"Writing is an outlet for me," she says. "It always has been. And you never told me that I couldn't write. You just made me promise not to publish it."
"I didn't make you promise, I made you sign a contract forbidding you to publish anything," I correct her. "But okay, writing is your outlet. Whatever. I can get that. What I don't get is the way you write. That passage didn't read like a fucking diary-"
"Because it isn't," she says, cutting me off. "I don't keep a diary. That's not what I do. I write stories, non-fictional stories."
"Non-fictional stories that you sell to the press."
She sighs.
"Yes. That's my job," she says. "Or rather, it used to be. But it's hard to break out of this habit. It's my style. Everything I write sounds like it belongs in an article or an editorial. It's how I write. I can’t help it."
"You can't fucking tell me that you never even considered selling that stuff, Button."
I tear my eyes away from the view and turn to her, meeting her eyes for the first time since I've walked in. She looks exhausted, her face smeared with the leftovers of yesterday's make-up. She has cried, a lot. Her eyes are red and puffy, speaking of pain as much or more than fatigue.
"I'm not saying that," she says in a low voice. "It would be a lie."
My chest tightens. "So you did consider it."
It's not a question, but she nods, lowering her eyes for a moment.
"At some point, I did, yes," she says. "When this was still strictly business. And long before that guy showed up. I never considered selling to him."
"I know."
Her eyes dart up at me, widened in surprise. "You know?"
I sigh, raising my eyebrows at the memory. I will still have to have a word with Silas about this. Despite his noble intentions, that move was not okay. It was more than not okay. He really overstepped his boundaries.
"He was bait," I simply tell her. "Paid by my team to tempt you to betray me. Without my knowledge."
"Great," she snorts. "So you weren't the only one who couldn't trust me."
"Can you blame them?" I want to know. "Or me?"
She shakes her head.
"No, not really," she admits. "But... if he was paid, you must know what I told him? You must know that I said no. Twice, actually."
Our eyes meet again, and I see a cautious smile playing at the corners of her mouth when she adds, "I was very adamant."
"So I've heard."
She peels herself out of the blanket and gets up from the armchair, stepping closer to me. Her body is wrapped in a white silk robe, hiding very little of her limber frame. I want to touch her, to wrap my arms around her, and feel her soft skin against mine. But I'm not sure if I can, if I should.
She seems to feel the same way.
Her approach is hesitant and overly cautious, her hand barely touching mine when she reaches for me.
"You know who I am," she whispers. "You know I'd be lying if I said I had never considered any of this."
She looks up at me, but we let our fingers intertwine.
"I'm the kind of woman who signs up to be a high-class escort because she no longer wants to work for money by the time she's thirty," she reminds me. "I mean... who does that?"
I can't help but join her little chuckle.
"You," I say.
She nods. "If you'd ever read any of my pieces, you'd also know that I don't shy away from nasty stories. Those that expose or shine a light on the darker side of society."
"Like an agency called Violent Delights," I complete her reasoning.
She smiles at me.
"Exactly," she agrees. "But you have to know, I've never enjoyed hurting anybody, especially you. I never wanted to hurt you - and by now I'd even go a lot further."
I cast her a questioning look.
"By now, I want to protect you," she clarifies. "And destroy everyone who ever tries to hurt you."
She lets out a sad chuckle, and it’s overridden by sorrow. "Though if that's true, I would have to start with myself."
"Why are you saying that?"
"Because I fucking hurt you, Jared," she says. "I thought that I let you go for my most vulnerable part every time we played. But I was wrong."
I catch my breath when she slowly lifts her hand up to my throat, placing her fingers around it as if she was to choke me.
"I don't think the throat is where we are most vulnerable," she whispers. "I think it's the heart instead. And I hit yours pretty hard."
She lets go of my neck and lets her hand travel down to my chest, placing her palm on the left side.
"I'm sorry."
I place my hand on top of hers and beckon her to meet my gaze with the other, by tilting her head up with my index finger below her chin.
"I'm sure my heart isn't the only thing that's been in a lot of pain recently," I tell her. "I didn't exactly treat yours fairly either."
She smirks at me, a single tear rolling slowly down her cheek as a deep sense of relief takes over, eliminating the tense aching that must have been torturing her this past night just as much as it tortured me.
"I guess we're even then?" she breathes.
I have never seen my Button like this. It's almost as if I'm seeing her for the first time, really fucking seeing her. Just her, with all her flaws, her pain, her brilliance, her raw beauty when her face lights up, as I lean down for a kiss.
I don't crave for us to be even.
I yearn for us to be together. Because that's when we're at our fucking best.
Partners. A team.
Epilogue
Ann
~ One year later ~
I often wonder how differently things could have turned out.
What if I had never decided to write that story about Violent Delights? What if I had never decided to sign up for their catalog?
What if I had never met Jared King on that fateful day?
What if he had never met me?
Would he be a Congressman today? Maybe. Maybe he would have followed through with his plan to take on something new, to make his voice heard on a new playing field. If he didn't have to worry about his character credentials as much, if he hadn't been haunted by those demeaning rumors again and again. If politics was less about kissing ass left and right, less about making the right friends and displaying a proper but false picture of yourself, and more about substance, maybe he would have gone through with it.
But it isn't, and Jared is too much of a self-dependent businessman to comply with a set of rules that inherently forces him to do nothing but appear to be someone he isn't, until he's finally allowed to make his voice heard where it matters.
We talked about this a lot. After all, our whole arrangement was based on this campaign he was about to embark on. The campaign and preserving his public image were the main reasons for me to become part of his life. But neither one of us saw this coming.
Jared and I, we have a lot in common. Unfortunately, we also share a number of negative traits. We've both been lone fighters as long as we can remember, and neither one of us is used to taking another person into consideration when it comes to making big life decisions.