The Cost of Love (5 page)

He lapsed into silence and stared at the TV, which was off.

Jason stared at his brother in astonishment, not knowing what to say.

A noise from behind the white door was followed by a small voice. “Daddy?”

Jason stood, blinking a few times before wiping at his eyes. He walked around the back of the sofa, leaned down and kissed the top of Rob’s head.

“I love you too, little brother,” he said.

Rob waved him away. “Stop it, you wuss.”

Chuckling, Jason headed for the white door.

Charlotte peered through the spyhole in the front door and gasped.

She stepped back, wiping frantically at her wet eyes, then made the mistake of looking in the mirror. No make-up, her eyes red and puffy from all the crying she’d been doing since the night before. It wasn’t a pretty sight. She looked down at the blue velour trousers and white t-shirt she had thrown on.

It was at that point she began to consider that throwing herself on her sword would be preferable to being seen as she was. Except she didn’t have a sword.

The knock sounded again. Heaving a resigned sigh, she opened the door.

Jason drew in a breath when he saw her. He, of course, looked like he’d just stepped from a photoshoot for World’s Sexiest Men Digest.

“Sorry,” she said, looking down, “I wasn’t expecting anyone.”

“You’ve been crying,” he said softly.

She shrugged and didn’t say anything.

“Because of last night?”

Tears burned at the back of her eyes again and she looked away.

He reached one hand towards her. “I’m sorry. Charlie, please don’t...”

She pulled the collar of her t-shirt up, using it to wipe her eyes, but stopping short of blowing her nose on it. She needed to maintain some tiny amount of decorum.

“Why are you here?”

His arm dropped back down. “I wanted to introduce you to someone, but if you don’t feel up to it...”

She bit her lip and looked up at him. He looked nervous. Scared, even. She was so used to his unwavering self-assurance that it was like looking at a different man. Her gaze went to the car parked on the road behind him. Someone moved inside.

He had come back. That was something, wasn’t it?

“I’m okay,” she said.

Jason beckoned to whoever was in the car. “Thank you for not telling me to get lost,” he said, turning back. “After how stupid I was last night, you’d have every right to.”

Her reply caught in her throat as she watched a man lead a little girl in a pink dress towards them. The girl let go of the man’s hand to run to Jason and he picked her up as if it was the most natural thing in the world, settling her onto his hip. She fastened her dark blue eyes on Charlotte then pressed her face into Jason’s jacket.

“Charlie,” he said, “I’d like you to meet my daughter, Trina.”

To say she was stunned would have been a vast understatement. He’d never once even hinted he had a daughter. Why was he bringing her to meet Charlotte? Where was the little girl’s mother? Charlotte’s stomach dropped as a terrible thought came to her; was Jason married?

She looked at him for clues, but all his expression betrayed as he gazed at the little girl was a deep love. Charlotte tried not to allow the thousand different emotions whirling around in her head to show on her face.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Trina,” she said. “I like your dress. It’s so pretty.”

Trina twisted her face so she could look at Charlotte while still staying pressed against her father and gave a shy smile.

“Pink’s my favourite,” she said.

Charlotte smiled. “Mine too.”

Jason glanced at the man standing behind them. “And this is my brother, Rob.”

If she hadn’t been so shocked by the whole thing, Charlotte would have guessed at the relationship. Rob shared Jason’s dark blond hair, blue eyes and good looks. They were a pair of heartbreakers. But only one of them had broken hers.

“It’s nice to finally meet you, Charlie,” Rob said, smiling.

Trina lifted her head and leaned forward in Jason’s arms. “Why do you have a boy’s name?”

“Well, my name is really Charlotte, but people call me Charlie for short.”

She nodded in understanding, her small face serious. “My name’s Katrina, but everyone calls me Trina.”

“I think Katrina and Trina both sound very pretty.”

The little girl leaned back into her father, smiling at Charlotte.

Jason kissed her temple. “Sweetheart, Uncle Rob’s going to take you home now, but I’ll be back to tuck you in later. Okay?”

She nodded. “’Kay. Can I have ice-cream?”

He glanced at Rob who smiled and nodded. “If Uncle Rob says it’s okay, then you can have ice-cream.”

Trina smiled and wrapped her short arms around Jason’s neck, burying her face in his shoulder. He held her tight, closing his eyes and whispering, “I love, love, love you,” before kissing her forehead and putting her down.

She looked up at Charlotte and waved. “Bye.”

Charlotte’s heart had melted into a puddle in her feet. She waved back. “Bye, Trina. It was nice to meet you.”

Trina ran back to Rob, taking the hand he reached down to her and chatting about what flavour of ice-cream she wanted all the way back to the car and as he strapped her into her child safety seat. She’d narrowed it down to chocolate or mint. Rob suggested she could go with mint with chocolate chips which Trina thought was the best idea in the world.

Jason watched them leave, waving to Trina as they drove away, then turned back to Charlotte. “May I come in?”

Not being in any kind of emotional condition to say no, she nodded and led the way inside. He looked at the tissues scattered over the floor around one end of the sofa, but didn’t comment.

“Would you like something to drink?” she said, more for something to say than because she wanted anything for herself.

“No, thank you,” he said.

She sat in the epicentre of the tissue explosion and he took the other end of the sofa, leaning his elbows on his knees and staring at the floor.

He looked so different to the sleek, sophisticated, confident man she’d met six days ago. That was the professional Jason, the persona he projected for clients. The man in front of her now wore jeans and a blue t-shirt, hair left messy. This was the man she’d come to know, the real Jason.

The Jason she’d fallen in love with.

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly before speaking. “Four years ago, I went out with a girl called Sandy. It didn’t work out. She was kind of self-obsessed and flighty and I broke up with her after three weeks. We didn’t see each other again until nine months later when she turned up on my doorstep with a two week old baby girl telling me she was mine. She hadn’t exactly regarded us as exclusive and there were three possible fathers. I was the last she’d gone to. As you can imagine, I was in shock, but I had my DNA tested and it turned out she was telling the truth.

“As soon as we found out, Sandy told me she was too young to be a mother and if I didn’t want our daughter she was going to give her up for adoption. At first, I didn’t know what to do. I was in a panic. I’d just graduated with a law degree, I was about to start the next phase of my training.

“Sandy suggested I took the baby for twenty-four hours to help me decide. So I did. I looked after this tiny baby girl for a whole day. I bathed her and changed her and fed her and played with her and tried to get her to sleep while I got no sleep whatsoever. By the end of it I was completely frazzled and had no idea how I would cope. But I knew I couldn’t let her go. In my heart, she was mine. So Sandy signed away her parental rights, I got custody, and I was suddenly a father.

“Trina changed everything. I had to put the training on hold, but I still needed a way to make money. My brother was amazing. He was twenty, in his second year of uni. We shared a flat and he said he’d help out as much as he could. Without him there, I don’t know what I would have done. I could have gone home, to our parents, but I didn’t want to burden them because of my mistake. But money was a problem.”

“That was the family emergency you said led to you becoming an escort,” Charlotte said, understanding.

He nodded. “My daughter needed me, so I did what I had to. A friend told me about his cousin who was a male escort. At first I thought the whole idea was insane, but the money he told me I could make was too good to pass up, and I could work it around when Rob could look after Trina.” He laughed softly. “The first time, I was so nervous it’s a wonder I could do anything at all. But I got used to it. I’m not going to lie, I never really disliked doing it. It’s not like I wasn’t with my fair share of girls anyway, just now I was getting paid for it. Although I wasn’t proud of myself either. But for Trina, I carried on. She’s my world and I would do anything to make her life the best it can be. 

“And that’s how things have been for the last three years and I’d got used to it. Until I met you.”

He pulled an envelope from his back pocket and handed it to her. To her shock, it was full of money, it looked like hundreds, or even thousands, all in fifty pound notes.

“That’s the money Tiffany paid me to spend time with you,” he said.

Charlotte hadn’t realised her friend had spent so much, although Tiffany was loaded, thanks to her family. But why was he giving it all back?

“I don’t understand,” she said, still staring into the envelope.

“I don’t want it,” he said. “Keep it, give it to charity, return it to Tiffany, I don’t care. I don’t want money to be with you.”

The tears she’d been battling since the previous night were suddenly burning her eyes again. “Is this because of last night? Do you regret the last five days with me?”

“No!” He leaned towards her and took hold of her hands. “I don’t want you to think that I would need to be paid to be with you. I don’t want this,” he touched the envelope, “to have anything to do with you and me. Money is why I’m with the others. But from the first night, it was never that way with you.” He looked into her eyes. “Other women had my body, but you’re the only one who took my heart.”

Charlotte couldn’t quite believe what was happening. “W-what?”

“Charlie, last night, I didn’t walk out because I didn’t want you. I left because I wanted you too much. But the first time you make love shouldn’t be a business transaction. It should be something beautiful and natural, with someone you love, and someone who loves you back with all his heart.” He looked down. “And maybe, one day, if you can accept what I’ve done and what I am, I could be the one you give your heart to and it could be me.”

Almost unable to speak, she whispered, “You said it should be with someone who loves me with all his heart.”

She watched his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed and drew in a deep breath before answering.

“Charlotte, I’m in love with you.”

She could barely breathe. Was she hallucinating? She’d taken two paracetamols earlier. Hearing things wasn’t a side effect, was it? “I... what... d-do you really mean that?”

He gazed into her eyes with such intensity she felt as if he was looking into her soul.

“I promised you I wouldn’t say anything I didn’t mean, and I never have. I know this is a lot to spring on you all at once, and that with what I do for a living it’s a lot to ask, but if maybe you think you could want me...”

He stopped when Charlotte launched herself across the space between them and threw her arms around his neck.

Wrapping his arms around her, he rubbed her back. “Hey, what...”

“I thought you could never want someone like me,” she sobbed into his shoulder, “and all I wanted was for you to stay and for it to be real, not just for a few days, and then last night you walked out when I practically threw myself at you and I don’t care that you’re an escort, I just love you so much...” The rest was so garbled and muffled against his shoulder that even she didn’t know what she was saying.

He froze. “Uh, could you say that last part again?”

She lifted her face and sniffed. “Which part?”

“The part about you loving me?” he said. “Did I hear that right?”

She smiled through her tears, feeling shy and dropping her eyes to his chest. “I fell in love with you the first time you kissed me.”

“Oh.”

Her eyes sidled back up to see Jason gazing at her, fear, hope and amazement fighting for time on his face.

“Does that mean you would, with what I do for a living and everything, that you would want me?” he said. “I mean, as a boyfriend?”

Charlotte smiled. “In a heartbeat.”

Their arms were still wrapped around each other and she leaned in hesitantly, her eyes dropping to his lips, brushing her nose against his. He closed the rest of the distance.

Maybe she’d had a niggling doubt every time they’d kissed before, that he was just doing it because he had been paid. But no longer. It made all the difference.

His arms tightened around her as their mouths played against each other. Her heart beat faster. She whimpered, pressing closer, wanting more; more contact, more love, more him.

She felt his hands move to her hips, fingers digging through the soft fabric of her trousers. As close as they were, his arousal was unmistakeable, pushing against her thigh.

She broke away, breathing heavily. “Jason, I want more.”

“How much more?”

“Everything.”

He swallowed, shifting against her. “We don’t have to. I can wait for as long as you need. Whenever you’re ready...”