Page 3 of Slow Burn (The Boston Beauties)

‘One moment, I’ll transfer you,’ I heard the familiar voice of Trish, the receptionist at Cahill Global headquarters, as Jules put it on speakerphone.

My sister held out the phone to me, and I had no choice but to accept her.

‘Good morning, Cahill Global, this is Jessa,’ she answered with her light and airy professional voice.

‘Hi,’ I said in a low voice. ‘You’re back then?’ I let out a nervous breath.

‘You can’t call me at work,’ she hissed at me over the phone. Yup, she was still pissed at me. I looked up to Jules, who rolled her hands, as to say, get on with it.

‘You’re not answering my text messages.’

‘I told you when I was ready I would,’ she sounded annoyed with me, and I rolled my eyes up to Jules. Fuck, this wasn’t going well at all. She let out a defeated breath when I didn’t say anything. ‘What is it? I’m in the middle of something.’ She was short, but at least she hadn’t hung up on me; I was going to take it as a small win.

‘Oh, what are you up to?’ I bit my lip from laughing. As soon as I said it, I knew how stupid it sounded.

‘You called me at work, what the hell do you think I’m doing, getting a pedicure?’ she snapped at me, which really surprised me. She must be much angrier than I had initially thought, as this side of her hadn’t appeared in months, not since she tried to break up with me and I showed her the videos, essentially blackmailing her into staying with me.

I didn’t speak for a few moments, hoping it would calm her down for my next request. ‘Can we meet?’ I finally asked her, and my sister mouthed to me,Finally.

‘I’m busy.’

I wasn’t going to take that as cop-out excuse. ‘When will you not be?’ I asked her, pushing her further, showing her that I wasn’t about to back down, confident I’d lock down some one-on-one time with her before I hung up this phone. If I needed to, I could always pull the video card, but I hated to do that.

‘Friday,’ she didn’t hesitate to tell me. I saw through it, she knew I hated to meet during the week, and I also knew she would be back on the Cape then. So be it, it wasn’t as if I actually had an office job where I needed to be between the hours of nine to five.

‘Great, I’ll be there. What time?’Bingo.

‘Meet me at noon at the pier beach. I don’t think it’s a good idea to meet at the house.’ I hung my head, that wasn’t a great sign. The fact that she didn’t want anyone to see us together wasn’t all that promising. But I was choosing to look at the positive—she agreed to see me.

‘See you then,’ I told her and hung up, handing my sister back her phone.

‘You can wipe that smile off your face right now,’ Jules rolled her eyes. ‘That means nothing, maybe she wants to see you to end things once and for all.’

‘Fuck.’ I ran my fingers through my hair, I hadn’t thought of that. ‘So, what do I do?’

‘Convince her not to cancel the wedding, if she hasn’t already, and then we need to come up with some grand gesture.’

‘Like what?’ I asked my sister, who loved planning things. It was her obsessive addiction to shows like The Bachelor that inspired her to plan elaborate dates, and she just might be the reason I hooked Jessa in the first place.

Over the next hour, we discussed what Jessa liked and disliked. Whatever we planned, it couldn’t be public, and it would have to be quick, personal and away from the influence of her family and friends. She had told me to leave it with her to plan, so that’s what I did, while I focused on meeting with Jessa on Friday and putting my pride aside so as to not lose her for good.

CHAPTER 2

MATT

My meeting with Jessa yesterday went a hell of a lot better than I thought it would.

She showed up late, but I didn’t call her out on it, as I normally would have. I can tell she’s still hesitant and a bit untrusting of my motives and me, so I had to ditch my manipulating ways for the time being. I needed to win her back with the tactics I used the first time around.

There were some tense moments, especially when she brought up the prenup. In addition, the bravery she demonstrated on the phone wasn’t just a one-time thing; she wasn’t shy about speaking to me in ways I hadn’t seen in a long time. She wasn’t docile, and this might prove a bigger problem for me. She was a lot bolder than she had been just a few short weeks ago. I turned on the charm and eventually turned the meeting around with a nice dinner and a confirmation that the wedding was indeed still on.

I was in my office, waiting for my sister to finish with opening the salon to tell her about my meeting with Jessa yesterday and to discuss the plan she had come up with for my grand gesture that I apparently needed to go through with.

The truth was, Jessa was a sweet girl. She was nice and thoughtful. Admittedly, I wasn’t attracted to her physically; this was especially true in the beginning. She was overweight, had short brown hair, and dressed in a classic, conservative way. With my influence, she grew her hair out from her neat bob, colored it blonde, and accepted my gift last year for a boob job and new clothes to show off her new features. When she tried, she managed to look decent, despite not having my ideal body type.

In the beginning, even knowing it was a con, I had started to actually like her. It was hard not to, she was so thoughtful, and I couldn’t knock her personality, sweet, funny, loyal, agreeable and easy to be around. She really grew on me in the first few months after I moved to Boston.

She loved me in a way that no one else ever had, not even my family. Perhaps my mother had, but she died on me too young, so that I didn’t really have memories of her. My father had never been the caring type, and my older siblings were too angry at the family circumstances and were just as caught up as my father was in plotting revenge.

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