandro.

Not just standing next to Alejandro.

KissingAlejandro.

Fuck.

38

JASMINE

On a scale of one to ten of how bad this video was, with one being harmless and ten being very bad, this was at least ten billion.

It wasn’t justvery bad. It was a total and utter clusterfuck.

So fucking terrible, there weren’t enough adjectives in the dictionary to even begin to describe it.

Alejandro and I weren’t just kissing, we weredevouringeach other like starving wild animals that’d just killed their prey and were gorging on a tasty meal.

My hands were roaming all over his arse. And if that wasn’t damning enough, I pushed him into me and… God, this was so embarrassing… then hooked my leg around him as if we’re about to start fucking in public.

Jesus.

I didn’t even remember doing that.

The very kind person who filmed this pornographic public display, then decided to zoom in, giving me (and now the whole internet) an even closer view of our tongues tangling and hands wandering.

This was mortifying.

I squeezed my eyes shut, not sure I could handle any more. When I peeked again, Hazel’s face was scarlet and steam poured from her ears. From the corner of my eye, I saw Alejandro’s head in his hands.

Thankfully, the video then flicked back to the sunset before roaming around the rest of the café, but it was irrelevant. We’d all seen enough to know that Alejandro and I were totally screwed.

There was nothing I could do or say to fix this. I couldn’t claim the video was fake. It was very obvious that it was us. I’d fucked up, so I just had to woman up and own it.

‘Hazel, I’m sorry. I take full responsibility for?—’

‘No!’ Alejandro jumped up. ‘It was me. I pursued her. I begged her to kiss me. She said it was not a good idea, but I did not let it go.’

‘And I’m assuming that you two didn’t just stop at kissing?’ Hazel slammed her hand on the desk, then paused the video. Neither I nor Alejandro said a word. ‘So this was why you conveniently had to get a hotel room!’

‘No! It wasn’t like that!’ I protested.

‘As well as acting inappropriately on company time, you used company money to pay for a night in a hotel so that the two of you could fuck! I’msodisappointed in you, Jasmine. Not only is this a blatant abuse of power, taking advantage of a younger employee under your care; it’s also a fraudulent use of expenses, which I’m sure is a criminal offence.’

My eyes bulged and my stomach bottomed out. This was even worse than I thought. But she was wrong. I had to defend myself.

‘What you’re saying isn’t true! I didn’t take advantage of Alejandro! And we didn’t get a hotel room so that we could fu?—’

---