The Union

The Union THE ESCORT BOOK THREE KRISTEN JAYE KRISTEN JAYE All rights reserved. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please do so through your retailer’s “lend” function. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at [email protected] Jaye, Kristen. The Union, (The Escort, #3) Copyright 2023 Originally published in 2016 as “Ties That Bind” by Kristen Strassel Cover Design by Dee J. Holmes of Bad Unicorn Design Contents Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Also by Kristen Jaye Chapter One Leah Kari would arrive any minute to bring me to the airport. My suitcase lay open on my bed, swimming in a sea of crumpled clothing. I hadn’t taken a shower. I may not have admitted it to myself, but I knew how this night would end. “Good news!” Kari called out when she came into my bedroom. I hadn’t seen her smile like that at anyone but Reno in a long time. “Someone with a law degree finally exercised a little common sense and tossed that garbage lawsuit out of court. It’s over.” “Is it?” On any other night I would’ve been ecstatic. I held up a dress, but it was all wrong. I couldn’t wear it on TV. “What about all those lawsuits you threatened me with the other night? I want to countersue, by the way. For slander and defamation of character.” “Absolutely. But you’re safe. The precedent has been set. Nobody can prove you willfully did anything harmful.” Kari frowned, picked up a discarded jacket, folded it, and put it in the suitcase. “Leah, you’re going to miss your flight. Let me help you.” “I can’t do it.” I sat on the edge of the bed, suddenly lightheaded. She took the dress from me. “This one’s never been my favorite. What about the blue wrap dress? Do you want to bother with a dress? You’ll have to sit with your legs crossed the entire time or the camera will see right up your skirt.” That actually got a laugh out of me. “I meant I’m not going to New York.” Kari pushed aside a pile of clothes and sat next to me. She squeezed my hand tight. “Sweetie, you have to go.” She was never this understanding. “You’ll lose your job if you don’t.” I shook my head. “My job doesn’t exist anymore. And this is an interview. On live TV.” My heart kicked against my ribcage so hard I thought it would land in my suitcase. “I can’t face him with all of America watching.” Waiting for us to fuck something else up. To fall flat on our faces. All those people who loved me so much changed their minds as soon as they found out I had to hire my boyfriend. “I wish I could tell you it won’t be hard. I can’t. But they’re expecting you there in a couple hours. You approved the questions you can be asked—” “It’s live TV. They can slip in anything. And they will, for ratings. But it’s not that. This can’t be the first time I see Jagger again, in a TV studio with people waving powder brushes in our faces and asking us to check our microphones.” “What will you tell Jagger if you don’t go?” I had to think about my answer. I hadn’t gotten past the debilitating anxiety over getting on the plane to get that far in the plan. “That I value whatever scrap of our relationship that’s left too much to turn it into a publicity stunt.” He had to understand. And even more than that, I hoped he felt the same way. Kari nodded. “I support whatever you decide to do. But as your friend, I have to also say that I think you’ll do far more damage by not going.” “Yeah, right. I’ll get fired.” I rolled my eyes. “Well, yeah, that’s pretty important. It’s your only source of income. Take it from me, it goes fast when there’s nothing coming in to replenish it. I was actually talking about Jagger. This can’t be any easier on him than it is on you. And he might think you don’t want to see him. That he was right about you being better off without him.” I glanced at my alarm clock. I had minutes to decide if I could go through with it. Kari made a lot of sense. I hated to think of anything as a loss. I liked to think that something could be gained from every experience, but all this interview would do would kick the dust back up. Put us back in the public eye. It didn’t matter how rehearsed our answers were, they could still be twisted and taken out of context. We approved the questions, but that gave us no control over each other’s answers. If this was the last time I would see Jagger, I refused to let it be like this. “I can fix the rest of it if I don’t go. But if I go and it’s bad, I can’t fix that,” I finally said. Apparently not even the best unemployed attorney in the country could change my mind. “Okay.” Kari stood up, surveying