Jasmine Allen has many vices. Rahul Khan has just one: her.
For the last seven years, Rahul’s been Jasmine’s closest friend. Sure, he’s strong, sexy, and deliciously stern—but she doesn’t care about that. She certainly isn’t tempted by his wicked smile or his genuine sweetness. She can’t be. Because everything Jas touches turns to dust.
Rahul disagrees. Seven years ago, Jasmine touched him, and he’s still standing—still standing, and still hopelessly in love. When disaster drives Jasmine into his spare bedroom, Rahul prepares for a month of painful proximity to the woman he secretly wants.
But when he realises that Jasmine just might want him, too… all bets are off.
She’s wild. She’s reckless. She doesn’t know how to love, and she doesn’t intend to learn.
But she’s also his. And in this game of desire, Rahul’s playing to win.
Wanna Bet?
An Interracial Romance
Talia Hibbert
Nixon House
WANNA BET?: Talia Hibbert
Copyright (c) 2018 by Nixon House
Credits: Cover by Cosmic Letterz
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or within the public domain. Any resemblance to actual events or actual persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
No portion of this book may be reprinted, including by any electronic or mechanical means, or in information storage and retrieval systems, without express written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a review.
Created with Vellum
This one is for my readers. I keep harping on about this, but it bears repeating: you have made my dreams come true.
Contents
Content Note
Prologue
1. Now
2. Seven Years Ago
3. Now
4. Now
5. Six Years Ago
6. Now
7. Now
8. Four Years Ago
9. Now
10. Now
11. Now
12. Now
13. Now
14. Two Years Ago
15. Now
16. Now
17. Now
18. Now
19. Ten Months Ago
20. Now
21. Now
22. Now
23. Autumn
24. Autumn
25. Autumn
Epilogue
Thank You
Become a V.I.P.
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
Sneak Peek: A Girl Like Her
Chapter One
About the Author
Also by Talia Hibbert
Content Note
Please be aware: this story contains themes of parental neglect and abandonment, parental death, and alcohol dependence that could trigger certain audiences
Prologue
1996
When Mummy had lived at home, Jasmine hadn’t liked her.
She was mean. She was always on the phone, and if Jasmine tried to tell her something—even something important about school, or that she’d burned herself on the oven—Mummy would shout.
Except it wasn’t shouting, not really. It was just, Mummy had a way of saying things that made Jasmine feel like the worst little girl in the world. She always said the bad things quietly, but they burned Jasmine just like the oven.
Jasmine wasn’t allowed to use the oven anymore. She wasn’t allowed to use most things in the kitchen now, and it was her own fault. Just like it was her fault that Mummy had gone. She knew that because Mummy had told her.
It had started with a sandwich. Jasmine had wanted lunch, but Mummy hadn’t wanted to make it. No, that wasn’t quite right; Mummy hadn’t wanted Jasmine to talk, to ask, because Mummy hated to be nagged. So Jasmine had sorted herself out because that’s what she always did.
Only she’d hurt herself trying to cut some cheese. She chose a pink knife from the drawer because she liked it, but it was big. Too big, maybe. She wasn’t sure how it happened, but it cut all along her arm, down from her hand to her elbow. Then maybe she fainted.
When she woke up in the hospital, there were nasty black lines in her arm that made her tummy squiggly to look at. Daddy was there, and she was surprised, because he had been on a big long business trip. Then he cried for a bit, and tried to hide it, so she pretended she couldn’t see.
Daddy had told her that Mummy was living somewhere else now. He’d told her that he wouldn’t be going away anymore, because he was going to look after Jasmine all the time. Jasmine had been happy, because Daddy seemed to have all the niceness that Mummy didn’t. He was her favourite. He was kind and he coloured with her, and listened when she did her reading, and always wrote a note in her reading log for school. Jasmine tried really hard and finished this book in three days! Like that.
So she was happy about Mummy being gone. But then Daddy had said… he’d said, very quietly and softly one night, before she went to sleep: “Would you like to see Mummy sometimes? On the weekends?”
And Jasmine had thought that she would say no, only she said yes.
And then the strange thing began. Because Jasmine hadn’t like Mummy when Mummy lived at home. But now, Jasmine liked Mummy a lot.
She didn’t know why. It confused her sometimes. But Mummy still didn’t like Jasmine, so at least that was the same.
Jasmine had been sitting here, at the bottom of the stairs, for a really long time. Waiting. Daddy was sitting with her too, and they were looking at the front door. They had been looking at the clock on the wall, when they first came down; but soon they had given up on that.
Jasmine was good at telling the time. The teacher had told Daddy so, and Daddy had bought a clock for every room in the house. He always asked her, “What time is it, Jazzy?” And when she told him, he’d smile so big, and tell her she was a very clever girl.
He hadn’t asked her about the time for a while, but she knew it anyway. She was watching the clock. They had been waiting for fifty-four minutes.
Mummy was late.
Mummy was always late. Every Sunday she’d come and pick Jasmine up and take her out, and every Sunday she would be late. But Jasmine thought Mummy had never been so late as this.
And even though Jasmine knew that when Mummy came, she would be tired and drinking her big coffee, and wouldn’t want music on in the car because of her head, and wouldn’t want to talk about school because it was boring, and would take Jasmine to that strange man’s smelly house, and sit and kiss him while Jasmine played in the corner… Even though Jasmine knew all that, she felt really scared that Mummy might not come.
She felt scared the way she sometimes did at night, when she woke up and saw funny shapes in the dark, and her heart beat very fast. But she didn’t want anyone to know she was scared, and especially not Daddy, because she knew she shouldn’t be. She shouldn’t like Mummy at all, because Mummy wasn’t nice. She shouldn’t want Mummy to come.
But she did.
Daddy squeezed her hand and said, “Give me a second, Jazzy. I’ll be right back.”
Jasmine nodded, and Daddy got up and went.
Some of the girls at Jasmine’s new school said mean things about Daddy. They said he was ugly and scary because one of his teeth was gold, and he had tattoos on his hands. That was why Jasmine had trouble at her new school. Not just because everyone spoke funny, all posh, or because they had to wear grown-up clothes as a uniform, but because they were mean about Daddy. They called him common. Jasmine didn’t know what it meant, but if Daddy was
common, she wouldn’t mind being common at all.
And it turned out she was. Because she kicked the first girl who said it, and the girl cried, and Jasmine got into trouble, and now everyone called her common too.
She watched the clock while ten more minutes passed. Then she got bored.
Jasmine got up and wandered through the house after Daddy, listening for his voice. Daddy had a loud voice. It was hard sometimes to go through the house on her own, because this house was so much bigger than where they used to live. But she heard him eventually, and followed the noise until she found the room he was in.
He was angry.
Jasmine hid by the door, because that’s what she’d always done when Mummy was angry. Daddy was talking to someone; he was on the phone. She mustn’t interrupt grownups on the phone.
“You listen to me,” he was saying. He had the growly bear voice he used sometimes, when he was reading stories, but it sounded scarier. “You do not leave my baby waiting by the door for an hour.”
He was walking around the room, up and down and up and down.
“I don’t give a fuck,” he shouted. Jasmine sucked in a breath. She’d never heard Daddy say a bad word before. Mummy said the bad words. “You couldn’t pick up the fucking phone, if you were at home all along?” He said. “You couldn’t ring me?”
He kept walking up and down. Was quiet for a minute.
Then he snorted. “Just shut up, Carol. Stop changing your story. I’m not interested. And no, you can’t come tomorrow night. You see her regular or not at all. That’s the deal.”
Carol was Mummy’s name.
“Fine,” Daddy shouted suddenly. “Fine. I don’t want you around her anyway. I don’t give a shit.” And then, after a second, he laughed. But he didn’t sound very happy. “You fuckin’ try it. I dare you.” He huffed like a bull. “Yeah, I thought not. I’m done talking.”
Jasmine watched through a crack in the door as Daddy pressed the button and stared at the phone in his hand. Then he wrapped the phone’s curly wire around his wrist, and pulled and pulled and pulled, until the wire came out of the wall. Jasmine knew that Daddy was very strong, but she’d never seen him do anything like that.
He threw the phone across the room.
After that day, Mummy picked Jasmine up a few more times. But then, one Sunday, she didn’t come. And Daddy called her again, but she didn’t answer.
And she never came back. Ever.
1
Now
“We should get back to work. We’ve been gone well past lunch.” Usually, Asmita said that sort of thing with firm authority—the kind that might convince Jasmine to listen.
But today, Asmita didn’t say it at all; she mumbled it tearily into a McDonald’s napkin. So Jasmine felt well within her rights to ignore the suggestion. Instead, she rubbed a hand over her friend’s narrow back in slow, soothing circles and murmured, “Not yet, love. Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”
Asmita hiccuped.
A nearby staff member looked up from his sweeping brush to glower at them. “Are you ladies buying anything today, or…?”
Jasmine stifled a sigh and dredged up a smile. “So sorry. We will, eventually. Only, we’re having a crisis.” She nodded towards her dour friend, whose perfectly kohl-lined eyes were looking dangerously red and runny. “You understand, don’t you?”
The employee pressed his lips together, then huffed out a breath. “Suppose.”
“Oh, thank you!”
He moved on with a dark glare.
Asmita tutted between sniffles. “We’re not buying anything. You can’t stand McDonald’s.”
True. Dad had made Jasmine work at the nearest restaurant for a year when she turned sixteen, to teach her the value of money or some such fatherly nonsense. Just the scent of those crispy golden fries was making her feel slightly sick.
But they had been walking past this McDonald’s when Asmita had started almost, sort of, maybe, crying. Jasmine had bundled her into the cursed establishment before anyone important could see the indomitable Asmita Shah in tears.
Mita would’ve done the same for her, after all.
So Jasmine gave her friend a quelling look and got right to the point. “Is it something to do with that woman?”
Asmita glared. The usual effect of her flinty gaze was marred by a sheen of unshed tears. Rather than vaguely terrifying, she looked… woeful? Wretched? Something along those lines.
“It is,” Jasmine nodded sagely. “I can tell.”
“Piss off,”Asmita muttered. Then she gave a sudden sob, and actual, real, live tears spilled from her eyes. She blinked in obvious shock. It wasn’t often that Asmita’s body disobeyed her commands, and Jasmine knew very well that she’d been commanding it not to cry.
Christ, this whole thing was unsettling. Jasmine had watched in alarm for months as Asmita was slowly infected by humanity’s greatest curse: love. Now her friend’s infamous self-control was shattering beneath Cupid’s heel.
It was enough to give a girl nightmares, really.
But what Asmita needed right now was support; not further doom and gloom. So Jasmine filed away her own horror at the situation and tried to think like a normal human being.
“Darling,” she murmured. “Just spill. You’ll feel so much better.” At least, that was what the magazines always said.
The words seemed to work. Or maybe it was the tone, or the back-rubbing, or the vibe—Jasmine had been trying to project comfort. Whatever it was, something made Asmita talk. Or rather, word-vomit.
“IjustlovehersomuchandshesjustperfectandI’msoohmygodIdon’tdeserveherbutIcan’tletgo—”
“Asmita!”
The rampaging jaw snapped shut. Embarrassed eyes met Jasmine’s. Asmita’s olive cheeks darkened as she cleared her throat. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, love, just—slower, perhaps. Take a breath.”
“Right. Um…”
Jasmine waited patiently as her friend corralled obviously messy thoughts.
“Well… We’ve been dating for a while.”
Yes. I’m aware. By Jasmine’s count it had been over three months since Asmita first showed signs of losing her fucking mind.
“And she wants to take things to… the next level.”
Jasmine stared. Was that some kind of euphemism for public group sex? Because Asmita hated exhibitionism.
“I mean, she wants to be…” Asmita lowered her voice, eyes wide. “Girlfriends.”
Jasmine’s brows flew up. “That’s why you’re upset?”
Asmita nodded solemnly, her lips pressed together so tight, they were almost white.
“But I thought you liked her? A lot?”
“I do!”
“So isn’t that what you want?” Jasmine wasn’t an expert on romantic relationships, since she’d never actually had one, but the love songs and the rom-coms and the dirty romance novels were all pretty clear. Asmita should be happy about this development. Shouldn’t she?
Apparently not. “I can’t, Jas! I’m not—I’m not good enough for her!”
Jasmine stiffened. “Asmita. I hope you, my intelligent, hard-working, gorgeous, funny friend, are not putting yourself down over some girl.”
“She’s not some girl! She’s special. And I…” Asmita looked down, her jaw shifting, her long, silky hair falling over her eyes. When she spoke again, her voice was soft and hopeless. “Ah, Jas. You know what I’m like. I’ll ruin it. I ruin everything.”
For a moment, Jasmine couldn’t speak. She’d said those same words so often, in the middle of the night, in the safety and threat and possibility of darkness—to herself.
Hearing them come from a woman she valued so highly felt like a slap.
Determination steeled her spine. She caught Asmita’s face in her hands, forcing her friend to look up and meet her eyes. “Now you listen to me, you absolute mango. You are currently afflicted with a grievous illness known as feeling, emotion, sentiment—the virus’s name
s are numerous. But no matter what you call it, the result is the same: you can’t see things clearly. You can’t trust your own judgement right now. So trust mine. No-one—no-one on earth, Asmita—is too good for you.”
Mita sniffed loudly and opened her mouth, as if to argue.
Jasmine narrowed her eyes. “Shut it. I’m talking.”
Mita’s mouth shut with a click.
“Thank you. Now; I’m sure your magical dream girl—“
“Pinal.”
“Yes, yes, Pinal.” Jasmine did know the woman’s name. Had met her. Tentatively liked her. But that could change at any time, if she fucked with Asmita. “Pinal is delightful. Divine. But you’re Asmita fucking Shah. You could shag the Queen herself and she’d say thank you. So you’ve never done this sort of thing before—who gives a fuck? You’ve never tried. You’ve never wanted to try. But now you do. And, because you’re an irritating bitch, you’ll be brilliant at it first time, just like you are with everything else.”
Asmita gave a wobbly, wet sort of smile. “Do you think?”
“I said it, didn’t I? Stop fishing for compliments, you cow.”
Asmita’s smile widened. “But I like compliments. And you were really on a roll.”
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