Chapter 9
Louis looked like he was about to cry as his voice choked with emotion.
“Jessica… Miss Bennett, I know I fucked up. I was completely blind to who you really are.”
–
“How about this let’s just go through with the engagement. We can hit the courthouse tomorrow and make it official!”
I gave him a cold smile.
“Mr. Johnson, it’s way too late for that now.”
“You already threw the engagement money back in my face, remember? You can’t exactly take that back.”
My words hit him like a sledgehammer. Louis hung his head in defeat.
Watching his life’s work crumble, Dexter could only stand there sighing helplessly.
The silence was deafening as everyone waited to see what I’d do to the Johnson family next.
After a long pause, I turned to the broken-looking Dexter and let out a small sigh.
“Uncle Dexter, for my father’s sake, I might consider letting your family off the hook.”
“But there’s a catch.”
Dexter’s eyes immediately lit up with hope.
“Miss Bennett, whatever it is – just say it!”
“I’ll do anything to save my family!”
I pointed directly at the sobbing Louis with a cryptic smile.
“Uncle Dexter, you know what they say – you break it, you buy it.”
The moment those words left my mouth, Louis’s expression shifted.
“What the fuck does that mean, Jessica Bennett?”
“Are you trying to get my dad to disown me?”
I spread my hands with a mock-innocent expression.
“Mr. Johnson, weren’t you just begging me to spare your family?”
“Now I’m offering you a solution and you’re bitching about it? Jesus, there’s no pleasing some people.”
I gestured toward my damaged Suburban.
“My supervisor’s vehicle got scratched up pretty bad. Someone needs to take responsibility for that.”
“Carrie’s not important enough to take the fall for this, but you… you’re perfect.”
That last line was specifically for Dexter’s benefit.
I was making my position clear while still giving the Johnson family an out.
After all, this whole mess was Louis and Carrie’s fault – nobody else was involved.
After a moment’s hesitation, Dexter gave me a firm nod.
“Miss Bennett, we’ll do exactly what you’re asking. Tomorrow I’ll call a press conference as head of the Johnson family.”
“And… publicly cut all ties with Louis!”
Louis tried one last desperate appeal, but nothing he said could change the outcome now.
He’d started this mess, and he’d have to finish it.
As for Carrie – the bitch who’d sparked this whole disaster – she was shipped off to D.C. that very night.
Just her phone conversation with my supervisor-the president Trump alone would probably keep her from ever seeing New York again.
After tonight, Johnson Corporation would be completely wiped from the map.
A few simple phone calls from me, and a Fortune 500 company with thousands of employees just vanished overnight.
Like it had never existed at all.
Once everything was wrapped up, I called my dad and specifically told him to do better background checks on his matchmaking
attempts.
But within a week of that incident, my father was back to his old tricks, flooding my phone with calls about “suitable arrangements.”
“Jessica, the Pemberton heir from Boston is very interested. Harvard MBA, family owns half the shipping industry on the East Coast…”
“Dad, I told you-”
“The Montgomery boy from California called personally. Their tech empire is worth billions, and he specifically requested to meet
you…”
“Not happening.”
“There’s also the Richardson family from Chicago. Old money, impeccable reputation…”
I’d hang up, and he’d call back an hour later with a new prospect.
The Pentagon assignment that had brought me to New York was officially over, but I’d requested an extended leave. After years of classified missions and political maneuvering, I craved something I’d never had-the freedom to choose my own path.
For the first time since joining the Pentagon, I wanted to experience what normal people called “falling in love.”
But my father was relentless. “Jessica, at your age, I was already married to your mother. These arrangements aren’t restrictions-they’re opportunities.”
“Opportunities for what? To spend my life with someone who sees me as a political alliance?”
“You think civilian relationships are any.different? At least with our arrangements, expectations are clear from the start.”
Maybe he had a point, but I wasn’t ready to give up on the possibility of something real.
That’s when I decided to stay in New York and try dating like a normal person-without the weight of my family name, without the shadow of the Pentagon, just as Jessica Bennett, a regular woman looking for love.
I rented a modest apartment in Manhattan, nothing like the government safe houses I was used to. For the first time in years, I was living an ordinary life.
And that’s where I met Drake Ashcroft.
He was everything I thought I wanted-charming, successful, handsome in that effortless way that spoke of good breeding and expensive education.
Drake was patient with my reluctance to talk about my family, respectful of my boundaries, and seemingly fascinated by my ‘mysterious” background. He’d joke that I was like a beautiful enigma he wanted to solve.
You’re different from other women I’ve dated,” he’d tell me, brushing a strand of hair from my face. “There’s something… intouchable about you. Like you’re from another world.”
f only he knew how right he was.
For three years, I lived this double life.
To Drake and his social circle, I was just Jessica Bennett-a hardworking lawyer from a “modest background” who preferred not to liscuss her family. I let them assume I was middle-class, that my reluctance to talk about home meant I was embarrassed by humble rigins.
told myself it didn’t matter. That love would transcend social boundaries. That when the time was right, I’d tell Drake !verything-about my real identity, my family’s influence, the power I’d walked away from to be with him.
genuinely believed he loved me for who I was, not what I represented.
was naive enough to think our love story would have a fairy tale ending.
Until that Thursday night when my perfect world came crashing down.
