Jasper Vale (The Edens)

“Eloise.” Jasper’s hand wrapped around my elbow, stopping me before I could round the corner and disappear down the block toward my house. “Let me explain.”

“No.” I whirled, shaking loose his grip. “How could you do that? How could you tell them? We agreed to keep it a secret. Maybe you don’t care what people in Quincy think about you. But I do. This is my town. This is my home. This is my family. You told Talia. My sister. You are a thief, Jasper Vale. You are a thief.”

He’d robbed me of the chance to explain.

Gone was my opportunity to fix this. Gone was my hope to keep this quiet until I’d worked up the courage to tell my family the truth. I glanced across the street, toward The Eloise.

Did this mean my hotel was gone too?

My chin began to quiver, fury and frustration bubbling to the surface as tears. “This changes everything.”

“You said you’d tell them.”

“I didn’t, okay?” My hands flew out at my sides. “Not yet. I was going to but . . .”

But I was a coward.

“You should have checked.” I poked a finger into his chest. “You should have waited.”

“Fuck. I know.” He dragged a hand through his dark hair, and that was it. End of explanation.

“‘I know’? Just . . . ‘I know’?” My hands balled into fists. Never, not once in my life, had I wanted to hit someone. Even as a child when I’d fought with Lyla or Talia over a toy. Even my freshman year of high school when Mateo had snuck into my room and read my diary. Today? I wanted to punch my husband in that handsome face.

“I’m sorry.” Jasper sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t plan on telling them. It’s been festering. We were sitting in the coffee shop and it just came out.”

“It just came out. Seriously? It just came out?”

We’d kept this a secret for a month. Jasper and I had avoided each other, relying on texts and emails for the few times we’d needed to exchange details. Otherwise, we let our lawyers do the speaking.

But today, it had just come out?

“I can’t believe this is happening.” My phone vibrated in my coat pocket. I pulled it out and turned it so Jasper could read Talia’s name too. “Would you like to answer this?”

Jasper’s jaw ticked.

“Didn’t think so.” I declined the call and returned it to my pocket. Before I spoke to anyone, I needed to think of what to say. “Oh my God. My parents.”

Mom and Dad were going to kill me.

My hands dove into my hair, pulling hard at the strands.

“Eloise—”

“We were so close to having this behind us.” My voice was practically a shriek. “So freaking close. We just need the annulment and—”

“We’re not going to get it.”

Now he sounded like my attorney. “We might.”

“We won’t. Which means we’re looking at a divorce.”

Divorce. My insides twisted. My lawyer had warned me about this. She’d said it would be easier if we just got divorced, if we didn’t even bother asking for an annulment because they were so tricky to obtain.

But I didn’t want a divorce. I wanted this marriage gone. Erased.

I wanted it to be like it had never happened.

I wanted it to be my secret.

Forever.

That was the real reason I hadn’t told my family. Because I’d let myself hope for the annulment. I’d convinced myself that I could make Jasper agree to keep this secret permanent. Then no one would ever have to know. Not my parents. Not my siblings. No one.

Stupid Eloise.

Another stupid idea.

I should have told them. Now it was too late.

Jasper had done it first.

The lump in my throat began to close, but I managed to croak out a single word. “Why?”

He checked over his shoulder, taking in the sidewalk, making sure no one was close enough to hear. “Lyla has a crush on me.”

I blinked, leaning in closer because I couldn’t have heard him right. “Say that again.”

“Lyla. Your sister.”

“Yes, I’m aware that Lyla is my sister,” I deadpanned.

“Apparently she’s got a thing for me.”

“No, she doesn’t.” Did she?

Lyla hadn’t mentioned it. Though we’d both been busy lately and hadn’t spent a lot of time alone together. In the past month, I’d only seen her at Mom and Dad’s, when we’d all met at the ranch for a family dinner. The house had been noisy and chaotic. Not exactly the best time for sisters to gab about their crushes. But still, she would have hinted, right?

“How do you know? Did she ask you out or something?” My head began to spin. “Do you . . . do you like her too? Wait. Was that why you told Foster and Talia? Because you want to date Lyla? Does she know we got married too?”

I’d run from the coffee shop so fast that I hadn’t even thought about Lyla.

“Oh my God. You want to date my sister. And we’re married.” I swayed on my feet, about to double over and vomit on his boots.

But Jasper’s arms were there, wrapping around me, holding me steady. “Breathe.”

My lungs wouldn’t work. My stomach was doing cartwheels.

This was happening too fast. Nothing was going according to plan. Jasper was . . . mine.

He wasn’t mine but he was mine. Sort of.

How was I ever going to face him if he fell in love with Lyla? How was I going to forget that he’d given me the best orgasms of my life? How was I going to see them together, knowing what it felt like to have him inside my body?

“Breathe, angel.” Jasper’s voice, low and smooth, sounded in my ear.

“I can’t.” My chest heaved. The world tilted sideways. Was this an anxiety attack?

Yep, I was going to puke.

One moment I was swaying on my feet, the next, they were swept out from beneath me.

Jasper cradled my body, holding me against his chest as he walked.

I stiffened, opening my eyes because I wasn’t ready to go back to the coffee shop. To face my sisters.

But Jasper walked toward the street, carrying me to his Yukon.

With a pop, the passenger door opened and he set me on the black leather seat. He closed me inside, then rounded the hood, climbing behind the wheel and starting the engine. With a quick glance in his mirrors, he reversed away from the curb and headed down Main.

He hit a button on the console. My seat warmers. Then he turned up the temperature, glancing over with his eyebrows furrowed.

How did he know I was cold?

Oh, right. I was shaking. Was it the cold? Or was it sheer panic?

I didn’t ask where we were going. I didn’t care. I just closed my eyes, waiting until the warmth seeped into my skin and the trembling in my fingers stopped.

The SUV slowed before Jasper took a corner. Then the whirl of the tires changed to a crunch as we turned off the pavement and onto a gravel road. I cracked my eyes as a street sign flew by.

Alderson Road. He was taking me to the A-frame.

Strange, how I’d only been there once, but the idea of that cabin soothed some of my worries. And this conversation, no matter the outcome, would be best had in private.

“Sorry,” I whispered. “For freaking out.”

“My fault.” Jasper shifted, his wrist draped over the wheel. “Better?”

I nodded. “Getting there.”

The drive down the gravel road settled more of my nerves. The rumble of the wheels, the bounce and jostle you didn’t have on asphalt. It reminded me of the ranch, of the countless hours I’d spent riding shotgun with Dad as he’d checked pasture fences or counted cattle.

My queasy stomach and clammy palms were gone by the time we reached the A-frame. My knees wobbled, just slightly, as I hopped out of the Yukon and followed Jasper inside, where I was greeted by the scent of a wood fire and Jasper’s cologne.

“What happened to your dining room table?” I asked. Instead of the round oak table that had been here the last time I’d visited, there was a black folding card table with four matching chairs.

“I bought this place.” He tossed his keys on the small kitchen island. “I called the owners a few weeks ago to ask if I could extend my rental. They were wanting to sell the place. So I bought it. Most of the furnishings too. But they wanted the table.”

“You bought this?” Did that mean he was staying in Quincy? Even after the annulment?

My head started to spin again, so I walked to the card table, sinking into one of the folding chairs.

“I’m sorry,” Jasper said. “I’m sorry I told them.”

“Who knows?”

“Just Foster and Talia. It happened a minute before you came in.”

I swallowed hard. “And Lyla?”

He blew out a long breath, leaning against the island. “I’m guessing Talia will tell her.”

“But you didn’t?”

He shook his head. “I didn’t know she felt that way.”

My heart began to race. “And do you? Feel that way about her?”

“No.”

Relief crashed through my bones, my muscles sagging. Maybe it was silly, feeling this claim on Jasper. Okay, it was definitely silly. We were former lovers and soon-to-be former spouses. But still, the idea of him with Lyla made me want to scream.

“I’ll have to tell Lyla,” I said. “If Talia didn’t already.”

My phone vibrated in my coat pocket again. I didn’t want to check to see who was calling this time. I was too scared to see Mom or Dad on the screen.

“I’m mad at you,” I murmured.

“I’m mad at you too. You said you’d tell them in a couple weeks. You didn’t.”

I frowned. “I’m aware.”

“Don’t you think it will be better this way? If people find out from us instead of gossip?”

“Or not at all,” I murmured.

Jasper studied my face, his eyes narrowing. “You weren’t going to tell them, were you?”

The blame, the scorn, in his voice made me wince. “No one needed to know.”

His jaw clenched. “That’s why you want the annulment.”

“Do you really want everyone to know?”

Jasper didn’t answer. He just cast his gaze toward the island and the stack of mail on its surface.

It turned quiet. Too quiet. He might be okay with these long stretches of silence but they made me squirm. The vinyl beneath my thighs squeaked.

He had a right to be angry. So did I.

But the damage had been done. By both parties.

Hiding this marriage was no longer an option.

“How did you tell them?” I asked Jasper. “Foster and Talia? How did you tell them?” Maybe I could steal his explanation because at the moment, my own eluded me.

He sighed. “Told them I fucked up.”

Brutal. But effective. And true. “Then what?”

“Said I married your sister. Talia assumed it was Lyla. Then you walked in the door.”

To freak out and announce our marriage.

“Ugh.” I dropped my elbows to the table, letting my head fall into my hands. “What a cluster.”

My phone vibrated again. The curiosity was too much, so I slipped it out. Talia. She’d called three times. Lyla, only once.

“How do we fix this?” The question was for myself, but Jasper answered.

“What if we called off the lawyers?”

“Huh? What do you mean? We have to get the annulment. Or . . . a divorce. We need the lawyers.”

Jasper stared at that stack of mail on the island, his expression focused on whatever was on the top. “What if we stay married?”

I rubbed my ears. They didn’t seem to be working right today. “Say that again.”

He stood straighter, his gaze whipping to me. “What if we stayed married?”

“You want to stay married. How does that fix this?”

“Hear me out. What if this marriage wasn’t some drunken mistake?”

“Except it was a drunken mistake.” Had he forgotten that we’d both been riding the alcohol express as we’d walked into the Clover Chapel and messed up our lives?

“We know that,” he said. “No one else does.”

“I don’t understand.” I pressed my fingers to my temples, to the headache that had sent me to Lyla’s coffee shop in the first place. It had faded momentarily, during my panic attack. But it was brewing again, raging behind my skull.

“Instead of hiding this, what if we owned it? Tell everyone we got married. Admit it was rushed and reckless. But tell them there’s something here and we’re going to see if it works.”

My hands fell along with my jaw. “Stay married. To me? But I just announced to the coffee shop that we’re getting an annulment.”

Jasper lifted a shoulder. “We tell them it’s not a for-sure thing. Which it isn’t. And that we’re just exploring our options.”

Stay married. That was impossible. Wasn’t it?

Jasper’s gaze flicked to the stack of mail again. It was subtle. But something on that stack kept drawing his attention.

“What are you not telling me?” I asked.

He faced me, pinning his shoulders back, making them seem even broader. “I need a favor.”

“And I’m guessing that favor has something to do with whatever you keep staring at.” I pointed to the mail.

Jasper nodded, plucking a square card from the stack. “I need to go to a wedding at the end of June. Go with me.”

“As your wife?”

“As my wife.” The way his voice dipped, low and gravelly, sent a shiver rolling over my shoulders.

“And after the wedding?”

“We’ll get divorced.”

Divorced. There’d be no annulment. No erasing this mistake.

“I know you want this to be annulled,” he said. “But there was always a good chance we’d have to go through with a divorce instead.”

My shoulders slumped. “I know.”

“I’ll take the blame,” he said. “You can tell the world it was my fault. Tell your family I was a horrible husband. Tell them I cheated or something.”

“No.” My lip curled. I wasn’t going to paint Jasper out to be a person he wasn’t. “They’d hate you for that. Foster would hate you. We’ll just tell them it didn’t work out.”

Jasper took one step toward me, then stopped. “Does that mean you’ll do it?”

Did it? My mind was reeling.

I’d gone to Eden Coffee for some caffeine to chase away a headache. Less than thirty minutes later, Jasper and I were discussing a fake marriage.

“Who?” I asked. “Whose wedding?”

Jasper dropped his gaze, staring at his boots for a long moment. Then he lifted his chin and whatever openness he’d had a moment ago in those dark eyes was gone. They looked shielded. Hard.

“My ex-wife’s.”