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The shower in the bath was only big enough for a single person, so much to Tessa’s disappointment, they cleaned up quickly using what shampoo and soap were available. They weren’t as nice as the things at her shop, but she felt a million times better when she emerged. The scrubs fit just right, and were so comfortable. She sat back on the bed and waited for Jonas as he did the same.
Was this the end of their evening, or just the beginning? Had he changed his mind about wanting to be with her? A few minutes later, he emerged, dressed and smelling completely horse free. She had to admit, it was an improvement.
“You look like McDreamy,” she said with a grin, and wondered if they dared commandeer the room any longer to make use of the bed.
Jonas smiled, but didn’t go to her. Had he changed his mind?
“We’d better be on our way,” he suggested, and she agreed, trying to hide her disappointment as they made their way to the main entrance.
Awkward tension settled between them as they stood beneath the fluorescent hospital lights.
“Crazy night,” she said, hating small talk, but unsure what else to say.
“Trains, taxis, horses and ambulances,” he agreed with a short chuckle. “What next?”
Their answer came as they stepped out to the main entrance, and looked for their cab.
“Not here yet,” Tessa said, feeling increasingly tense. “Things are so overwhelming tonight for everyone.”
“It might take some time.”
Were they still talking about the storm? she wondered.
He seemed preoccupied and distant, and she wasn’t sure what to do.
A stretch limo pulled up and parked in front of them. Tessa watched the driver get out, an older man clad in a long raincoat and hat, who held two huge umbrellas as he made his way to the main entrance.
Looking at her and then Jonas, he approached them with a smile. Tessa figured he was seeking shelter himself or thought they were his clients.
No such luck.
“Tessa Rose?”
She paused in surprise. “Yes, that’s me.”
“I’m your driver, Collins. This way, please,” the driver said, and held the two umbrellas out to them.
“Wait, there’s some mistake,” she sputtered, and then halted. “Did Senator Rose send you?” she asked cautiously.
The driver seemed surprised. “No. I received a call from Ms. Masters to come pick you up here. At your service, miss,” the driver said again, guiding a shocked Tessa to the passenger door, and then helping to guide Jonas to the other side.
Kate sent them a limo?
Only then did she note the name of the transport company embossed on the inside of the rich leather door.
Masters’s Luxury Transport.
“Kate owns the limo service?” Tessa said in shock, catching Collins’s smile in the rearview mirror.
“Yes, ma’am. It’s a small company with only five vehicles, but we do a steady business. Her husband started it many years ago, and left the majority of it to her when he died, with a small share going to me, as well, for my retirement, but I enjoy the work. Hank Masters hired me twenty-five years ago. He was a good man.”
Tessa sat back in the luxurious seat, shocked. She never would have guessed. Kate lived so conservatively, and even took the bus and train to get around town, at least as far as Tessa knew.
Collins leaned in, his arm on the door. “Kate told me what you did for her tonight. She tried to contact me earlier in the evening, to pick up her medicine for her, but I was in Baltimore dropping off a couple to their wedding and couldn’t get back in time. Thank you, ma’am and sir,” Collins said expressively, obviously very fond of his employer.
“I would do anything for Kate,” Tessa said truthfully, taking Jonas’s hand. “And thank goodness Jonas could get that door open,” she said. “I could never have done it by myself.”
“You let me know if you need anything,” Collins said. “I am at your disposal for as long as you need me.”
Kate was obviously trying to help her and Jonas along a little, Tessa guessed. A compartment opened on the other side, sliding out to reveal a champagne bar, strawberries and pretty, foil-wrapped chocolates.
“Some privacy, perhaps?” Collins asked with a twinkle in his eye.
Tessa, still stunned, nodded.
“Enjoy,” was all Collins said as he closed the door and slid into the driver’s seat, which seemed yards away from where they sat. A solid, and probably soundproof, barrier rose between them. A minute later, the car pulled smoothly away from the hospital.
The vehicle seemed to cut through the wind and rain like butter, the dark windows lit only now and then by a flash of lightning.
“I can’t get over this,” she said. “In all the time I’ve known Kate, she never said a word about owning a business.”
“It sounds like it was her husband’s venture, and maybe Collins runs it now,” Jonas agreed.
“I’m so relieved. I always worry about her being comfortable, or paying her bills.”
“People of their generation don’t make an issue out of wealth like some do,” Jonas said. “It’s good to have friends who care about you. Kate obviously values that,” he said.
“I do, too,” Tessa responded, hoping he knew how much she meant it.
A buzzer sounded. Tessa pressed the button that lit up on the console.
“Yes?”
“I have your addresses, ma’am, but Ms. Masters wondered if you would like a late meal, since you may have missed dinner while getting to her apartment. There’s no hurry.”
“Now that you mention it, I am hungry,” Tessa said. “And please call me Tessa. But we’re not really dressed for dinner,” she said. They looked like a couple of surgeons coming home from work.
The idea triggered a fun idea for role play—she would love to play doctor with Jonas, she thought mischievously, but then returned her attention to Collins.
“If you have any preference, let me know. I’m sure your attire won’t be an issue.”
An idea sparked immediately, and Tessa put down the divider, climbing forward to whisper something in Collins’s ear. She knew the perfect place.
Putting the divider back, she eyed the champagne. “Okay then. I guess we’re riding in style,” she said to Jonas as she poured two glasses of champagne and went back to sit by his side, handing him one.
“I’m so glad it wasn’t my dad who sent this car,” she said honestly.
“Why?” Jonas asked, and she wasn’t sure if she detected a note of suspicion in his tone.
“I don’t like owing him anything, or having him monitor my movements. He says he doesn’t, or that he’s just trying to keep me safe, but I know old habits are hard to break.”
“He’s just looking out for you. Dads are usually protective of their daughters.”
“Protective is one thing. Dad takes it to a whole other level.”
“How so?” Jonas asked.
“When I was young, we were close,” Tessa said, remembering.
Her father had been the sun, moon and stars back then. He’d taught her to ride a bike, played tea party with her and had sent her first flowers, delivered by a florist on her thirteenth birthday.
“But he confuses protection with control. I don’t like to be controlled,” she said, remembering less pleasant teenage years when her father had made her life miserable more than once. “As I got older, I realized he wanted me to be who he wanted, not who I am.”
“Isn’t that typical with teenagers and parents? My brothers and I gave my parents a few tough moments, as well. All teenagers rebel.”
“It was more than that. I couldn’t have a normal social life, even more so than what happens with other politicians’ kids. He wanted to approve my friends, my activities, my boyfriends. It seemed like I only mattered so far as I was a reflection on him.”
“I’m sure he didn’t think that,” Jonas said. “Your father has always seemed to genuinely care for you. He’s proud of you.”
Tessa snorted. “That’s the image he shows to everyone else. He was furious when I dropped out of college.”
“Seems like most parents would be.”
“Yeah, probably, but I was only studying law because he wanted me to. I’d gotten into soap-making as a hobby, but I loved it. I was good at it. I was selling soaps online and to classmates out of my dorm room,” she said with a laugh.
“You couldn’t do both?”
“I didn’t want to. Maybe if he had let me do something more creative, more … me, I would have stuck it out, but I hated what I was doing, and I knew I wanted to open a shop. He thought that it was frivolous, the shop, the soap-making. He forbade me to do it. He tried to stop me, at first.”
“How?”
“He blocked the business loans I applied for, and did anything else he could to thwart me,” she said, remembering how ugly that had gotten.
A woman who had been buying her products for a while, who also happened to work in credit services, told Tessa why her bank loans weren’t getting approval.
She’d been furious and felt betrayed by her father in the most hurtful way.
“He really did that?” Jonas said, sitting up, his blind gaze focused on her as she spoke.
She knew he only saw the facade her father provided, the solid politician who cared about country and family. The man who put up with a wayward daughter who was selfish and ungrateful. It was what everyone saw.
James believed his own press, and she figured he really thought he did the things he did for her own good.
“Yeah, he really did that, and more.”
“Like?”
“Well, the worst offense, other than the store, was paying off a guy I was crazy about in college. He was in the music program, wanted to be a guitar player. We were so in love … and suddenly he received a paid scholarship to Juilliard.”
“That’s a huge break,” Jonas said, frowning.
“Yeah. One that my father funded, I found out later. He would have had a heart attack if I had married a rock guitarist.”
“Oh,” Jonas said, frowning deeper. “So what happened with the store?”
“I proved to him that I can play hardball just as well as he can. I knew a city reporter, a guy who was dating a friend of mine, and I told Dad if he didn’t get his nose out of my business, I would leak the story to the press, about how a city councilman, which was his job then, was using his clout with local banks to block small-business loans. If I went on record, it would have been a nasty political blow,” she said. “And I had the paperwork to prove it.”
“That sounds … bad.”
“It was. He backed off and let the loan go through. It didn’t matter. If he hadn’t, I would have just used my trust fund left to me by my grandfather. He couldn’t touch that, but I didn’t want to use it if I didn’t have to.”
She sighed. “We didn’t speak to or see each other for two years after that. Then my mom got sick, and when we were trying to be there for her, and after she was gone, it brought us together again. He had to admit I was doing well, and things got better. He even came to the shop, and we have lunch now and then. But I’m always wary of him.”
“I had no idea,” Jonas said quietly.
“No one does. My exploits, as you know, were fairly well noted in the media. I know I was wrong to act out like I did back then, but I couldn’t help it. He was smothering. He says it’s all out of love, and I think he believes that sometimes, but it’s hard for him to let me be who I am.”
“You’re probably more like him than you think,” Jonas said.
Tessa drew back. “Why would you say that?”
“I’m sorry. It didn’t come out how I meant it. Just that … you’d have to be a strong personality not to let someone like him, with his own strong presence, completely obliterate you.”
She took a deep breath, and released it, relieved. “Yeah. I never thought about it that way, but I suppose that’s probably why we came at each other so hard over the years.”
Jonas was quiet then, his face pensive, and she watched him closely.
“What are you thinking about?”
He blinked, as if not realizing he had mentally wandered off.
“Oh, sorry. I just can’t imagine growing up with all that pressure.”
“Different families have different dynamics.”
“Yeah.”
She noticed he hadn’t taken even one sip of his champagne. “You don’t like your drink?”
“Not thirsty.”
“Me, neither,” she agreed, and set the glasses down. She quickly stripped off her scrubs and returned to the seat, straddling his lap. His arm grazed her bare skin, his hand finding its way down her arm to her waist, hip and leg, his pulse slamming in the base of his throat.
“You’re naked.”
“You noticed.”
She leaned in to kiss him. “I hope Collins takes the long way,” she said, bringing both his hands up to cover her breasts.
