CHAPTER 222: TRUE COLORS

As soon as the lady attending to Evalyn left the room, Evalyn slid down in her chair and spread her legs wider, giving Jack an unobstructed view of her hairless celebrity slit.

She still didn’t make eye contact with him, instead keeping her head down and looking at him through her lashes. All the while, a playful smirk was faintly visible on her lips.

Was she trying to seduce him, or was she escalating because he didn’t respond when she exposed her thighs? Was this just some sort of weird power play, or was she actually interested in him?

And how much of this was just who she is, and how much was her reacting to his soul strength?

He’d been planning to interrogate her anyway, so now was as good a time as any to get answers to his questions.

In the physical world, he leaned back and closed his eyes, ignoring Evalyn entirely.

Then, his soul space self started a simulation that included just the room they were in, and excluded the two ladies attending to his and Madison’s feet.

He made a template of Evalyn and instructed the copy he placed in the simulation to speak honestly without deception, and to hide nothing. He also told her to believe the ladies had left the room and would not be back for a while.

Finally, he told her to forget he had given her instructions, but to continue obeying them. Then, he started the simulation.

As soon as the simulation started, he sat up and looked Evalyn in her eyes and asked, "Why are you here at the Wallingford spa? Are you staying at the hotel? And if yes, why?"

"I own a modeling agency, and we have a branch office here in Stetle. I come here once a month to meet with the staff, and I make it a point to visit this spa when I’m in town."

So, if she was in Stetle once a month, and visited the spa each time she came, the odds of him meeting her were not as low as he had initially thought.

"And why did you choose to sit next to me in the lounge?"

"Usually, if there’s anyone sitting in the center chairs in front of the fireplace, it’s someone rich, or powerful, or both. Someone confident in themselves and their place in the world. So when I saw you, a young man, sitting there, I was intrigued."

And that answered his second question. It was possible she would have sat next to him, even without his soul strength affecting her.

"And what is your reason for showing me your pussy?"

She looked down at her still-exposed crotch, then back up at him, with a look of mild confusion on her face. It seemed she hadn’t fully thought through her own actions.

"I’m not sure. You didn’t seem to care when I showed you my legs, and I just wanted to make you look. Plus, you were paying more attention to her than to me, and I didn’t like the way that made me feel."

So, maybe envy on her part? The old ’why isn’t he looking at me?’ routine.

"Why did you ask to meet my girlfriends?"

"Curiosity. You’re the first man I’ve met who claims to have multiple girlfriends who not only know about each other, but who are happy together. I want to meet them and see if you’re really telling the truth."

"And is that still the only reason?"

"No, I now also want to pick Madison’s brain about her time in prison."

"And will you honor your promise to keep the meeting a secret?"

"Only if it’s convenient. If I can gain some benefit for myself by telling someone, then I will. You’re not part of the Briarwood elite, so there’s nothing you could do to me if I broke my promise."

Madison laughed darkly at Evalyn’s ignorance of Jack’s true power.

"What will you do if I change my mind and cancel the meeting?"

"I’ll find another way to meet them. You have my attention now, and I want answers. If you cancel the meeting, I’ll just hire a private investigator to identify your girlfriends, then arrange to run into them."

"What’s your interest in Jack?" asked Madison.

"Interested in what way?" Evalyn deflected.

"Sexually? Romantically? Some other way?" said Madison uncertainly. She probably hadn’t thought through her question before asking.

"Hmm, sexually? Maybe. He’s no Tanner Chatum, but he’s not bad looking. As for romance, no. Maybe if he was a billionaire or something-"

Evalyn paused at Madison’s suppressed laugh, then continued, "Mainly, I just want to understand him. What kind of man can keep the attention of seven girlfriends?"

"What about his money?" asked Madison.

"What money? So he’s bought a few houses. Big deal. I own a modeling agency and three apartment buildings."

"Let’s say you meet my girlfriends," said Jack, "and you find that they are genuinely happy with me and each other, then what?"

"You’d still have my attention. There’s just something about you that makes you impossible to ignore."

She tapped her chin with a finger for a moment before saying, "Now that I think about it, I’ll probably hire that private investigator regardless of what happens with the meeting."

Great, just great. He’d started this conversation mostly out of curiosity, and because he wanted to understand her motivations for asking to meet his girlfriends. And now that he knew the answers to his questions, he had a problem.

No matter what he did, she would try to dig into his secrets.

He figured that whoever she could afford to hire would probably be less capable than Orin Blake’s investigator, so she was unlikely to learn any more than him. But even that was more than he wanted blasted out on one of her social media posts.

He knew that his relative anonymity would not last forever, but, damn it, he wanted to be the one controlling how much public exposure he received. He wanted to control the flow of his information.

And he would not be able to do that if Evalyn Tanner decided she wanted to give him some publicity. All she needed to do was mention his name in any of her social media posts, and hundreds or millions of people would suddenly become aware of his existence.

Worse, at least a million of those were die-hard fan-boys that would immediately view Jack as some kind of potential threat to their dreams of being Evalyn’s first.

There had already been two separate incidents where someone casually mentioned by Evalyn had later been doxed and all their dirty laundry aired.

He was going to soul bond her one way or another. Either she would accept after their discussion, or he would "encourage" her to accept, like he had with Agent Jackson.

What remained was for him to decide what kind of role she would play in his life going forward. Would he turn her into an obedient servant, like Isabella but minus the zeal? Would he make her his first peripheral girl, or would he add her to his inner circle?

There was one question he wanted answered before he would even consider her for anything but obedient servant.

"Are you really a virgin?"