Jasmine pours some hot water over the tea bag in her office, on the fourth floor of the prestigious St. James hotel, and sighs for the hundredth time that day, her hand threading through the loop of the tea cup handle.

Carrying the teacup and saucer back to her desk, she leaned back against the desk, staring out through the wide windows overlooking the London eye and Big Ben with the river Thame flowing through central London–the perfect backdrop to camera-wielding tourists. The brilliant blue sky and humid sun beat down on the unique architecture, and large green trees reflected brightly in waves of heat.

The view made it feel like she was living in a postcard.

She took a sip of tea. The normally refreshing warmth of English black tea was rich and smooth on the tastebuds. Staring at the dark rose-red liquid she found it lacked the effect it normally did on her. She sighs again, setting down the cup of tea and rested her head against her hands.

The day of her sister's wedding just one month ago haunted her.

Usually it was the first born to head into matrimony but fate had different plans. Turned out, the baby of the family that tied the knot before her older siblings. Jasmine was middle child with an older brother– Zayn and her baby sister, Camelia. Unlike she and Zayn, Camelia knew what and who she wanted from life at a ripe young age. Jasmine was happy for her. Truly. It just had her looking at her own lonely life. Except for one particular event stood out in her mind.

Mr. Gorgeous aka Cristiano Russo–the Italian heartthrob she met at the wedding who came along and fell from the sky. Seeing him for the first time descending from the helicopter while she was tucked safely high above the highest tower in the castle her sister was married in was somewhere between a dream and reality.

Her thoughts flash back to the day.

"Expecting someone important?" Jasmine asks, her eyes glued to the newly landed helicopter looking out into the field and narrowing her eyes to get a closer view of the occupants. The ignition is shut off and the rotor blades slow and quiet.

A figure gracefully eases out of the helicopter's door and jumps out. It was a man. Even from their distance they could tell he was incredibly handsome. Tall, dark and dressed in a black elegant suit.

The mysterious man slicks back his black hair and adjusts his suit, striding off the helipad.

Jasmine releases a slow whistle.

"For the first time in my life I'm impressed." Jasmine says softly. "Who is he?"

"I can't remember his name..." Camelia murmurs. "All I know he's Italian," she adds, "he owns several winery's and shipping businesses that span the globe."

"Hello Mr. Gorgeous." Jasmine purrs. "I've heard Italian's take lessons in kissing."

Camelia laughs. "Yeah right. Could this be the guy you've been waiting for to fall out of the sky...?" She said.

Jasmine silently contemplated what her words meant and it dawned on her then and there. She asked her sister to include her in her wish before blowing out the candles of her birthday cake months before.

"Oh. My. God." She turns to her with wide eyes, gripping Camelia's arm and squeezing. "On your birthday I recall asking you to wish....Seriously?!? You think? I sensed something inside me shift when I saw him...and he literally came right out of the sky!"

Camelia shrugs her shoulders. "Could be. You know what they say: wishes do come true."

"Then you should be wishing more often my dearest sister, cause I think I just fell in love." Jasmine sighs, laying a hand over her speeding heart.

On that day she could say for once in her life she was impressed. From those mere moments her heart reached out to him. Her body sensed a pull towards the mysterious man walking off the helipad in his dark suit and impressively dominating presence demanding attention. It was the first time she'd felt her heart pound with a strange new desire. It was the first time she'd ever been wildly, truly infatuated with anyone.

With dark chocolate colored eyes that melted tender hearted women and deliciously tanned Italian skin. Hair that looked dark as sin, thick, silky, and glossy slicked back from his face and perfectly layered as though he were a model stepping out of a magazine. It wasn't just his 6' 3" impressive height that made him stand out from the rest of the men, it was the aura of power emitting from him that was dominating and worn just as casually as his pitch black tux.

His dark gaze absorbed every thing about her during the reception dinner. A dominate male kind of sweep that spoke of power, privilege and possessiveness that tingled every recesses of her body. He seemed so attractively different from other men. He relentlessly flirted with her, made her laugh, blush, squirm in her own skin as he shared the secrets of his country all the while with only one thing on his mind.

However, she was too green, too naive to understand, too engrossed in his perfect white, winning smile. She never taken the hint of his intentions or about the true nature of his invitation wanting her for one sole purpose.

Until that night.

She recalled the tearful departure of her sister and new husband from the castle. Jasmine had smiled as she watched her sister drive away and waved, blowing kisses and sending her love, hoping Camelia looked back from the dark tinted windows to notice. She'd felt a part of her detached, was missing, as she stared after them until the limo vanished out of sight.

Jasmine stared out of her office window reluctantly rewinding back to the last part of that night.

A lone tear escaped down her cheek as sadness descended over her. She would miss her dearly. There would be no more late nights when they talked on the phone. No more staying up late at night watching movies in their pajamas fighting sleep until their eyelids closed. Her little sister wouldn't be waiting for her at their parents house when she came to visit.

It was a sad realization. Of course, they dreamed of the day they would be married. Planned out their lives in their minds and hoped for an endless love to sweep them off their feet. They were girls who dreamed big and wished for a magical, mind sweeping romance. The shock of being separated and sharing their lives with different people made the reality of it difficult to absorb. They had always been so close, sharing each other's secrets and now her baby sister had someone else to share her thoughts and secrets with.

To her surprise Cristiano was beside her, seeming to sense her melancholy thoughts, offering his elbow in invitation like a true gentleman, giving her comfort in his own way. She had instinctively curled her hand into the crook of his proffered arm with a tender smile and re-entered the castle returning back to the reception.

They found a table in the nearly empty ballroom. Inviting her to join him by holding out a chair was such a old-fashioned courtly gesture and extremely romantic and once Jasmine was seated he gently eased it closer to the table. She felt his fingertips accidentally brush her shoulders and she thanked the heavens she was sitting because her legs turned to jelly.

Her mood soared high into the heavens thinking he was so interested in her as he seated himself beside her. Their eyes locked and spirals of electricity traveled down Jasmine's body to her toes and something suddenly twisted in her chest.

Unconsciously, she touched that very spot with the palm of her hand.

Cristiano motioned with a quick hand in the air for a passing waiter asking for two glasses of champagne in his thick and sexy mixed accent. Jasmine blushed a bright pink as champagne was poured. Cristiano held his glass and she did the same as they toasted.

"To you Bella, and to our future," he says, clinking their glasses together.

His words warmed her soul and gave her hope.

They sip at the champagne slowly watching one another over the rim. Fascinated as he swallowed, she watched the lift and fall of his Adam's apple where he had undone his bow tie. His throat was golden, as was the inch or so of his chest visible in the V at the top of his pristine white shirt.

She lowered her glass from her lips and she continued on watching him lick his lips slowly as he gaze moved over her, feeling faint. Shaking her head to distract herself from continuing to stare, she decides to strike up a conversation to find out more about the man behind the face. They flirted during the reception dinner until she realized how little she knew about him personally.

"Your accent is. . . Different," she starts. "You're Italian yet you have a British accent mixed in. Do you live in England?"

Cristiano's lips curl handsomely, "I did at one point, tesoro," placing his champagne glass on the table. "My father sent me to school there for years hence my accent. I lived there for quite some time and surrounded by these Brits one could only absorb it," he explains.

Jasmine's shoulders sagged slightly. Listening to him say he lived there once only meant he didn't anymore and the news dashed her hopes. Having relocated from California to England just a year ago with her brother helping run her father's vast hotel empire, they were now permanent residence in the beautiful and diverse country.

She wanted to see more of this mysterious man, she realized. Long distance relationships rarely lasted according to the things she'd heard.

"Do you visit often?" She asks, her curiosity still peaked needing the urge to find more of him she can latch onto. He still didn't know anything about her and hadn't asked. Withholding that little bit of information would show her if it were even possible to be with him.

Brazenly, he slowly brushes a finger along her exposed arm sending instant flutters to her heart. No man had touched her so intimately. The warm sensuality of his fingers against her skin had her trembling, fisting her empty palm in her lap to keep still. She held her breath. His close proximity was overwhelming her and his light caress distracting. But she remained unaffected and forced herself not to show her emotions.

"Your dress is beautiful," he whispered looking down at her tight red gown, his gaze roaming from her breasts, to her hips, and back again. She followed his gaze. Her cheeks colored at the display of the soft swell of her breasts, her slim body sheathed like a cocoon leaving no curve unseen by the eyes. Flattery had always made her uncomfortable, but Cristiano sounded nothing but sincere. It cost her a great deal of effort to simply smile and murmur her thanks.

"But to answer your question, yes I do. It's a place to do business. I have a home close to the city and travel back and forth regularly."

He looked down at her, his dark eyes breathtaking rimmed with dark thick lashes. Watching her with an unusual intensity of interest, there was a hungry look in his eyes that slightly alarmed her.

"I'm very rich, Bella."

Listening to his Italian words of endearments had her blushing again and again. Something she couldn't stop. However, revealing he was rich did not impress her in the least like it would other girls. She wondered why he had the need to declare it.

His handsome face was now impassive as he studied her, reaching out a hand to stroke the curve of her cheekbone. Jasmine very nearly flinched at the contact and bit her lip instead veiling how she felt trying desperately to cover her emotions.

"And I am very interested in you. . ." His voice trailed off.

She looked up and caught him staring at her lips. The flute of champagne felt like it was about to shatter in the palm of her hands, clutching it with a constricting grip.

"I'd like very much to make a special arrangement with you."

"What do you mean? What kind of arrangement?" Finding her voice anxious, her soft grey eyes wide. Her expression was unguarded she knew and she was puzzled by his declaration. Did he want to see her as in court her as the Brits would say?

"I would very much like to know you better, Yasmina." Jasmine watched as he reaches froward and pluck a red rose from the floral arrangement from the center of the table and smell its essence watching her at the same time.

Yasmina–the Persian pronunciation of her name from which Jasmine was derived from. It sounded so beautiful coming from his lips and found she liked it despite the cryptic meaning his previous words made her feel.

"I find that I enjoy your company immensely. You have a effortless beauty. You're unique and innocent. And I'd like to explore your feminine secrets and make them my own. How should I put this delicately?" He leaned toward her and lowered his voice to a wicked whisper. "Perhaps on a more personal level, if you take my meaning."

Tracing the rose against the skin of her arm sensually, she gave him a startled look, growing suspicious as the seconds passed. He pulled back and gave her a dazzling smile she was sure would melt the hardest of hearts.

"On a more personal level?" She echoed, gulping the lump in her throat and the fear jack-knifing through her staring at the rose in his hands as he caressed the bold red petals.

Then her eyes turned wide, watching the desire and something else enter his eyes. Jasmine thought she detected a look of ruthlessness in that hard set of his jaw and deep in his dark eyes. It was gone, suppressed as quickly as it had flashed when he continued, "Become my mistress and I shall shower you with the riches of the world and all your hearts desires will be yours." He stated so boldly, giving her a half-intimate smile.

His mistress?

Jasmine stiffened, her knuckles turning white, the glass ready to shatter between her fingers. The realization of his intentions and avid interest acted like a bucket of ice water dousing her enthusiasm.

He wanted her body for his sexual release.

To purchase her with pretty things like some upscale whore.

Though she was fully clothed, Jasmine felt exposed all of a sudden. Naked. Dirty.

She wasn't the type of woman who knew how to seduce a man. Who kept themselves dolled up with red lips and their eyes lined with heavy kohl. Who greeted a man at the door with silk lingerie and welcomed them to their bed waiting to be taken and used for a man's pleasure.

Heart pounding, she looks away with a glare feeling a surge of anger rush through her blood and blurted out the first thing that came to mind, "I–I am not that kind of woman."

She felt sick to her stomach while her opinion of him quickly plunged. He'd been sweet talking her the entire night, showering her with his undivided attention, treating her with familiarity and personal consideration. They had even danced twice during the party, the gentleness of his touch around her waist alluring her as they moved to the slow music.

The compliments that rolled smoothly off his tongue. Everything he did, everything he said. . .

Most of the attention she received from the opposite sex was brushed off and ignored. Jasmine usually never wore her heart on her sleeve. Anything she felt was normally hidden beneath a facade. Had she been that transparent? Did he see the worship in her eyes? She desperately hoped not.

"My dear, I present you with an opportunity of a lifetime," his dark eyes were undressing her, right there in the ballroom with waiters coming and going, "Woman would kill to be in your shoes."

Jasmine gasped softly. The audacity of the pig, she thought, a permanent scowl settling over her face.

Rage locked in Jasmine's throat and she turned to look at him ready to give him a piece of her mind. "How dare you. . . How dare you say such things to me!" Her quavering voice became breathless with rage. She held back what she really wanted to spit back in his face. Not knowing if it was because she was raised to be well mannered or because he caught her off guard. Whatever it was, was ready to explode as she reigned in her self-control.

"What did you expect me to believe?" He replied, with a lazy shrug regarding her with patient ease that chilled Jasmine to her bones. Stunned into speechlessness, she felt her voice die in her throat. "That you're an honorable woman? A woman with class? Don't pretend my dear, we both know–"

Jasmine's face was bloodless. She heard enough. She just turned twenty-three but she was born with a straight, unbending back bone. Standing up for herself and others was a challenge she relished. Head-strong and determined, Jasmine was as tough as a nail and just as hard to break. Giving up without a fight for her self-respect went against her grain.

It was time to show him how classy she could be.

Finding her voice, she cut him off mid-sentence. "What a high opinion you have of yourself! You are disgusting and despicable to suggest that I–" pointing to herself with a free arm against her chest, "I–would even consider your offer and sleep with you for the exchange for what? Money? That's rich! You're not such a prize, you low life, egotistical, self-pompous bastard!"

She took several deep breaths, trying to calm herself. The expression on Cristiano's face remained impassive, but his jaw was hard as he stared at her, "I believe I've tried to be civil with you by asking but I will have you one way or the other. I always get what I want Bella. . . " he challenged, "always."

With a blast of anger shooting right through her at his words, she stood quickly, the back of her legs pushing the chair back and nearly tilting it backward. "Who the hell do you think you are?" She asked having a hard time believing such cruelty would come from a man she did nothing to and never met before.

Why would he even suggest such a prosperous proposition? Was she giving him all the wrong signals? Her infatuation with the dark and handsome man before she realized he was a liar, a womanizer, swiftly evaporated into thin air. He didn't even see her. She was but only a body to him where he could derive pleasure from.

"I'm a man that knows exactly what he wants. . . And who he wants," lifting a dark eyebrow, his eyes alight with a strange fire. "I haven't given you any hint of anything further have I?" He laughed now, tilting his head back and clearly enjoying a sick joke at her expense. "Did you honestly believe I endured talking to you because I purely enjoyed your company?" He laughed again.

Her body went red-hot with humiliation.